A trip to Ha Long Bay and Moving on from Hanoi
26th February
I had a pretty good night sleep but the boys both didn’t seem to enjoy it much… in fact as I write this on the bus to Ha Long Bay, Luke is literally now talking to Scott about how much he was getting annoyed last night that he couldn’t get to sleep. Out of the 3 of us I had the least amount of sleep on the planes so I slept like an absolute baby!
We met up for breakfast though which was delicious and this morning I got the first indicators of how Scott is going to handle the Vietnamese cuisine… it’s not looking good.
Luke and I both enjoyed the spring rolls, rice and steamed buns, all of which Scott screwed his face up to and then pounded his way through half a pineapple in 15 seconds. Then when they asked us about food allergies here on the bus, ready for the bay cruise he again screwed his face up as if he was chewing on a lemon at the idea of sea food. He’s not looking forward to having any fish. I told him to just try it, because it’s not going to be like home. Don’t think there will be any battered cod here! But he’s not convinced so by the time we come home he might be a deflated bag of his former self! I on the other hand haven’t stopped eating since we landed!
Scott’s also sat at the window on this bus so I told him he’s got to do the filming. We’ve been on the bus for an hour now and I think he’s taken a photo of the dentist practice (where you get treated in the shop window) and a man asleep on his moped.
I don’t think you’ll be seeing much footage filmed by these 2 geezers when we return from this trip!
In total I think it took around 3 hours of driving but that’s with 2 short stops before arriving in Ha Long Bay. One of those stops was at a place which specialises in clam rearing for the pearl trade. This was actually a really interesting process to see for ourselves after I remembered seeing a documentary about it a few years ago. The clam went almost extinct, at least locally so the farmers managed to find out that they could actually remove the pearl and replace them with a plastic nucleus where it would have been. This nucleolus means that the pearl will now form quicker and can (with the right nucleolus) also become bigger.
The main advantage however is that with careful considerations and good management they can now be harvested for their pearls more than once. They claim that it is a harmless procedure but even if it isn’t, considering that the trade in pearls isn’t overly controlled, a sustainable trade is far better than either a legal or illegal trade that’s decimating wild numbers in Ha Long Bay. And judging by the showroom with necklaces costing in to the tens of thousands of dollars it doesn’t look like the trade is going away any time soon.
We pick up the story here from the third hotel on this trip. Tonight we’re staying in Kian Giang which is just a 15 minute drive or so from the Viet Nature field office. Up until now we’ve been living it up hotel-wise! In Hanoi we stayed in a basic but clean and nice hotel with very friendly staff before moving to the Luxy of Dong Hoi where we had a luxury hotel with a river view for just £35 each for the night with breakfast. Tonight however, I am less convinced!
Tonight we have no shower… not communal showers… no showers. This is paired beautifully with some weird mood lighting in purple and a mystery bed sheet stain I don’t like the look of. The staff also speak no English. I don’t consider myself to be picky with hotels but I think I’m trying out my sleeping bag tonight.
Anyway back to the story which is back in Ha Long Bay and now in the past tense!
We arrived at our boat and were seated with a lovely family from China and I have to say the lunch was actually really good, especially the spring rolls paired with fish sauce, and even Scott ate most of it… or at least tried it. We did find out at this point that he’d most likely now be mostly sustaining himself on sticky rice.
Ha Long Bay is absolutely beautiful and you can see why it’s such a popular Hollywood backdrop.
We didn’t see any wildlife which is a shame apart from what I thought were fish eagles but turned out to be black kites according to my trusty field guide. I always like to have a field guide with me!
Ha Long Bay however, is all about the scenery and they have that in droves.
Our first stop was Titov Island where we hiked up 400 steps to get to the lookout point, giving amazing views of the bay. I’ll be honest when we got half way there was a viewing platform and my heart sank when I realised it wasn’t the top! We made it to the top though and have sacrificed our comfort ever since, because even now my calves are still on fire each time they see a set of stairs. Coming back down again mine and Luke’s legs were shaking with each of the 400 steps. BUT we were treated when we got to the bottom and I found that there was a guy selling fresh coconuts for drinking… I can’t say this felt like work when I was standing there cooling my feet in the sea of Ha Long Bay, sipping on some coconut milk while talking to Ripley on Whatsapp.
