We got picked up from our hotel in the morning and travelled by mini bus to Ha Long City harbour ready for our junk boat tour to Ha Long Bay. There are so many boats trying to get in and out and they pretty much just push there way through, bumping and scraping along the sides of other boats as they go. We boarded our boat, checked into our rooms and then had a delicious lunch. After lunch we went cruising through Ha Long Bay, it was an overcast day but it's absolutely stunning, the only thing that ruined it was the rubbish floating in the water, it wasn't excessive but it was noticeable. Later on we docked and went ashore to explore this awesome networks of caves, it was massive! After that we went canoeing into this tiny little bay that was surrounded by mountains with only one little opening to get through, it was so calm and peaceful, paddling around was really fun but my arms were a bit sore the next day. By the time we finished our canoeing and got back onto the boat it was getting dark andBecause the weather was pretty yuk we didn't end up going swimming which was a bit of a disappointment but you get that sometimes, so we pretty much just lounged on the top deck and got cleaned up before dinner....which was another great meal. After some drinks and some socialising we retired pretty early, it had been a big day!
After a pretty peaceful sleep we awoke to find the weather had not improved at all, it didn't actually rain but it was overcast and miserable so we packed up, had breakfast and then made our way to the top deck to lounge about while we headed back to the harbour. We hadn't been cruising for long and then we stopped and another boat came right up beside us and they connected the 2 boats together and then starting cruising again....little did we know at the time but our boat had broken down and they were towing us back in, we later had to change boats anyway to get back into the harbour....junk boat alright! After we got back we had lunch and then boarded the bus and headed back to Hanoi. Deb and I were headed to Sapa on the train that night so we needed to kill some time so headed to a cafe for a drink and a bite to eat, whilst we were sitting there I noticed a hairdresser across the road so I headed over and sussed out how much it would be to get my hair washed, it was cheap so Deb and I both got our hair washed and dried, it was so worth it! After that we made our way to the train station for our overnight trip to Sapa.
