Needed to get out of the city...so i booked a trip with the backpackers out to halong bay...there were 11 of us...10 girls and one guy named nik...an oxford univ boy on break...what a great group...cha cha the chinese american...maud from holland...lynne from england...eliza another oxford student on break...nik and her are friends...the oz girls...tom our vietnamese guide...stacey (aka sandy to me cause i some how kept switching his name back and forth) our hostel guide his girl nei everyone was great...
we left the hostel in a mini van to head to the pier to catch our boat...on the way tom told us some facts about vietnam...he told us how they just want to be happy and our peaceful people now since they have been in so many wars...that a woman is judged on how good of a wife she will be by the spring rolls she makes...too fat = greedy...too skinny = selfish...wont looked after the family...if vietnamese kids like each other and our dating it will be 3 months b4 they hold hands...1 yr before they will kiss and the girl best leave a stain on the sheets the night of her marriage as that should be this first time they are having sex...the mother-in-law will come to check in the morning to be sure...some girls will prick their finger to cover up if needed but most do not need...that they love ho chi minh and that he left 5 letters b4 he died for them to open they tell predictions that were going to come to vietnam...so far all three have been correct...ho chi minh asked to be cremated when he passed and to be spread over north central and south vietnam...they have not granted him this wish instead they have preserved his body in a mausoleum...i would have thought they would have granted his wish but i guess they want to see him more...he told us about the different villages and the different groups/tribes in each one...as we approached ha long bay he told us who the rock formations were made of limestone and acid had washed parts away...it was so interesting listening to him talk i loved the information i was getting...
we arrived after about an hour to the boat...it was beautiful...on our way from the pier to the bay we passed floating villages...these people live out here they even have
a school on the water...they fish and also get clams...and rent the
kayaks we will be using...they even kinda have a floating market or as
we called it our floating 7/11...cheap beer snacks etc...the boat had a great upper sun deck which while waiting for our lunch we all took advantage of...we all chatted and had a few drinks...then they called us into eating area for lunch...i could not believe the amount of food they served each table and if you were lucky enough to be at the table with the vegetarian you got even more food...we were served at least 6 different things for each meal and they all were amazing...after lunch we all headed out to do some kayaking in the bay around the rocks and into cave like areas...as we were paddling back to the boat the sun was setting between two rock formations...it was amazing...so big...so colorful...we just all sat there and watched...silently...taking it all in...when we got back to the boat we had dinner...after that we all took turns playing our ipods chattin and drinking under the stars on the sun deck...it was so quiet there...just us and our music...under the dark sky...the crew let us know they had made rice wine so we ended up doing shots with all the members and sometimes we did two for people like the captain...needless to say we had a great night...we listen to music dancing singing laughing...later that night about 7 of us went for a late night swim...jumping off the upper deck of the boat...a night to remember
the next morning we all got up a bit later then we were supposed to...but it was ok...no worries...those of us who were staying for two nights got our things to jump over to a smaller boat that was here to pick us up...the rest of them left on the boat to head back to the van...4 of us stayed on...maud, lynn, cha cha and myself...stacey and nei did too...tom left with the others...we had a choice to go kayaking or rock climbing i was the only one who wanted to climb so i only got to do half a day and went "extreme" kayaking with them in the am...now i say extreme because we stopped at this beach (which stacey has now claimed his in attemts to write his name again so i would stop calling him sandy at times) while we were hangin on the beach tanning goofing off the tide went down...way down...now all underneath us was coral while we were kayaking...now we could see it...walk on/thru it...we were stuck we had to get back to where there was water but first we had to trek thru this sharp ass coral...every one of us has wounds from that day...it was fun all the same all we could do was laugh...since we had soooo much fun kayaking the other girls did not was to venture again well cha cha did and went alone the others just hung on the beach and watch me climb...i did the eight months in the oven and i can not remember the name of the other climb...nice sweet climbs...when the sun set we headed over to cat ba island which is the biggest island in the bay and over half of it is covered by national parks...unfortunately i did not get to see much of it since we were only there for one night...we all eat pizza drank beer watch some bad karaoke and called it a night...we were all pretty beat...
the last day we joined up with another boat that would take us back to the pier to catch our minivan home...we laughed until we fell asleep it was an amazing three days...
