Day 30 - Thursday, Nov. 14 - Ha Long Bay

The dragon's teeth that make up Ha Long Bay

I had to turn my watch back an hour last night.  All of China may have just one time zone, but I’ve headed west and gotten an hour back.
       I used that hour to sleep.  And I must have needed it greatly even if I didn’t do much yesterday except ten hours in transit for a three-hour flight.  I realize, when I get out my door, that I was just blindly following the bellboy to a room and have no idea where the elevator is.  I do remember that breakfast is on the second floor and my room card says I’m on the fourth; that’s a start.
       What isn’t lost on me is the irony of awaking in a king-sized bed, in a five-star hotel, in a country with which my country was once in a deadly - and needless - war!
       At a copious breakfast - a blend of East and West - I see the Australian from last night now seated with his brothers, who finally arrived.  Then it’s pick-up time for Ha Long Bay... in a drizzle.  What happened to last night’s forecast for sun?

Bo Hon Island - the aptly named Surprising Cave

The trip is an hour and a half at high speed on a modern, three-lane highway.  Tony aka Kian, my guide, tells me it was built to speed container-ship semis from the port city of Haiphong on the ocean to Hanoi.  But there’s a toll (shades of China) of $80, so semis never use it!
       We arrive in Ha Long, but not the town.  The tourism boats now sail from a man-made island created from landfill, the tops of mountains dumped here.  Aside from the marina, the whole island is full of completed and semi-completed apartment buildings.  No school, no hospital, no stores, only a few snack bars and mom-and-pop shops.  Completely built for tourists.  Of which there are precious few.  (At least ones staying here; they all day-trip out from Hanoi.)  Even the complex’s magnificent white, manor-like reception building is empty, as seen through its picture windows.  So much for Paradise Bay, created by a businessman with government connections.
       Kian hands me off to “Jackie” (Chan, he quips) and I board the boat for a four-hour tour of the bay.  Only five other people on this boat, instead of its capacity of 35.  Good!  There’s Roz from Winnipeg who winters in Kona, Hawaii, two ladies from Japan, a Swiss diplomat and his Filipino wife, plus me.  Truly an international bunch.

Ha long literally means “descending dragon”.   Long ago, the Vietnamese prayed to the Mother Dragon to help defeat some fierce invaders  She and her children came down and destroyed the enemy.  Then giant emeralds (the islands) appeared along the bay; they are said to be the teeth of the Mother Dragon and her children, who left them behind to create an impossible-to-penetrate barrier meant to discourage any future invasion.  

Hen-and-Rooster Island

Incense Burner Island

     The boat slows down for photo ops at Incense Burner Island, named for its shape, and then at Hen-and-Rooster Island, two rocks facing each other.  While we’re taking photos and nursing our welcome drink, the chef has been busy in the kitchen.  We start our lunch with a creamy chicken and mushroom soup, followed by shrimp and salad, then three mini shrimp spring rolls and a cute little crab cake served with a small crab shell for a top.  (They raise shrimp on farms in this region; we passed them on the drive in.)  The main course (because all that was just the starters!) is roasted chicken and sea bass à l’orange served with broccoli, carrots and rice (which is also grown locally, with the last harvest of the year in late September).  Many of us are full and escape to the open upper deck for a better view, but a plate of orange slices, jackfruit and dessert cake finds us up there.  I learn that “thank you” in Vietnamese is gah mun; no more shay shay.  China’s over.

        To work off the calories, we dock at Bo Hon Island for a visit of Surprising Cave.  Created 50 million years ago, it’s 11,000 square miles of cave inside this karst island.  It was discovered by a Frenchman, but “development work” to make it visitable began only in 1989 and it opened to the public in 1994.  Five years of labor to create a safe stone-paved path through all the wonders.  We move from a small grotto to a medium-sized one, and then to a gigantic one, all with stalagmites and stalactites.  210 steps up to the entrance, many ups and downs inside, then 210 more steps down.  Perhaps they should create a zipline from the exit right down to the docks!

        After cruising a bit and sailing through an isthmus, we reach an island where we have to transit to a smaller boat - or a kayak for the more athletically inclined - in order to navigate through low-ceilinged Luon Cave and into a caldera-like “lake” where golden monkeys roam free, fed by people.  I see adults eating bananas and venturing down to see if we have anything for them.  And adorable babies play-fighting with each other.

       Then it’s back toward the marina, but slowly, marveling at all the islands, including one Uncle Ho (Chi Minh) showed to visiting Russian Cosmonaut Titov, so it’s named after him.  With a pagoda-like house-lette on the top.  But it’s late; we don’t stop to climb the many, many steps to the top.

       One more activity - this one on-board.  A cooking lesson.  The chef comes out of the kitchen with batter made of mixed-up sea bass, octopus and rice flour, plus a touch of dill, to be cooked in a frying pan on a hot plate.  He shows us how to shape the fritters and we all have a go.  Shades of making rice cakes for the pandas.  Once sauteed golden, he serves them up on a plate he’s decorated with huge artistically-carved carrots and bookended between two intricate cucumber sculptures.  Delicious!

Back at the marina, Kian is waiting.  We leave behind these 1,969 islands covering 1,553 square kilometers - a tourist destination since 1993.  The same karst geology as the Li Valley in China, only deeper, floating in the waters.

       Kian is quite talkative driving back to Hanoi, as he was on the drive out this morning.  He’s in his 30's or very early 40’s, lost uncles in the war with America, yet is extremely outspoken against this country’s party line.  As with the young Chinese guides, who never knew the hard years Stanley talked about, Kian makes a poor Communist-Socialist.  If all the young people feel as he does, I think Communism-Socialism will give way to a “me generation”, as capitalism has.

       A quiet evening with a Mojito (!) on the rooftop bar, looking out over the lake and the traffic while concert music blares from somewhere below.  I’ve spent lots of time with Rosie planning tomorrow’s visit of Hanoi on my own.  Time to rest up.

Hanoi by night