Halong Bay

Dear Faithful readers,

Please bear with me as I add one of my longest posts ever (at least in the sheer number of photos). Our next stop on our Viet Nam trip was to Halong Bay. A World Heritage Site and considered by many to be a "wonder of the world" we were excited about this.

Here is Alessandra after we are dropped of by the docks. We were going to take a smaller boat our to our "Junk" which would be our home for the next 24 hours.

Here are the girls and I on the boat heading to the Junk.

Olivia - Junk in the background

Junks, Junks and more Junks.

We were greeted on board our Junk by LUNCH (you know how much we love lunch)

Here is Olivia (our fabulous 6year old who will try ANYTHING... once) With an Elephant Clam. She wasn't crazy about the texture, but she loved the taste.

Heading into Ha long Bay - a foggy, foggy day.

The girls on the top deck or out Junk. It was a bit drizzly and chilly, but we managed. (must be all of that time in Oregon, that prepared us).

We stopped at an incredible cave. Above the Junk you can see one of the cave outlines. We had to walk up hundreds of stairs to get up there. The Junk Captain offered for us to leave the kids on board while we went (um, yeah, I can see that going over well.... ) They went with us and did great!

Here is a look at the bay from the cave entrance.

One of the overlooks. Our happy family.

Brad and Olivia inside the giant cave.

Brad - Ha long Bay. Nice combo.

Walking back on the docks (from the cave) to find our Junk.

The next stop was a beach. Now, had the weather been clearer and warmer we would have likely swam (although the water had a bit of trash in it, so we weren't soooo keen on that). Haven't you always wanted to swim in the Gulf of Tonkin?

So, no swimming this day, but the girls got off of the boat and RAN, ran, RAN through the sand in the rain. Olivia - showing us the gloriousness of Ha long Bay (while Brad is enjoying a beer behind me and I am under an umbrella to stay dry).

And Alessandra amid her jog on the beach. The only other people in the water were a large group of Russians. Who, by the way, have really good taste in swimwear.

We were greeted back on the boat by another phenomenal dinner (complete with loads of fresh seafood) and after dinner you could go fishing with the guides. Not one other person on board wanted to (there were only 2 other couples with us on our boat) except for......

Olivia - our fishing girl. Note the Vietnamese squat position. She fits right in. (she didn't catch anything, but enjoyed being out there at night).

The next morning, we got onto a small boat (rowed by a person) to go into another area unreachable by large boat.

The boat ahead of us - at the ticket area (all floating cities)

Where are they taking us?

We saw monkeys from our boat and threw them bananas.

Alessandra - very happy about the monkeys.

Under the cave...

and into a quiet and serene place.

Back onto the Junk for lunch and the ride back into the port.

Here are the girls poking their heads out of our cabin. Note that we were right on the water - and I have a feeling that safety requirements aren't the same in Viet Nam. Thankfully Alessandra didn't have one of her acrobatic moments while we were on board.

Outside our cabin...

Highly recommend Ha long Bay. We were only disappointed (slightly) that the weather wasn't clearer. It would have been wonderful to see it even more grand than it was.