Its been a few days since....

... I have done any updates but I have finally settled down and decided its time. I am no longer in Hanoi, i'm currently on Cat Ba Island. I'm here to visit the famous Halong Bay, do some climbing hopefully (deep water solo this time) and just relax for a few days.

Mysterious Cat Ba Island at night, the view from my room window

My friend and I did want to push here beacuse we heard the club Blue Wave over here was pretty fun and we wanted to catch the Halloween party on Sat if there was any. Suffice to say there was none, the party was gay (by gay i mean there were gay people there), and so we ended up having 2 drinks and leaving. Fortunately I didn't expect a huge great party since the details provided to me by some French girls that we met in Hanoi already gave me a good idea of what to expect.

Hanoi was a cool place but we defintely spent way too much time there. You can see everything pretty much in a few days. There are streets to walk in the old quarter, and scooters to see during the day. I guess we wanted to party pretty badly since Laos was so chilled out. But according to people in Hanoi, most of the good clubs were shut down a few months ago for political reasons. So finding a fun place to club was pretty much an exercise in futility. We did however get a chance to see Dan Troung live in concert! He's one of Vietnam's hottest pop stars right now and he harsh tore the club apart! Picture 1000 screaming fans cheering for every song that he sang. Of course we had no idea what he was singing but we still cheered too! Well, not really, we spent most of the time looking at the girls in the crowd and the dancers. There are some very nice women in Vietnam. But so few of them speak english. And of course I'm the asian guy that everybody thinks is viet, so my Swiss friend keeps getting the smiles and waves while i keep getting asked to translate.

We did end up having one good night which was basically the first day we got into Hanoi. We went to 2 afterhours clubs (Titanic, Lighthouse) and pretty much partied till the early morning. I was giving up around 2 am but we didn't get into our room till about 5 am. The europeans i was with just kept going and going and going (the swiss guy and two french girls) . A korean guy that was hanging out with us pretty much gave up about 3 am and just stood around with me for the rest of the night. It was a fun place with goodmusic but a terrible chick to dick ratio so it was pretty tough for the Korean guy and I to get any attention.

End of the night at Lighthouse

Overall, i didn't really enjoy Hanoi. Its really annoying when everyone tries to rip you off. Its very hard to trust the locals in Hanoi and i'm glad i'm out of there now. Don't get me wrong, its a neat place, but if there is no night life, and it feels like everyone is after you, then you can see why i wanted to leave. I don't really have any exciting stories about Hanoi other than riding the scooter taxi. They are definetly a rush! I have videos but it will take way too long to upload so you'll just have to wait till i get home.


When we FINALLY got out of Hanoi, we headed east about 100 km to a city known as Hai Phong. We only spent one night here and left in the morning. I wish we did spend more time there, its a beutiful city with much much nicer people. Its supposed to be what Hanoi was like 10 years ago. Its not a tourist city, more like a stopover for people going to Cat Ba Island or Halong City. We went around a little and its seems to have a very big industry. Its a port city so i guess they move a lot of stuff around for the rest of the country.


The next morning we left Hai Phong (no pictures from there) and took the ferry to Cat Ba Island. Now this place is supposed to be a huge tourist attraction beacuse its the largest island in Halong Bay. There are two industries here, tourism and fishing. And you have no trouble telling which one is bigger. There are several resorts set to be open in the next few years and the construction is omnipresent. Its always a double edge sword when it comes to tourism. You lose the magic of a place when its over run by megaresorts but without the tourist dollars coming in, you will never ever know that the place existed. I guess its good to get in right before big development starts so that you have facilities that you want (English speakers, Internet, hotel rooms) without the everpresent stupid tourist.

I have been on Cat Ba island for a few days now. There really isn't anything to do in the town itself. Its all hotels, resteraunts and other supporting facilities. The other day we chilled out on the beach (which i read is fake, the sand was imported) which was ok. I'm still not a beach person or enjoy chilling out. I think chilling out is something you do after working hard, not just to sit there and plan to do nothing for a day.

Cat Co 2 beach

Today however was a different story. We went on a day trip to visit Halong Bay. I must say it is quite beautiful. The topography is incredible and so unique to me. Imagine flooded mountains and thats what it was. There are an estimated 2000 islands in Halong Bay and when you get here you have no trouble imagining that many. The limestone karsts (limestone cliffs) just appear out of the water everywhere and form both large and small islands. You can see the water has eroded the base of all of them showing the tide lines. There are also all these hidden little beaches everywhere which we visited by kayak today. The ocean here is very calm (must be beacuse of the protected nature of the bay) and the air is very misty. I thought it was pollution at first but after talking to people they told me it looks like this during the winter months. I'll let the pictures speak for themselves, but i must say i throughly enjoyed being out there. I puddled around in the kayak for about 3 hrs (first time in one too) and the scenery was breathtaking. First, tubing in a cave in Vang Vieng, now kayaking in a cave in Halong bay.

Sunset over Halong Bay

The view from our boat (total of 4 people on the boat so always a great view)

Going in and around the Karats

Kayaking in and around caves. One of the caves we entered actually opened up into a sheltered lagoon. We went around the lagoon and found yet another cave which led us to yet another smaller lagoon. Its quite amazing to find these isolated little spots you'd never see if you didn't go explore.

Deep water solo heaven! I never acutally got to do any deep water soloing beacuse it was just too expensive. I'll try again in Thailand

-bk