It was easy to get up this morning since I hadn’t drank much at all, and we were in bed before midnight. We had the same exact breakfast as the first morning. The four of us joked about staying on the boat longer to analyze the goings-on. It was very interesting to see the staff doing, saying and serving the same things over and over again.
After breakfast we packed up our room, and went to the top level to hang out until we arrived back at the port to catch the bus back to Hanoi. It was very hot, so we stayed in the shade of this little hut on the top of the boat. Gary and Kahn, our Aussie boys got back on the boat after staying on Cat Ba island the night before. They said it was amazing, and were so glad they had decided to do it, and they mentioned eating pizza which made Erika and I very jealous!
Finally back on shore we waited for our bus. We were all soaked in sweat. Erika thought we should hustle onto the bus so we wouldn’t get stuck in the center fold-down, jump-seats in the middle of the bus. So when the bus arrived we hurried on and got the back row, which was four seats all together. We were very happy about this until we started driving. They were the bumpiest seats on the bus! Erika apologized, but it wasn’t her fault, she didn’t know. I moved forward to another seat and tried to sleep most of the way back. Kyle read his half of the book. He is gaining on me!
On the second day of the cruise an older couple arrived with a young Vietnamese girl. They seemed to be in their late fifties, and the little girl acted quite young, but her size suggested that she was 3-4 years old. They seemed very awkward with her, carrying her around like she was a baby. If they were holding her and sat down, and she wined they would get up right away. I thought right away that they had adopted her and were new to the whole thing. Later we found out that they had just adopted her, but what we all couldn’t figure out was why they would go on a Halong Bay cruise when they had just gotten her. We all thought it would be better to get her home as soon as possible, or at least stay in the hotel until you can leave. The little girl seemed nervous about what was going on. Well the point of me including this was that they were on the bus with us and sat right in front of us. This gave us even more of an opportunity to analyze the situation. My first thought was that they were way too old to be adopting, and they seemed so awkward with her. At one point on the boat, Kyle overheard them say to one another “Ok what do we do now?” while they were holding her and walking around the boat. I was torn between thinking this was a good thing for the little girl or if it was a bad thing to take her away from her country and language when she was already talking. She had to go to the bathroom at one point, and they couldn’t even communicate with her to tell her to hold it. They had to have Dat ask her to hold it. That was the part that really made me sad for her to be ripped out of her country at such an older age, and then have to live with old fuddy-duddy parents in South Carolina. Anyway just a little side note.
The rest of the bus ride was uneventful. We stopped at a pottery place that had snacks. Kyle got an ice cream cone, and I had a popsicle that was Taro flavored. I still have no idea what taro is, but the ice cream treat was purple.
Once back to Hanoi, Dat took us to South Pacific Travel’s office so we could pay. We tipped him, left our luggage at the office and headed out in search of pizza with Robin and Erika. They had a flight to Bangkok at 9pm, so they had a few more hours to spend with us. Kyle and I were trying desperately to convince them to change their plans and travel with us, but Robin has to get back to his new job on time.
We walked for a little while and found a pizza place. It totally hit the spot. Over dinner Robin and Erika told us how Robin proposed to Erika. It was a very cute story. You can tell they really care about each other. They treat each other with such respect, I think Kyle and I can learn from that, even though we have been married longer. After our dinner we went back to the office to pick up our baggage, and we had to say goodbye to our new friends once again! I was so sad to see them leave. Again one of the last things Erika said to us, was for us to come and visit them in NY. You can count on that Erika!!
Kyle and I waved to their taxi as it drove away, aw so like a movie. Then we started walking in search of a hotel. The first one we came across in the area we wanted to be in fit the bill. It was clean and only $25 and they had room for us. Kyle and I showered since we were both dripping with sweat and my face was so red! Then we just relaxed at the hotel. Kyle was still not feeling better, I think he has a cold. Too much drinking, not enough sleep and the air quality out here is very poor. He has been coughing quite a bit. We went down to the lobby to do internet stuff, and ended up buying a tour to Sapa. I will get to take an overnight train after all! We leave on the night of the 14th, so we may not be able to get on the internet. Sapa is on the northern border of Vietnam and China. We will be trekking into some of the villages of the Hill Tribe people. More on that later. The night was pretty mellow, just emailing and blogging, and reading our book!
