We bought a bus-bus-boat-bus ticket to Cat Ba Island, which is part of Halong Bay. Most tourists take a tour..but we wanted to avoid the “cattle herding” of a tour (one hour to swim, one hour at the cave…with all the other tourists). It was interesting…the good news is that Vietnamese buses have air con and USE it! Yay. The bad news (especially for Dean) is that they pack as many people in a bus as possible. To be fair, this particular one was a shorter bus ride, and they did give him a stool to sit on in the aisle…;)
The view from our hotel balcony. The only nice thing about our overpriced hotel (the shower was in the center of the bathroom and the drain backed up…so you had to wade through water to get to the toilet/sink….and don’t get me started on the bed…sleeping on a slab of cement would be more comfortable). The harbor is full of “junk boats” and floating restaurants.
The “strip”…cheap hotels and restaurants. Cat Ba is supposed to be less crowded and hectic then Halong City…but wow, at night the locals on holiday fill the streets. We were happy to be there mid-week avoiding some of the hoopla.
The next morning we joined Slo Pony Adventures for a climbing trip. A group of us got on a “junk” and cruised around the islands (2000 islands in Halong Bay!) most are surrounded by floating fishing shacks.
Each shack has at least one “guard dog”…usually quite large and male. They run around on the rickety planks and mark their territory.
We picked up our kayaks at this shack. Note the huge fish in the net enclosures…when they chum the water the fish go nuts.
Our boat in the distance….we sat on the rooftop on big bean bags. In the morning we kayaked around the islands…then swam in a beautiful lagoon…jumping off the roof of the boat.
Our climbing spot…much easier to get to then the one in Laos. One of our guides , who is from Sweden….amazing climber. He set up all of our routes by climbing in flip flops (he didn’t want to ruin his shoes…)
Dean and I were first up….kind of fun climbing side by side! Not that my eyes ever left the wall in front of me!
The routes here were much better. I was able to finish them…and no falls!
After 4 routes our Swede guide set up a more difficult climb for Dean and one other guy. Dean did some amazing climbing! This is an “under cling”…..which takes all your strength since you have to lay back holding all your body weight with your arms.
On our way home we picked up some climbers that were ‘free solo deep water” climbing (no ropes…and you fall into deep water). Our swede guide gave it a go….and climbed all the way to the top of the route! It was incredible….he then turned around on a little ledge and jumped….it was HIGH.
Sunset…a great day of climbing in the Bay. Back on the bus again….flying to Ho Chi Minh City.
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