As much as this really is a work trip and I’m here sat in this hotel room writing these blogs each day and getting footage, it’s still an amazing opportunity and I want to thank Tony and Jackie including me in the team coming over here. I can’t say that I’m not lucky to have a job with these sorts of opportunities.
But anyway, we left there after watching big boats literally ram each other out of the way to get to the dock… especially our captain who was an absolute animal! What’s the boat term for road rage?
We then headed to another secluded bay where we did some kayaking (which killed my legs even more due to the position we were sat in) while scott went on a row boat being chauffeured around… it was just to get good footage of us of course!
Finally we headed to Surprising Cave as named in 1900 or so by the French team that discovered it. It’s named such because it was a surprise for them how big it is inside and I can’t agree with them more. It is beautiful in there and just kept on going!
Cake back on the boat could have been bigger if I wanted to be picky… gone in 3 bites but as we came back to the dock we were treated to an absolutely stunning sunset. There aren’t many places in the world where the setting sun looks quite this good!
On the drive back home Scott even joined us for tucking into a steamed bun filled with BBQ pork (Char siu). But that wasn’t the end of the day for us as we pulled up at the hotel at 8:30pm. We managed to also secure a quick meeting with the Vice President of the Vietnamese Zoo Association as he’d managed to help us organise a meeting with the director at Saigon Zoo on our last day which we really appreciated.
Dinner before bed! Myself and Scott had delicious rural style beef & spring rolls while Luke had a honey margarita pizza… I’m telling you putting honey on a cheese and tomato pizza is an absolute winner – I even finished half of his after my dinner. That’s probably why today when we tried on our jelly jungle shoes (wait until you see these) I couldn’t do mine up… they’re super awkward and my belly kept getting in the way of me reaching them. I hope I’m fit enough for this 5 hour hike tomorrow!
27th February
The next day wasn’t overly interesting as we were flying from Hanoi to Dong Hoi but we did check out a local market in the morning. They were selling live turtles which are used to make turtle soup (we have an interesting sign and exhibit about this in the new reptile house when it opens) which wasn’t nice to see but many of these are farmed so they were not shy about it and love fish. We then saw some small song birds crammed in a tiny cage before being shooed away by the stall owner who looked like she had something to hide in the back of her stall. She didn’t want us anywhere near there!
Dong hoi
28th February
So that brings us to this morning!
We had an 8am start driving through the countryside to the location of the Vietnam Pheasant breeding centre which is still under construction. It was nice to see how big and well situated the site is. With the plans they have for it I think it has some real potential.
It was the first time we saw some nice thick foliage and got a taste of walking in the terrain. It’s also where Luke picked up the first leech of the trip… that lucky bugger!
We got back to the Viet Nature field office and as we were sat there talking, Scott wanted to look at the poster on the wall and suddenly stopped and asked if that was a leech on the ground. Sure enough it was and we wondered who it had come from before he carefully stepped over it as if it was going to launch up at him. Turned out when we tried those sandals on that Luke had a bike mark with some fresh blood. All fun and games in the forest! We do have leech socks but just didn’t think we needed them today.
Finally we had a meeting with the forestry department (although not until Scott had entertained us with an apparently tall tale of how he has some mosquito repellent bath soap… no use here though unless he plans to bathe in the bath like a toddler) to discuss the created Argus conservation project which we are starting with them and Viet Nature.
Today was our most inductive day so far and now I need to sign off and get packing. I need to jig around my bags so that we are only taking the essentials to the forest:
Long sleeve shirts
Trousers
Leech socks
Jelly jungle sandals
Camera equipment
Spare batteries and charging packs
Blackjacks & short bread
Microfibre towels
Water filters
Insect repellent and bite relief gel
It’s just 2 nights so we are packing quite light but it’s all stuff to make the hike more comfortable and ensure we can document it for you.
Will speak to you again in a few days when we emerge from Khe Nuoc Trong National Park.
