Day 8: Back to Hanoi, Basque Reunion!

We awoke at 6am to get ready for our included hotel breakfast buffet. The sun was just starting to rise and cast its light into the Cat Ba bay.  The view from the balcony was gorgeous.

We ate our breakfast and headed down to the lobby to meet our tour guide. I made a quick call to Eliza and then it was back onto the bus for a quick 5min ride back across to the small harbour.

Our boat was ready and waiting for us and we all hopped back on.  There wasn't much planned for today because we were heading back to board our original bigger ship which would take us back to the main Ha Long port.

For the next 1.5hrs we sat on the roof of the boat quietly enjoying the view of the islands and the hot sun. I put on some Kow Otami music from Shadow Of The Colossus which seemed to fit the scenery perfectly.

As we approached our bigger ship I noticed Asier standing on the upper deck! I waved to him and he waved back. It was great to see him because I wished we had exchanged contact info and I doubted we would run into them again.

It's Asier standing in the green and black shirt!

We climbed up and over the railings with our bags and boarded the ship.  We went upstairs and chatted with Asier and caught up on what we had been doing since we last saw each other. It was another 1.5 hours to Ha Long port and Rob and I pretty much chatted with the Basques, standing at the front of the boat.  Asier kept joshing us about yolkless omlettes because Rob had mentioned it was something some people do in Vancouver. Eggs ended up being a big topic.  We told them about some of our favorite egg dishes such as eggs Benedict and soft boiled eggs where you dip your bread soldiers in the hill.  They had never heard of these dishes so I'm writting them here on the blog in case he forgets :P (Hey Asier)  One of the egg methods that they shared with us that I had not heard of before was that you first separate the egg white and yolk, then you fry the egg white first, and when that is cooked you put the raw egg yolk on top and just head it up ever Su slightly. Rachaelle put her thumb and index finger to her lips and kissed the air, with the gesture of deliciousness.  I agreed it sounded tasty!  Before arriving at the port we made sure to trade contact information so that we can share pics and give them the address to this blog.

When we arrived at the port, it was lunch time. We all made a short treck down the street to a nice hotel restaurant where we proceeded to have another nice lunch that was included with the tour.  Rob and I additionally ordered lemon milkshakes because they sounded interesting.  When served to us they turned out to be really light tasting and refreshing sorbet type slushies. Delicious for $1.

After lunch we crammed back into the van for the 3hr drive back to Hanoi city.  The 12 of us that had Dang as our tour guide pooled together some money as a tip because He had been excellent and we wanted to show our gratitude.  I realize now how much a tour guide can really make or break a trip.  Dang had been great!

Rice seedling farm on the way back from Ha Long

By about 4pm we pulled up in the packed Hanoi streets to Vega Travel.  We said our goodbyes to our group and walked back to the Blue Paradise Hotel.  The Basques be followed us there as well but the hotel rate wasn't so good (25USD/night) so we agreed to meet at 630pm for dinner and they left to find another hotel.

We deposited our stuff into the top 5th floor room and headed back out into the streets for me to do some let minute shopping for friends.  I managed to bargain  some "I heart Pho" shirts for $2 a piece which I was really happy with.

At 630pm we met the Basques at the arranged meeting spot and headed to this little Nom restaurant recommended from an Ipod app I had downloaded.  Nom is a Vietnamese street food consisting of a bed of thinly sliced daikon with cilantro, and three types of dried beef with a light sweet vinegar dressing and crumbled peanuts on top.  It was quite tasty and the experience of sitting on the road with mini plastic stools was fun!  We even had about 7 different ladies come by ad try to sell Vietnamese rice timbits and a guy serenaded us with his nose flute.

After that light meal we all went to Papa Roti for some of their delicious sweet freshly toasted buns.  We ate them standing in the middle of the street and watched two Vietnamese women get into a pretty physical cat fight while the police basically just stood there and watched.

The night was still young so we took our friends to Yummy for some coconut and fruit drinks.  I guess the Vancouverites were used to the jelly and big straws that came with the drinks but this was something new for the Basques so it was fun introducing them to this type of Asian drink.

After some laughs and the drinks we decided to go to one last place to hang out: Legends Beer.  It's a place we spotted on the first day and it has a long circular patio overlooking the major traffic circle in the heart of the tourist and night life area of Hanoi.

We said our last "Salute" (cheers in Spanish) and drank our beers while overlooking the bustling chaotic traffic.  Grimmace even made an appearance for a photo op!  He gets less shy every trip.

By this time it was 930pm and our friends had to get back to their hotel for their 6am flight to central Vietnam.  We walked them back to their hotel and said our goodbyes.  I told Asier I was getting married in January and he said congratulations.  I mentioned that if they ever traveled to Vancouver they should definitely email me and it would be a pleasure to show them around and maybe they can eat a yokless egg omlette :P  He replied back and said that anytime if I was to ever be in Spain travelling to Bilbao in a year, 3 years, 5 years, or whenever, to let him know as it would be wonderful to meet up with them again in the future.  I've always wanted to travel to Bilbao and now I am 100% sure that it will be on my radar for a trip in the near future.  I look forward to the day we get to hang out again!  Farewell and bon voyagé friends!  I hope the rest of our trip throughout Vietnam and Cambodia is unforgettable. :D

After saying goodbye we headed back to our hotel for some chill out time.  We had seem quite a bit of Hanoi at night and we thought it would be nice to wind down for the evening.  I had to catch a taxi at 6am so it was lights out for me soon after getting back to the hotel.

It had been a fantastic past 7 days and bumping into Asier and Rachelle again was the icing on the already delicious Vietnamese cake!

