Ha Long Bay, a UNESCO Natural World Heritage Site, was our weekend destination. Ha long Bay is about three hours northeast of Hanoi. Legend holds that the 3,000 limestone pinnacles scattered throughout the Gulf of Tonkin were created by a dragon’s tail as it slipped into the sea. The dragon, as the legend goes, was in Vietnam to help the overmatched Vietnamese repel a hostile invader. Since the country has spent much of the past 1,000 years occupied by one force or another, this is a common theme. We will say that the dragon seems to have created one of the most beautiful places we have ever visited.
We drove through the countryside filled with small towns of tall skinny homes, countless fields of rice, and the occasional water buffalo by the side of the road.
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Once we got to the Bay, we boarded our Junk boat and settled in for a lovely cruise around the bay. We quickly found out we weren't the only boats on the bay! I guess part of of being one of the Seven New Wonders of the World means a huge boon to tourism. Needless to say we were surrounded by lots of boats and people. (We were actually pretty dismayed by the amount of pollution we saw and are hoping that the tourism board of Vietnam figures out a way to improve that soon!)
After cruising around the bay for a while, we were taken to Surprise Cave–an enormous cave that felt right out of Indiana Jones. Check out the pictures and see if you can see the Surprise! (Hint: It's an enormous, uh, phallic symbol…..)
During the rest of the short cruise, we stopped on another island and hiked up to the top, Brad took a short cooking class and learned how to make spring rolls (while Lisa was still doing her hair) and we took a flat boat trip to another cave. All in all, it was a nice way to catch up on some sleep and get in a little relaxation before our trip really started on Sunday. We also got to know a couple of great people that will be on our tour for the next ten days.
Here are a few more pictures from the weekend and the drive to and from Ha Long Bay. On the way home, we stopped at a pineapple/fruit stand and had delicious pineapple with chili powder on it. The women were fascinated by the height of Dr. Jack (one of our traveling companions) and had to take a picture with him. We also stopped by the side of the road and watched people processing and drying rice. Along the way, we saw more interesting “items” on motorbikes. We saw chairs, tables, loads of baguettes….all being transported. The “item” that caught our attention most was when our guide pointed out an actual “live” water buffalo being transported on the back of a motor bike. He was apparently being taken back from the field to his family home!
Enjoy the sights of Ha Long Bay and the drive to and fro……
Small Business is Big Business in Vietnam
Vietnam is an emerging economy. While it declared its independence from China in 1945, it has only truly been independent since the mid-1990s. The government remains Communist, but, the people of Vietnam are independent and resourceful. So, everywhere you look, whether in the city or the country, you see small businesses. People are selling merchandise, services, food, you name it. And, often, they sell it from the first floor of their home while living in the upper floors. Notice the photo of the tall, skinny three-story building. This is very typical. Sometimes it is connected to other similar buildings. Other times, for some reason, it is standing by itself like this one. I guess it is waiting for others to be built some day.
They will use whatever resources are available to them. Many times this means they carve out space on the sidewalk as their cafe seating area. And, curiously enough, they use those little molded plastic blue chairs and tables our kids used to sit on as their cafe furniture. So, you see lots of people sitting on little blue chairs on the sidewalk enjoying coffee, lunch, or a snack. It doesn’t look comfortable to me, but, people seem quite content doing so. In the country, these cafes were located under freeway overpasses, on the roadside, or under a tree — still using those same colored plastic chairs.
Many families in Vietnam have been granted a patch of rice field to farm. Each rice field yields two harvests per year providing needed sustenance. As you look out over the picture of the rice fields, you see, perhaps, a hundred such patches. We happened upon a harvest in which the entire family was out to help bring in the crop. They pay to have another man bring out a machine that separates the rice from the stalk. They will then allow the rice to dry on the side of the road. They’ll wash it, store it, and eat it.
While small enterprise is thriving, the big projects are stagnant. We’ve seen unfinished hotel and resort complexes, large housing developments and factories. It seems that the recession of the past few years has taken its toll in a big way on the Vietnamese economy. The boom times they saw a few years ago came to a screeching halt. Sad to see. We’ll hope for improvement in the near future.
What is clear to us, however, is that despite the lack of what we might call basic comforts, the Vietnamese people are happy, friendly, intelligent and curious. They love Americans and desperately want us to love their country back.
Lisa and Brad's Travels 