Halong Bay

At last we arrived at Halong Bay.  After seeing many photos of this spot I expect this to be the highlight of this Vietnam trip.  We are sailing on a small cruise ship called the Athena, with about 20 other people.  Our cabin is just like a hotel room with en-suite.

Today is our second to last day in Vietnam.  Tomorrow night we fly to Luang Prabang in Laos to spend a week in that country. It only has 7 million people compared with Vietnam's 96 million.

This is not our ship but one very like it.  This one is somewhat prettier because of the sails.

Our guide tells us that there are 700 cruise ships in Halong Bay and there are no more to be built as it is getting too crowded.

It is lovely to be sitting at lunch and watching beautiful islands just floating by.

A fishing boat among the cruisers.

We went to see some caves and some of us went in rowing boats, worked by the locals, and others kayaked.  Here is Andrew in the kayak with the cruise manager of the ship.

Kayaking among the lovely stony sculptures that Halong Bay is dotted with.  There are apparently about 4,000 islands in the bay.

The caves in one of the islands had amazing stalactites.

We leave Vietnam this evening.  We enjoyed it.