Halong Bay, Vietnam: Cruising among giants

It was while researching Vietnam that I first heard of Halong Bay. I instantly fell in love with the pictures I saw of the towering karst formations surrounded by sun-kissed turquoise waters.

The Halong Bay I saw was quite different. We had booked a tour through one of the local agencies (slightly overpriced as we later found out; do bargain) which included pick-up from Hanoi, all meals, visiting some attractions in the bay and staying overnight on the boat. The weather in the few days before our trip had been terrible - thunderstorms and rain. It was still cloudy when we left. While making our way from Hanoi to Halong, it was positively gloomy. It stopped raining by the time we reached, but the sun still wasn’t in sight. Naturally, I complained about the weather just like the others who were to join us on the boat.

It was after getting onto the boat that I realized I would be seeing a side of Halong which the pictures hadn’t prepared me for. Hạ Long means “descending dragon”, and legend has it that the islands were formed when a family of dragons spat out jewels and jade to protect Vietnam from Northern invaders. In fact, the islands have protected Vietnam from Chinese invaders in the past. The mist shrouded the hulking limestone cliffs and made the whole place look rather dramatic. The water was an angry, but beautiful green. Our boat slowly made its way among the cliffs - I had seen some islands like these in Langkawi, but what makes Halong unique is the sheer number and closeness of the islands. There is actually nothing like it in the world, and that's why it's a UNESCO world heritage site too.

We had a delicious lunch of rice, steamed fish, tofu salad and batter-fried shrimp. We were seated with a Vietnamese-Korean family of parents, daughter and grandparents. I watched how they ate and that's how I realised the greatly undersold amazingness (yes, I made up that word) of soy sauce. What we call soy sauce in India doesn't taste like the real thing by miles. Soy sauce is supposed to be naturally fermented to develop a rich taste. It's also not supposed to be refrigerated. Many houses in India (including mine many years ago) will have a bottle of soy sauce in the fridge. That's why we end up adding it to noodles and rice for its saltiness and colour rather than flavour. This soy had such a depth of flavor that it could be eaten on its own with rice.

The first stop was at Sung Sot cave, also called Surprise cave. The name is definitely an understatement. The sheer size of the cave is breathtaking. Many pillars with interesting shapes support the cave and of course, the locals have stories associated with them.

It was cool and dark inside the cave, and the weird pink and blue and yellow lighting made it look quite interesting. Millions of years ago, when sea levels were higher, the waves had lapped against the insides of the cave and that gave the roof the look of being like a wave-mould. It was exactly the inverse shape of waves.

The cave also had a good view of Halong Bay from a bit of a height. The better view came during our next stop which was at Ti-Top island. After climbing more than 400 steps (not as difficult as it sounds; we did it in less than 20 minutes), a small pagoda like gazebo is reached from which we got panoramic views of Halong Bay. Despite the weather, it was a beautiful sight to see the ships cruising lazily in the bright green waters, surrounded by hundreds of karst islands.

Halong Bay from the top of Ti-Top island

After climbing down, I decided to go swimming. The water was refreshingly cold after the sweaty walk down. That small beach with its calm and clear waters was a patch of tranquillity for me in an otherwise busy trip.

Fishing squid and farming pearls

We went back to the boat and had an early dinner of quite a lot of dishes - Vietnamese salad, fresh spring rolls, fried shrimp, fish cutlets, noodles, rice and chicken and a potato curry which tasted vaguely Goan.

After dinner, the boat set anchor. I socialised a bit and got to know the other travelers. Most of them had been travelling for months or had planned really long trips. Karaoke from a heavily lit up ship floated down towards us. Ours wasn't a party boat at all, unfortunately. So we lounged on the deck and tried out some squid fishing. It was mostly jellyfish that got caught, but my friend got lucky and actually caught an unlucky squid. Protip: Learn how to kill a fish once you've caught it so that it doesn't suffer too much once it's out of water. We ended up throwing the squid back into the water because we didn't know what to do with it.

The next morning, we had an early breakfast after which we headed to a pearl farm. Pearls are formed when a foreign object enters the oyster - the oyster reacts by forming a layer on the object, which keeps getting added to and forms the pearl. When pearls are farmed, this process is done manually. A guide explained how membranes were removed from oysters, cut into pieces and implanted into different oysters along with a nucleus made of mother-of-pearl. Only half of oysters survive this process and even less than 30% of the total have pearls in them.

At the end of the tour, the guide asked for volunteers to pick an oyster to see if they had pearls. I raised my hand. She joked that I would have to work at the pearl farm for 4 years if there was no pearl found. That's a win-win situation, in my opinion. There was no pearl, so maybe when I become world-weary, I will take up on the offer she posed and become a pearl farmer in Halong Bay!

Me thinking about becoming a pearl farmer

We returned to the boat to attend a cooking class. Our guide, who also doubled up as the chef-instructor that day taught us to make fried Vietnamese spring rolls. Actually, he made the filling and we did the rolling and folding. I got the hang of it quite easily, although I may have folded one or two like samosas rather than spring rolls.

We had that for lunch, along with Vietnamese salad, fried shrimp, a pork salad and rice (which I ate with soy sauce). By now, I was friends with the kid in the boat. She couldn't understand a word of what I was saying, of course. But silly faces have #noborders, and that's how we got along. I taught her to stick her tongue out and she would do that whenever she saw me. I spent the rest of the time lounging around on the deck and sharing travel stories with my fellow travelers.

The way back to Hanoi was spent chatting and sleeping. That night, we were to catch a train to Da Nang. We had a few hours to spend in Hanoi, and it turned out to be the most memorable time in Hanoi.