After Ha Long bay on land, we are now heading to the “real” Ha Long bay.
Why a cruise from Cat Ba and not Ha Long ?
Actually we will not be going in Ha Long bay exactly, we will instead be visiting its little sister Lan Ha bay. Lan Ha bay is just South of Ha Long bay, East of Cat Ba island, the largest island of the region.
We decided to come here instead of Ha Long bay, because Ha Long bay is VERY popular among tourists. Which means that there are way too many boats, the bay starts to get polluted and the trips from there are more expensive. Lan Ha bay on the other hand isn’t as famous, so there are less people and we can rent private junks (traditional Vietnamese sailing boats) for a lot cheaper than in Ha Long bay.
Because there are less boats departing from Cat Ba, we have a better chance to being all alone in the middle of the bay. And the landscapes seem to be pretty much the same, big karstic pics in the middle of the ocean.
These are all the reasons why we decided to come here.
A few months ago, as we were still in Laos, be booked a private junk for the 4 of us, for a 2 day and 1 night trip on the bay. We had to book in advance because we are very close to the Easter vacations in France, which is the high season here.
Ride from Tam Coc to Cat Ba
Our host, Hau, booked us bus tickets to go to the Cat Ba island. We say goodbye and thank her for her amazing hospitality before climbing in the bus.
In total a 5 hour ride, including the bus and the ferry to get to the island.
We arrive around lunch in Cat Ba
Cat Ba
After a first excellent seafood based lunch, we decide to spend the afternoon working on the blog, leaving the parents to go explore the island. At first glance the city doesn’t offer anything out of the ordinary. Plenty of hotels and restaurants in high, not very pretty, buildings.
Cat Ba island is mainly inhabited by fishermen, and in the main harbor we see only fishing boats. The cruise boats leave from a different harbor.
The parents will walk along the bay, where hotels are being built everywhere, right by the only publicly accessible beaches…
Cruise in the Lan Ha and Ha Long bay on the Cat Ba Legend
The next day the serious stuff starts, we walk to the Ben Beo harbor where our private boat awaits to take us on a cruise. We board at noon and are excited to discover our boat, the Cat Ba Legend.
A private, charm-full and intimate junk made entirely of exotic wood. It was built following the traditional Vietnamese fishing junks that can be seen in Ha Long bay. There are only very few of these junks left, making way to more modern boats. They are the only boats that can still sail in the bay, all the other boats are exclusively motorboats.
There are two bedrooms, a bathroom and a large upper deck with a table and long-chairs. Awesome !
We leave the harbor around 12:15 pm, after walking around the boat.
And we take a seat on the deck to enjoy the landscape while leaving the harbor and sip our welcome drink !
The junk powers on the engine and off we go for a 24 hour discovery of Lan Ha bay.
We very quickly feel comfortable on our private boat.
Just as we leave the harbor, there is a huge floating village.
These villages mainly live off the fish and seafood farms that they built. Hundreds of people live here in these tiny houses surrounded by pools full of different types of fish.
The fishermen catch these fish when there are little and spend several months feeding them before selling them. The goal is to sell the fish in the market in Cat Ba, or export them to China.
It is incredible to imagine how they can live here in these floating houses year round. They even have dogs and roosters, just as if they were living on land. Some even have TV !
Shortly after making our way out of the harbor it is time for lunch. And what a lunch ! We have prawns, clams, stir fried veggies, pork, rice, enough to feed ten of us. And it was delicious !
Then time for a nap on our super comfy long-chairs. We are already fans of our boat, we wish we could stay here for ever.
We can’t stop taking pictures.
After lunch we start getting in the heart of Lan Ha bay and the landscapes are unreal.
Despite the grey-ish weather, the site is beautiful. All these “sugarloaves” carved by erosion appear all around us.
We sail past more remote floating villages.
Then comes time for a swim to wake us all up from our nap. Our captain stops in a deserted bay with a nice deserted beach afar. We feel as if we are the only people on the planet.
We jump in the water and go swim to the beach.
While there are only very few beaches in Ha Long bay, Lan Ha bay on the other hand has 139 deserted beaches. Which makes it the ideal place to go for a swim.
We will spend some time swimming and having fun on our own private beach before getting back on the boat and dry a little.
We will relax on the deck before our captain stops again and proposes a kayak tour.
Off we go kayaking in this beautiful place !
When we get in our kayaks there are only two other French families in the water as well with a local guide. So we decide to follow them because we have absolutely no idea where we should be going, indeed our captain speaks no English or French so it is hard to understand what he tells us. So we follow them and get deeper inside the bay.
Thankfully we followed the guide, because we make it to a couple of caves that we would have never found alone. He even shows us areas where we can spot monkeys. We will see three monkeys playing in the vegetation, perfect timing.
