The Wonders of Halong Bay

By Perrin

   When we arrived at Halong Bay on Saturday the 4^th of May, we unloaded our bags from the bus and boarded the small motorboat that would take us to the mother boat: The Valentine. Our small boat was about 30 feet away from the Valentine when we started to hear a drum playing a beat, something like a slow drum roll, welcoming us aboard. 

We got out of the motorboat to find the whole crew waiting to help us onto the boat. The Valentine had 5 cabins, 4 of them on the lower deck and 1, the King Suite, on the upper deck along with the bar, the dining space, the public bathroom and some couches. On the outside top deck, there were some lounge chairs and tables, and best of all, a heavenly view of the beautiful and numerous limestone karsts and the shimmering sunset of Halong Bay.

Halong Bay is a beautiful bay with almost 2,000 islands, and is located in the north east of Vietnam. It looks like it could come out of a Chinese painting or a fantasy movie. Halong Bay is a big tourist attraction and the Vietnamese believe that it is also one of the seven wonders of the world. 

      
One of the places that is visited most in the bay is a huge cave called the Surprise Cave and tourists come from everywhere to see it. It is made up of three large chambers and is located inside one of the many islands. Nobody lives on the islands in Halong Bay except for one lady with three goats whose ancestors lived there so the government is letting her stay.

        Halong Bay seems almost magical, especially a lagoon we visited. There was only one entrance to this lagoon; a long pitch black cave that fills up with water at high tide but is only half full at low tide so that kayaks can just fit through.  It took us about 10 minutes to kayak through. The lagoon was small and felt like it was in a fairy tale.  It seemed like we were the first ones to discover it in its own little world. The lagoon is only one example of the many wonders of Halong Bay.

Entering the tunnel into the lagoon.

In the lagoon.

  As we got situated on the boat after we arrived and ate an elaborate lunch, the boat started heading out amongst the many little islands of Halong Bay. After about 3 hours of slow cruising, we stopped right outside a floating village, got in some kayaks, and kayaked in to see the community. A floating village is a community of people all living in floating houses. The houses we saw were very simple, made of bamboo and wood, and were floating on Styrofoam blocks or empty plastic water tanks. The biggest houses were about the size of a big American dining room, and the small ones were the size of a large American bathroom. Most of the houses had wooden porches where the families washed all the dishes and hung out, but the inhabitants went to the bathroom in the back of their house right into the ocean.

Under most of the houses were big nets in which the people farmed fish to sell at the market. Once they were big enough, the fish were sold at the mainland markets and provided the fishermen’s main income.  The result of this farming was that the water in and around the village was polluted, and we learned that the government was trying to force some of the families to go back to the mainland because of water pollution. As we kayaked through the village we noticed that the water was murky and filled with trash.  I would definitely not have wanted to swim in it!

In the village, there were two long rows of houses that were anchored off the shore to provide protection from the weather. The children had lots of freedom and we saw many of them rowing boats around with their feet. One boat had a girl that looked about 8 years old rowing and her little brother, about 4, was in the front playing with a huge knife. Families in the Upper Valley would never allow their kids to do that. Every house had at least 1 rowboat, just like most people in our community have at least 1 car. 

As well as the floating houses, there was a floating school. The 80 kids that lived in the village could go to class there from grades 1-5, though we were told that there were some 15 year olds that were in 5^th grade. 

The floating school

There were also small market boats that sold food and goods. 

In the center of the village there was a small barge where people could buy drinking water to fill the tanks in their houses.
Our afternoon was spent jumping from the 2^nd floor of our boat into the water, showering and then doing a fantastic Master Chef cooking contest in which the kids competed against my mom and dad. Diep (pronounced Zee-up), our guide, taught us how to make two Vietnamese dishes, a shrimp and pomelo salad, and vegetable spring rolls with a dipping sauce.  Then, from our memory, we had to try to make them. Bob, Elisabeth and one of the crewmembers were the judges and judged the food in terms of its appearance and taste. We won the contest for both dishes!

The dinner that night was served on a white and red tablecloth, with red and pink rose petals sprinkled over the table. Seven courses later, feeling very spoiled, we stumbled off to bed and fell asleep.