Another early morning, but this time to transfer by plane to the north - Hai Phong, the fourth largest city in Vietnam, which has much industry, including ship-building, apparently even supplying the UK. In Saigon (still often called this, as opposed to Ho Chi Minh City, even in the names of shops and services within the city) we had seen a small railway track, which I had assumed was disused as it looked rather forlorn, and crossed a very busy, four lane main road. Apparently there are several trains per day running on the tracks to the north, and we had further evidence of this today where the track runs between the road and the buildings outside Hai Phong, with little room for manoeuvre.
A couple of hours on the road brought us to Ha Long Bay, a World Heritage Site. We knew we were due to cruise around the bay for a day and a half, but not that we (the five of us) would have the boat to ourselves! That is, apart from tour guide and crew.
The whole of the region is made from limestone mountains and Ha Long Bay has been "drowned" so the mountains now form islands, nearly two thousand of them. The afternoon trip was fantastic, especially with my geography/geology hat on - caves, stalactites, nodules, undercut bases, tilted bedding planes, eroded joints and even a superb arch.
At one point we donned life jackets and clambered down to a boat propelled through the water to a fishing "village" by a local lady. She must have strong arms as she continued for an hour!
The houses are all floating and the fish, which have been caught out in the bay, are kept in nets underneath the houses.
There are also oyster "farms" where the people produce pearls.
Water is supplied by a special boat from the city which fills barrels on the ledges of the houses, and foodstuffs are provided by a mini supermarket boat!
Water is supplied by a special boat from the city which fills barrels on the ledges of the houses, and foodstuffs are provided by a mini supermarket boat!
Once again, the culinary delights (both lunch and dinner) on the boat were a delight, with lots of fish, but also soup, rice, meat dishes, salads and green vegetables. I even discovered that I like squid, having shied away from it for the last forty years!
The boat's facilities are quite basic (a little different from the Alaska cruise) but the staff are excellent and we thoroughly enjoyed the day.
P.S. I wrote this on Friday but couldn't post it as, of course we had no wifi!
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