Day 7: Cycling, Jungle Trekking, Private Beach, and Cat Ba Island

I awoke at quarter to 7am to the light coming from outside our window above the bed.  I could see that the sun was starting to rise and I didn't want to miss it so I quickly hopped out of bed and made my way to the upper deck.  The sun was just starting to rise above the islands and I was treated to an incredibly beautiful view.  The air was cool because of the wind but it was still warm out and you could tell it was going to be another hot day.

The plan for the morning was to hike up the 400 steps to the top of Ti Top island, which was an island close by for us to view the sun rise.  By 7:20 or so everyone was up and we boarded our small boat to take us to the island.

When we arrived there was a group of people doing Tai Chi in the morning sun.  There was also a good sized natural sand beach with a few people just coming out from the water.  I thought to myself what a spectacular view to experience for an early morning swim with the sun rising over the islands and some beautiful traditional looking boats parked close by.

Our group walked along the back of the beach and up the steps to the top.  It was a fairly short climb up to the top and I was completely distracted by the natural beauty around me so it made the trip up even shorter.

resting stop on the way up

At the top we were treated to an amazing 360 view of the bay.  Check out some of the pictures because they'll paint a much better picture than me trying to describe it.

After mulling around at the top for 15 minutes I was thinking of going for a swim so we made our way back down.  Upon arriving at the beach we walked over to the waters edge.  I wasn't sure if I wanted to swim but I knew I wanted to dip my feet in the water.  I was wearing my sandals so I slipped them off and dipped my feet into the water.  It was cool but not cold.  I looked up and saw the two older german ladies already swimming.  What the heck if they're living it up then so am I!  I took off my shirt although I wasn't wearing completely perfect swim wear I ran into the water and jumped in :D  The felt great and the feeling of swimming around in the cool water with the sun beating down in this fantastic scenery was unforgettable.  I had given Iwao my camera and he took some pics of my morning swim.

After 10 minutes or so of swimming around I came back to shore and we motored back to our boat for breakfast.  I quickly showered to get the salt off and sat down to eat fried eggs, bananas, jam, and toast (not all at once).  Near the end of the meal Dang introduced us to our itinerary for the day and the first thing we would be doing was getting off this big boat and onto a smaller boat for the remainder of the tour.  Tonight we were sleeping in a hotel on Cat Ba island and this boat was returning to Ha Long Bay Port.

The Singaporean family were not coming with us so we waved good bye and boarded the smaller boat.  We then cruised for an hour or so along some more magnificent limestone Islands and we made our way to a small dock on the south eastern side of Cat Ba island.  This is where our cycling tour would begin!

rock formation named "Chopstick"

South China sea on the top left

We left our bags on the boat and walked along the cement dock to an area with a few dozen bikes parked.  We each picked a bike and started our 30 minute ride around the island.  The first part of the road was along the coast and then it went up over a hill and dropped us back down into the inner part of the island.  Biking through the jungle was something I had been looking forward to and it did not disappoint.

After half an hour we found ourselves in a village along an inner valley floor on the inside of the island.  It was really neat how the valley was quite skinny, yet it was all cultivated for farming and a small community had risen up there.  We parked our bikes and proceeded on a 45 minute trek through the jungle.  It was an easy hike and we got to go through a cave and then climb up some pretty steep limestone rocks.  We reached the top after only 10 minutes of ascent and we were able to look back behind us over the jungle canopy or forward and see the valley floor with the little village below us.

The guy in the straw hat is Dang!  Our excellent tour guide

After a short break and some riddles from Dang we climbed back down the other side and walked back to the village to get our bikes for the bike back to the boat.  We biked back along the same trail, yet it felt different because you're seeing everything from the opposite direction :)

Back at the boat we ate another lunch of veggies, spring rolls, shrimp, and roasted fish.

Dang then gave us the option to do more kayaking or go to a beach.  Most people wanted to go to the beach for a swim (including me) so we cruised for 15 minutes or so until we came to a really small beach on some random island.  Noone else was on it and it was like our own private beach.  Great!  Most of us ended up dipping into the water for a swim and once again, the water was nice and cool and the scenery magnificent.  After my 10 minutes of swimming I layed on the beach and got a bit of a tan.  I think this would be my first time getting a tan in December.

our private beach!

After an hour at the beach we got back onto our boat and sat on the upper deck for an hour and a half as we cruised the islands towards the main Cat Ba Island Port.  As we grew nearer there was a really massive floating village comprising of over 400 families.  It was quite something to see.  And almost every house had a dog or two.  I wondered where the dogs went to the bathroom...

We reached the port at Cat Ba in due time and departed the boat onto a bus that took us 4km over a small mountain and into the main Cat Ba resort area.  It was a smallish promenade built up along the water with a small bay filled with another floating village.

At the hotel Dang showed us on a map in the lobby the route we had taken during the past 2 days.  I just drew this path on the map in photoshop (it wasn't actually on the map in real life).  It's an approximation of where we went.  The black line is where the main boat took us.  It started at the top of the map and went south.  The purple line was around where we kayaked, the blue dot is where we slept, green line is where we biked, red line is where we took a bus onto Cat Ba Island where this photo is taken in the hotel lobby.

We checked in to our hotel and had free time for the rest of the evening.

For dinner Dang recommended the Green Mango restaurant so that's where we ate our diner.I had my most expensive meal of the trip with the total coming in at a whopping $8.  It was a Spicy Medium Rare Tuna with green mango rice and a mango salsa.  Delicious!

After diner we went to look for a bar to have a drink or two.  We found "Good Bar" and went upstairs for some 75cent beers and free pool.  The place was empty when we arrived but it soon filled up within an hour or so.  Some Vietnamese kids also came in and we watched them play pool after us.

It wasn't all that late but we were tired and had another early morning the next day so we decided to head back to the hotel for some sleep.  Another successful day :D