13-14 january: halong bay

left the hotel at 8:30am for a 3.5 hour drive from hanoi to halong bay, our final destination in vietnam. not too much of particular interest to report on from the ride itself, with the following exceptions:

1. people in vietnam are quite label conscious, particularly as it relates to cars. as a result, the owner of the car we were in (not sure if it was the tour company's or the driver's own car) had doctored brand insignias on it. basically the owner had taken the leaves from a cadillac emblem and placed them around the toyota decals on our mini suv. the result was quite entertaining.

2. when we exited from the road out of hanoi onto the highway that would take us to halong bay, we saw no less than 25 individual people selling baguettes (bread) to passing motorists. this is literally on the shoulder of a major highway, and apparently commuters will stop their cars/motorbikes and buy some bread as a gift for their family in the countryside.

we arrived at the port as scheduled around noon to board our "junk" (you can only imagine how many times andrew said "junk in the trunk"). junks are wooden boats that cruise around the bay - they come in a variety of sizes, from small ones that have no cabins and are used for day trips all the way to cruise ship-like yachts that sleep 75 people; ours had 12 cabins. the whole port scene was pretty crazy because so many people were taking off on their trips at the same time, and it's definitely a tourist magnet - but we just have to embrace the fact that we are, indeed, tourists. plus when the tourists are speaking dutch, hebrew, german, french and chinese, it's still a multicultural affair.

we took a little tender (basically a big boston whaler with bench seats) out to our junk, and our junk WAY nicer than what we expected from afar. it's comprised of two floors of rooms, the upper deck for hanging out and a dining room (where we spent the vast majority of our time). it would have been ideal if the weather were just a tad warmer, because we would have enjoyed more outside time and could have even kayaked, but the cooler weather created fog that was beautiful against the mountains. to set the stage, halong bay (the part where the junks cruise around, anyway) is probably a few miles wide and 30 meters deep, with lots of limestone islands with mountain formations on them that the boat navigates through. we're not sure if the voting is done already, but halong bay was up for one of the new 7 wonders of the world and certainly deserves it.

we weren't on the boat more than 15 minutes before it was apparently lunch time - so we took our seats for a SEVEN course lunch! this was totally unexpected. seafood in vietnam is VERY expensive (at dinner, a normal main course would be between $3-5 and shrimp or crab might be $28-30), but aboard the junk we lived like kings with every course being a different seafood delight. lucky us! they also served us some white dalat wine, which if you recall from prior posts kind of tastes like wine at services/church. no so lucky us.

we made our first stop about 90 minutes later to explore a massive cave carved into one of the mountains on the bay. when we say massive, it was probably the size of 3 football fields in total. they've also added mood lighting with different spotlights shining upwards in each of the rooms which gives a very cool effect (destination wedding, anyone??? apparently companies will use the place to hold events for their top salespeople, which would be quite a perk). afterwards we got back on the boat and then stopped at a beach where we hiked up to the pagoda at the very top of the mountain. good thing we got that miniscule amount of exercise in, because as soon as we got back on the boat it was time for our NINE course seafood dinner. it seems that cruises are the same gluttonous affairs no matter where you are.

the next morning we set off on a little speedboat to go through a smaller cave and stopped along the way when we spotted tons of little monkeys running around. got some great pictures of them eating the bread that our tour guide threw out to them. they are undoubtedly the best fed monkeys in vietnam. we sped around a little cove and then idled for a bit and just took in the perfect temperature (probably around 65 degrees), the gorgeous turquoise water and the huge mountains surrounding us. even though its quite a drive from hanoi, it was totally worth it.

we got back to shore around noon the next day and started the drive back to hanoi to catch our flight to cambodia. in the seven hours that we spent talking with Duong in the car, we gleaned some amazing cultural insights:

- how the phenomenon of "keeping up with the jones'" is just as prevalent in the vietnam countryside as it is anywhere else; Duong referred to it as "keeping up with the nguyens". supposedly it wouldn't be uncommon for one family to have a tv that the other kids would be jealous of, which would spur the father of those children to go and work in the city for up to ten years in order to save up the money to buy his family a tv (as long as it was bigger than the neighbors').

- how most young people have ipods and iphones, even though they cost the same amount in vietnam as they do in the states. in vietnam, however, that one ipod costs approximately two months' salary for an average worker. doesn't matter - people will save for a year or more to get just one new device b/c they're that sought after. if ipods cost 2 months salary, we wonder how debeers (that devil company responsible for the diamond commercials) positions engagement rings.

- how property in hanoi is pretty damn expensive - again, given the average salary. supposedly 1 and 2 bedroom apartments can range from $150K-$600K, which really isn't too different from some US cities. and yet there is no such thing as a mortgage here. Duong makes about $2-3K a year bought his apartment in 2003 for $32K which he described as very basic/budget, and it's now worth $120K. But that $32K took him 15 years to save and he borrowed quite a bit from different family members to get the total amount, which he ultimately paid in cash.

so that's it - five locations in 13 days. we truly enjoyed vietnam and would recommend anyone make the trip. every city offered a completely different but fascinating/entertaining experience. and now we're off to cambodia!

next up: siem reap, cambodia