In total almost an hour rowing for a beautiful ride. We loved it. And we are shocked to see the number of boats when we get back to ours. Plenty of day trip boats are here ready to hop in their kayaks. We were lucky to have the place almost all to ourselves, the timing was perfect. Thank you captain !
After our kayak tour we continue our cruise inside Lan Ha bay. The captain took out the main sail, which calls for a picture.
And for our biggest delight the sun comes out. We will spend the rest of the afternoon taking advantage of the blue sky. Awesome !
The colors of the sky late afternoon turn absolutely amazing.
The karstic pics are even prettier under this light, we are breath-taken by the beauty of these landscapes.
We see a few fisher boats and more floating houses.
We get served some coffee and fresh pineapple as an afternoon snack. Basically the dream life right there.
Our captain then takes us to the bay where we will spend the night.
And we are just in time to admire the sunset.
When the day started we would never have dreamed of such a beautiful sunset. But thankfully the weather changed and the clouds all dissipated by the evening. We are super happy to be able to admire such a beautiful sunset. Another amazing sunset we will remember for a long time.
The rest of the evening will be spent relaxing on the deck and taking a nice shower.
After the shower and with the night falling, our captain proposes to try to fish some squid before having dinner. We all try but fail miserably, thankfully they didn’t need us to catch anything for dinner !
Another delicious meal with fish, squid, baked oysters, crab filled spring rolls, stir fried veggies, french fries and more. Once again we end dinner having ate way too much.
A beautiful and quiet evening.
We try one last time to catch some squid, desperate when we see our captain fish a couple while on the phone and smoking a cigarette… After a while we abandon and go to bed.
A very nice night on the boat and an even nicer wake up around 6:30 am. We open the curtains and just admire the beautiful landscape from our bed.
It is absolutely amazing. We are so happy to have decided to spend a night in the bay.
Unfortunately the sun is gone, and leaves us with a grey sky. At least it is not raining so we can’t complain.
Breakfast on board is once again huge and delicious. We never have time to get hungry on this boat !
Off we go continuing to sail in Lan Ha bay.
After an hour we disembark on a fishing farm and our captain walks around with us showing the different types of fish they grow here. These fishing farms and floating villages are part of Lan Ha bay and make for some of its beauty as well. Being able to sail around all these islands, beaches and floating villages gives us a good idea of how it is to live in the bay.
Before sailing back to Cat Ba, our captain proposes to stop to go for one last swim on another deserted beach. Of course we say yes ! This morning swim feels great, and we are once again all alone.
We finally make our way back to Cat Ba and sail past the massive floating village we saw on the first day. This time our boat slows down, giving us the chance to really watch how the local live. It is incredible for us to imagine people can live here.
We arrive just before lunch in Cat Ba for one last meal on board. We are still not hungry, but hell the food is delicious, we can’t say no !
We disembark at 12:15 pm, absolutely amazed with our cruise. Our only regret is that we weren’t able to stay longer 🙂 . We are glad we decided to book a private boat for the 4 of us. We were extremely lucky weather-wise because it rained all night the night before we boarded and it will rain again tonight. We saw only very few other boats on the water and loved feeling all alone in the bay.
An unforgettable experience during this trip around the world.
Back in Cat Ba
This afternoon we decide to rest while the parents go for a walk. It seems that they are never tired.
We meet up all together on the summit of the island, at the castle, to watch the sun set.
The view on the bay of Cat Ba from the top is pretty amazing.
We sit on a bench and stay a little hour to watch the sun slowly set.
We have once again beautiful colors.
On the way back we stop at a few viewpoints to admire the beautiful landscape.
The next morning we had planned on renting a motorbike and go for a hike in the Cat Ba National Park but the weather decided otherwise. When we wake up it is pouring rain until 9:30 am. We are afraid that the hike will be too slippery so we abandon our plan. Around 10 am the sun comes out and Maider and her parents go for a walk on the island. In the meantime Matt stays in the hotel because of a cold.
The walk along the harbor is very nice, we can see all the fisher boats in the bay.
We arrive at a first beach where a huge resort takes up the entire beach. It is a week-end so there are plenty of Vietnamese coming from Hanoi to take advantage of the beach. Here too they go to swim all dressed.
We continue the way along the bay. There are several nice points of view.
Before arriving at a second beach where we decide to go for a swim and spend the rest of the morning. The water is refreshing and it feels amazing with the heat.
We meet up with Matt for lunch and the weather turns grey again during the afternoon. So we all decide to rest this afternoon and work on the blog.
Brigitte and Justin go back out for a quick walk late in the afternoon.
Last night in Cat Ba before taking the bus tomorrow to Sapa, up North in the mountains, 300 miles from Cat Ba.
Our stay in Lan Ha bay was absolutely amazing, and it is time for us now to go hiking in the mountains.