Day Trip From Hanoi To Halong Bay Part 1: The Islands

Our Saturday started very early while our Friday the night before ended very late.. Now the 3 hours ride from Hanoi to Halong Bay actually came in quite handy..

And ta-dah, next time I opened my eyes (ok, with a little break for food on the way) we had arrived. There are lots of tour operators starting from the harbour that is located an around 30min boat ride away from Halong Bay. We boarded one of the lovely boats below; they are actually quite comfy from the inside. I was surprised to see proper ‘dinner’ style tables in there plus clean bathrooms and a sun deck! So all in all, this was actually a ‘romantic’ fisher boat..

After lunch on the boat we arrived at the first of the thousands of limestone karsts and isles that make up Halong Bay.

It was too bad that the sun was quite a no-show that day. Halong Bay looked stunning anyway though and maybe there were fewer tourists because it wasn’t that sunny – a good thing!

After a little bit of a journey through the isles we arrived at a floating fisher village in Halong Bay.

It seemed that our tour guide found the last ‘parking’ spot available which was behind another boat. Hence, in order to leave ours, we had to climb into the next boat and walk through their ‘dinner’ table area to get to the jetty.

Next on the list was hopping in a little boat and being shown around some of the little islands by a lovely Vietnamese lady.

After having seen the pretty little islands of Halong Bay for around 4 hours, we headed to one of the beautiful caves in Halong Bay. Read more about them in the Part 2 of Halong Bay!