Holidaying in Hanoi (Final Part)

When we arrived Hanoi, we checked in back to Garden Land Hotel. This time, we have the family suite. The room is very spacious.

We went for our dinner, followed by shopping around the streets while waiting for our Water Puppet Show at 9.15pm. We stopped over at a shoe store for quite long to customise our shoes. Finally, we proceed to watch the Water Puppet show. It was quite interesting actually. We thought it might disappoint. The show was full house. We were fortunate that the hotel manager managed to get the tickets for us.

After the show, we back to the hotel, to pack our stuff, getting ready to check out and depart for home. This trip was really refreshing. It was like Singapore in the 1920s-30s. It's very laid-back. To sum it all, crossing the roads in Hanoi is a great challenge, food is fantastically good and cheap and Halong Bay is very magnificent. Foods that you can buy back are Green Bean Cakes, Jacket Cashew Nuts and Fried Lotus Seeds. These are the only ones I know.

Dinner at City View Cafe

Night view of the Hoan Kiem Lake from City View Cafe

Shoe seller cum Cobbler- instant choose, instant fix, instant buy. She was very patient with us as we chose one design after another, one shoe base after another, mix and match. Adjust and adjust to fit. LOL.

Water Puppet Theatre

Live orchestra

The Performers had to endure waist deep water at all shows.

Across our hotel room

At the airport

Goodbye Hanoi!

Holidaying in Hanoi (Part 3)

We woke up in the early dawn hours to try to catch the sunrise. As the sky was rather misty, we couldn't really see the sun coming up through the horizon. However, we did manage to catch a glimpse of the sun piercing through the scattered clouds.



From October to February, it's the autumn-winter period, therefore, it will be difficult to catch the sunset and sunrise from the horizon. The weather will also be very chilling and cooling. During the period from March to September, when it is the spring-summer period, you should be able to catch the sunset and sunrise. However, the weather will be hot and dry. I thought the autum-winter period will be nice as it's chilling. But then again, you can't get a clear view of the caves far away due to the mist.

Last glimpse of the moon before it lets the sun takes over

Majestic eagle flying above us

Sumptuous breakfast

"Sister" junk

Oyster farming for cultured pearls

Personalised boat ride around the caves

Fishing village boathouses

We stopped over at the Vung Vieng fishing village centre, while the boats waited for us.

Pufferfish

Cultured pearl

Back to our junk

Cruising back

Lunch on board is the only disappointment. However, it was good enough that this Indochina Junk provided lunch on our way back. Many tour junks do not provide lunch on the last day. So, no complaints right?

Holidaying in Hanoi (Part 2)

Going to Hanoi is incomplete without the visit to Halong Bay, a UNESCO site.

"Halong Bay is located in the northeastern part of Vietnam and constitutes part of the western bank of Bac Bo Gulf, including the sea area of Ha Long City and Cam Pha Town and part of Vân Don island district. It abuts Cat Ba Island in the southwest. Toward the west is the shore with a 120 km-long coastline. It is located within 106o58’-107o22’ east longitude and within 20o45’- 20o50’ north latitude. The site is 1553 sq. km with 1969 islands of various sizes, of which 989 have been named.

The islands in Ha Long Bay are mainly limestone and schist islands most lying in the two main areas: the southeastern part of Bái Tử Long Bay and southwestern part of Hạ Long Bay. These islands represent the most ancient images of a geographical site having a tectonic age of from 250 million to 280 million years. They are the result of many times of rising and lowering processes of the continent to form a karst. The process of nearly full erosion and weathering of the karst created the unique Hạ Long Bay in the world. In a not very large area, thousands of islands with different forms look like glittering emeralds attached to the blue scarf of a virgin. The area where many stone islands concentrate has spectacular scenes and world-famous caves and is the center of Ha Long Bay Natural Heritage, including HaLong Bay and a part of Bái Tu Long Bay.

The area is recognized as the World Natural Heritage that is the area of 434 sq. km with 775 islands. It looks like a giant triangle with Ðầu Gỗ Island (in the west), Ba Hầm Lake (in the south) and Cống Tây Island (in the east) as its three angle points." - extracted from Red Dragon Junk website.

We booked our 2D1N Halong bay trip through Red Dragon Junk. The junk we travelled in is called Dragon Pearl Junk. It is a refurbished old junk. The interior looked very classy and new. There were activities like exploring Thien Canh Son cave, kayaking around the cave, fishing and swimming. There was also a visit to the Vung Vieng Fishing Village with a long ride on a boat. The dining onboard was also very very good. The overall experience was simply fantastic. My family just have good raves about this experience. Out of five stars, we'll give it a six stars!

I'll let the pictures do the convincing.

On our way to Halong Bay

Road side hawker

Many junks docked on the bay, awaiting customers' arrival

Welcoming us to the Junk

Upper sundeck

Captain and the wonderful team onboard

Our twin share room

Set sail

Santa Claus resemblance?

One of the fishing village

Sumptuous lunch onboard

View from Thien Canh Son cave

Inside limestone cave

Getting ready for Kayaking

Dusk hours

Full moon

Full moon that provides the light over the darkness

Sumptuous Dinner onboard

Prawn Mentis, a very ugly looking sea creature. The flesh is soft and tasted like prawns. But I still prefer the taste of prawns as it's more firm and succulent.

After dinner, it was time to retire for the night...