Halong Bay

Halong Bay is right up the top of Vietnam; about 4 hours drive from Hanoi. It is one of the most naturally mysterious places I’ve ever been. There are literally thousands of limestone karsts and isles that make up the bay and every single one is completely unique. As we were there in winter, the heavy mist made it impossible to see them for the first couple of day, but cleared enough on the third for us to get out on a Junk Boat for a day cruise and actually have something to look at.

There are a number of little floating villages out amongst it all, and apparently quite a few of the people have never set foot on the mainland.

The Fisherman & I were completely fascinated by the following formation…I mean it’s a fish!!! Right down to the last details – the mouth, eye, fins, tail…everything. What made it quite funny is we were sitting at the back of the boat and as we were approaching from the opposite direction the deckhand kept trying to get us to go to the front. If we did, we wouldn’t have seen this. Maybe most people don’t.

All morning there was not even a hint of wind and all the boats had their sails down and just motored along, I was so disappointed because I knew what beauty I was missing out on. Fortunately by the end of the afternoon, sails were up everywhere and just as perfect as I had imagined :)

This last one is the view from our resort. For the first 2 days, we couldn’t see anything past the patch of palm trees, so I was delighted to have this view as we were checking out. One or two more posts from Vietnam still to come, then Fiji, and then we’ll be back to some recent portrait sessions and very soon it’ll be Marty & Liza’s wedding!!