Thursday, January 26, 2017

Ha Long Bay

As we are nearing the Vietnamese New Year, Tet, people are busy preparing for the celebrations and going to their homes to be with family so the traffic on our route from Hanoi to Ha Long Bay has been light. New Year's Day is Saturday January 28 and the people have many special foods to prepare, fresh florals decorations to buy and put up, and cleaning in preparation for company.
Our Junk holds about 26 people and 10 crew. It is bigger and more accommodating than we expected. As we have lunch we cruise out to the islands of Ha Long Bay, a UNESCO heritage site since 1984. The Bay covers 345 square miles and contains almost 2000 islands with 100 limestone caves. All the islands are named. The most recent movie shot here is "King King" coming out in March.
We visited the the largest cave- Hang Sung Sot - which mean Most Amazing Cave; climbed 400 steps to the top of Ti Top Island, named for a Russian cosmonaut; and wadded in the waters of The China Sea. Then we spent the night on our Junk among the islands.
During the evening we dressed as Vietnamese royalty, tasted wine and learned how to make fried spring rolls.

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