Cat Ba

When we reached Halong Bay we dicided to head for Cat Ba. We had to organize a bootticket at the harbour which was not that easy. But we met some people whom we just followed to teh island.

The boottrip was about three hours and was absoluty breathtaking. BIG rocks whereever you look coming out of the sea. Around 3000 island were seen in the Gulf of Tonkin with hundreds of grottos and caves. Ha Long means „Where the dragon slides into the sea“. The telling says that a big dragon went from the montains into the sea and his tail formed the landscape.

As we hit the harbour at cat Ba there were four people without a hick to the city 30 km away. So we had to agree, this is to far for walking. We bargained minutes with soem motocycle drivers who brought us to the city. This was a scene made as Jurrasic Park absoluty crazy.

They took us to a cheap hotel for 9 US a night. It’s low season almost nobody there. Nadine got a cold in Sapa so she stayed in bed next day. We met Steve on ou rway to Cat Ba, he is an american guy from Idaho, yippie I oh. Steve catched up with us the next day and we planned a tour 18 km through the island. We wanted to do at least a part of this trail. 

We hired a bik efor 3 US a day and went to the park. We saw a big bus packed with tourists who had the same idea we had. So we ran up a hill like gooses and had a great lookout on a tower which didn’t look to stable. The sign, max 5 people alowed, wasn’t seen by any tourist. We left the tower when 20 had been up there...

We went back to the original trek, which we missed in the beginning and made our way to the frag lake. There we were, no tourists and just a scene out of Lord of the Rings. Stonestairs to reach the peak, close jungle which „ate“ the trek. It was so wonderful, it just hit ur taste! Away from the beaten trek...

The frog lake looked more like a swamp, but quite faszinating. Wir were a little disappointed taht we lost so much time to see the tower. So we could make it to the Village, which was aonther 4 km into the jungle. In the middle of nowhere. But we couldn’t make it back in time before the dark would hit us. So we turned around heavy hearted. But this trek was great. Thanks Steve for beeing such a good trekking-made!!!

We decided spontaneously to leave Cat ba next day to Haiphong. So we had some beers into the night at a street“bar“. Beer costs about 60 Cent a liter. When the girls needed a leak, the female boss brought them to her house. This was an experience. In Vietnam they don’t have any privacy. They live together without doors in one big room. The bathroom had just had a curtain maybe 2 squaremeters.

Next morning we had a long trip. 20 hours from Cat Ba to Hue. We had a sleeping bus. Let’s see how this will be.