Trevor & Jonathans Cruise & Trip to the Far East and Australia 2016

Day 25 - Friday June 3rd 2016 - Halong Bay, Vietnam

After a great night’s sleep it was an earlyish morning for us both as we had to be up and breakfasted by 08:00. Once again the food on this boat is relentless, you could choose from full western cooked options, full Vietnamese breakfasts and soups, cereals, fruits, the list goes on. The only thing I can fault the boat for is its coffee. We poured a cup and were more than a little disappointed to see that the coffee actually had a layer of oil floating across the top of it. We retreated to our room with a cup of milk and made some instant with the coffee granules we had left from the previous cruise (we are going to try and find some more in Singapore for China).

Breakfast over and we transferred boats. The main cruise boat went back to Halong to pick up new passengers and we were transferred onto a smaller boat for the day.

Now when I say smaller boat please don’t imagine too small a boat as it is not at all. The obvious difference between the boat we had come from and the one we were on now was that there were no cabins.

We cruised through the bay, gliding through the stunning scenery, trying to absorb as much as we could of the wondrous surroundings before the boat anchored up and it was time to try our hands at Kayaking! Now I will be honest and say that I just found the whole kayaking thing uncomfortable. You have nothing to support your back at all and with your legs stretched out at ninety degrees to our body it seemed to make every muscle in my body (Jonathan’s) ache. We kayaked into a cave of one of the limestone mountains and followed the edge before heading back towards the boat. We were the first back but that was very much my fault….old age, it’s a killer!

We laid out on the top deck for a while under the shade. It was yet another boiling day weather wise in the bay not that we were complaining at all. Laying there, looking out on this incredible landscape you can feel like the luckiest person in the world and that’s just how this felt.

By 11:30 everyone was back from Kayaking at believe it or not it was time for lunch already. Their reasoning behind such an early lunch was that we would be going off to a beach on one of the limestone mountains later in the day so they needed to feed us up now. It was another five or six course affair. We sat down with Olga and Nori and exchanged travel stories. Olga come across as a really spiritual person, she has managed to cleanse her life of belongings and is travelling with a 6kg backpack for three months and that includes the weight of her camera and lenses. There did not seem to be a country that they had not visited and they obviously thrive on this spirit of life. Nori is seventy but looked incredible, a silent man, gently spoken. They obviously have a very special connection being able to live a simpler less cluttered life and they oozed a youthful curiosity that was infectious.

Lunch consisted of orange and tomato soup, a fish stir fry that was fresh and delicious and chicken curry, a fantastic salad and some kind of fish patty that was also delicious, you certainly do not go hungry on these boats.

We cruised past more breath taking scenery and you start to lose all sense of direction as you glide in and out and around the monstrous Rocky Mountains that protrude from the emerald sea. For all that we knew we could be going around in a constant circle just seeing the same thing from different angles but every view was sensational.

Soon we had arrived at our beach stop and we transferred to a smaller motor launch to access the mountain. This was the first piece of manmade intervention we had seen on any of the rocks as someone had built a jetty for boats to land onto and then a small path and stair that took us down to the beach and what a sight that was.

This crescent shaped white sandy beach was a feast to the eyes. Set against the vertical fall of the mountain all lush and green, flawless sand inviting you into the South China sea again with a backdrop of more mountains and more beauty. Overhead the occasional bird of prey would fly over, gliding on the thermals in the air, you could almost make out their individual feathers. We guessed they were eagles by their size and colouring but to be honest we don’t know but they were majestic.

So back to that beach, now this is Trevor’s kind of place. With its peace, beauty and water it does not really get much better for him and as we both ventured of into the water more or less as soon as we arrived we knew we were having one of those special moments. Those moments that you hope you will never forget, those moments that you know you will draw open later as one of the times of your life.

The water was warm, really warm, not hot but when you got up to your belly there was no shock, no jumping off the ocean floor to dodge the next wave (not that there were any waves, the sea was more millpond like).

We swam, we sunbathed, we gauped at our surroundings. Most of all though we looked at each other, glad that the other was there, happy that we were both sharing this with the one person you care, love and cherish above anyone or anything else. Sharing this moment with that very special person only made it more special. We lost ourselves for a time in that moment, in the sights and in our love for each other.

Our time on the magical beach was over too soon, we had been here for two hours and the time had gone really quickly. We were soon back on the small tender though and headed back to the main cruise ship to shower and change.

We lazed around or an hour or so, looking back through the hundreds of photographs of Halong that we seem to have taken. It’s a real problem not pressing click to take a picture as everywhere is a view, everywhere is the perfect picture you must have and everywhere is a memory that you want to take away with you.

Showered and changed we left our cabin to sit on the main terrace with a drink. A beer and a pina colada again watching, looking at this gracious scenery. The bar was quite empty at the moment as there were only four people that stayed on for this two day journey, everyone else was on a one day excursion but new guests would be arriving later in the afternoon and so the whole cycle would begin again.

It was Jonathan’s §turn tonight to stand in front of the small group of people that had come to watch the Vietnamese cooking demonstration. Tonight we were making the hot version of spring rolls. Luckily for me I did not embarrass myself so all was good and tasted good as well. We plan to make these at home now we know how but where on earth do you buy edible rice paper??

As we said a few days ago, just before we got on this cruise they had changed our flight time to Ho Chi Minh which was a nightmare as we would not had got to the hotel there until something like two in the morning. We had only this afternoon discovered that the boat had WiFi when in signal and luckily we were able to get one so looked at the detail again of the change. We spoke to Lee, the cruise director for want of a better word and he offered to ring the airline (ViaJet) for us and try to sort it out. We did tell a little white lie about a connecting flight when in all honesty we just did not want to get into Ho Chi Minh that late when we knew the airline was still selling seats for planes with an earlier departure.

Lee managed to sort it out and we moved from a plane taking off just before midnight to close to five in the afternoon (our flight that we had booked was for six originally so this was far more like it). Now we just had to get from Halong back to Hanoi airport in time…..but that’s for tomorrow.

Flight sorted it was time for dinner, we sat with Olga and Nori and watched how they prepared their meal especially when it came to eating what was like an Asian fondue hotplate accompanied with a plate of leaf and herbs and sauce. It turned out that they had this dish before and had equally been as unsure as we were how you were meant to prepare it so we asked. That little bit of knowledge made all the difference to the taste especially when you are dealing with herb leaves that look and feel like stinging nettles.

It was another great meal, great company but now it was time for some us time and we said goodnight and escaped to the terrace off our cabin.

This was the moment that I wanted. Me, Trev, our bottle of chilled French brut and our surroundings. We sat on our terrace listening to show tunes (yes something from Miss Saigon was first on the playlist) and toasted us, our journey so far and our life and our love……it was turning into a sloppy day!

We drank the bottle dry, celebrated what a wonderful day it had been and even went back up to the bar for a nightcap. As we sat on the terrace we saw lightning light up the sky ahead, little did we know at this time what it was going to bring our way……

We had maybe been in bed for about two hours, fast asleep when the crack of thunder and the illumination of lightning both woke us up. The boat was thrashing around on its anchor and the rain was lashing the windows and doors. We could hear the terrace furniture sliding up and down the terrace behind us and on top of us. This was a violent storm and the boat was swaying side to side with the sounds of the thunder only getting louder and louder.

This went on for about an hour, maybe longer. I’m not going to say we were frightened because we were not but we were aware that this could go horribly wrong if it got any worse. The storm passed, we got back to sleep but what a day and wat a night for very very different reasons indeed.