Ha Long Bay

After three nights in Hanoi we boarded a motor coach to take the 2 and 1/2 hour trip for a one-night stay on a small cruise boat on Ha Long Bay which is a beautiful natural wonder in northern Vietnam near the Chinese border. The Bay is known for its emerald waters and roughly 2,000 limestone islands topped by rainforests.  (After Ho Chi Minh died in 1969 the country changed the official number of islands to 1,969 in his honor.)  The area was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1994.

The Government has appointed a private developer to build a large resort area right on the shores of Ha Long Bay complete with amusement parks, restaurants, shopping and tours of the bay. The area where we boarded our ship, called Paradise Elegance already had numerous luxury buildings in all different stages of construction. The ship we are on called Paradise II is one the luxury ships they operate. Their vision is to make this a miniature Hong Kong.  

Our “cruise” took us to through Ha Long Bay amongst these numerous limestone islands for an afternoon and evening. A highlight for us was climbing through a large cave system. The fisherman used this cave, which is dry and has fresh water up until the mid nineties to wait out a storm. They used the fresh water to cook meals and for drinking water. They can no longer use the caves for this purpose because it is popular with tourists and because technology gives them the ability to know a storm is predicted. 

After a night on the ship we visited a pearl farm and then took a long coach ride on the old highway back to the Hanoi Airport to fly to Da Nang.

 On the way to the airport we stopped for a shopping/lunch excursion at a large place called ABC.  It was a huge warehouse style building with clothing, paintings, embroidery, jewelry, etc.  After we purchased an embroidered wall hanging we were introduced to the artist who worked at ABC and discovered that all of the paintings and embroidered items were done by handicapped artists.
  


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