Halong Bay And Away.

After our ingenious method of tubing, Little Spoon and I had to make some moves. Moves back to Luang Prabang and then Hanoi where we had planned a trip to yet another UNESCO World Heritage site called Halong Bay. UNESCO owe me some sort of sponsorship given the dedication I have shown to visiting their various sites, and I may have to bring this to their attention.

Several things happened on our journey back to Hanoi and I will summarise them briefly. A truck crashed in the mountains spilling fuel all down the dangerously narrow and high roads, meaning our cramped bus was stuck for several hours in choking humidity. That was excellent. Even better was that Little Spoon had obviously been so impressed with my ability to act as a human water tube, that she clearly felt I would also make a great pillow, so I spent the hours cramped against the window with a small baffoon lying across me completely unconcious.

Luckily I had her I Phone with the worlds greatest game on it. Angry Birds! I may be late to the Angry Birds party, but I'm glad I got there eventually, because slinging cartoon birds at rocks, monkeys and green cartoon faces is one of my favourite ever pastimes.

Outside of Angry Birds and truck crashes the following events stick out as note worthy...

Little Spoon screamed and nearly destroyed an entire table at a roadside cafe because a dogs tail brushed her leg.

That's it. That is the extent of the "events" that I remember from our journey back to Hanoi. Gripping travel tales at their best.

Once back in Hanoi we booked a trip to Halong Bay. Here is a picture of Halong Bay so I don't have to bother describing it using words. Afterall they say a picture says a thousand words, so without this it would a very long and tedious blog.



But before we got to the bay with it's rock islands, caves and floating fishing villages (you now know all the key points of the bay) we had to get on another bus with our cheeful guide. He was unsurprisingly Vietnamese and introduced himself with a name that was fairly incomprehensible but then added "But because Vietnamese is difficult I have chosen an English name that is easy for you to remember and say, so you can call me Nicky."

I already liked Nicky. He had recognised that his own language was frankly ludicrous and that the name his mother had bestowed upon him was somewhat of an embarrassment, so he had wisely chosen a slightly effeminate western name. But at least it was in English, which was undoubtebly a huge relief to the rest of our tour group who were from Russia, Slovakia, Singapore, Japan and Germany. In fact Little Spoon and I were the only fluent English speakers there, and that's being generous to Little Spoon.

And to think some people look back on English imperialism with shame. I nodded with smug satisfaction as I listened to various nationalities forced to ask questions in English to "Nicky".

So as the bus started off, I got settled in for the 3 hour trip to the bay. Water? Yep, nice and cold. Pringles? Yep, Little Spoon had got those for about $20 from a trinket salesman. Angry Birds? Definitely. I focused on the latest level and began to play...

"Okay guys so right now we are going past Hoan Kiem lake which is the centre of the old town in Hanoi and..."

What the hell was going on? Nicky was talking for some reason. I paused the game and looked up to see what he was babbling on about and learnt about the lake and a few facts about the old town. Fair enough Nicky, some interesting stuff there and it is a nice lake.

Ten minutes later and Nicky is getting on my nerves.

Nicky: "My city is called Hanoi, which means 'River in the city', because Ha means river, Noi means town or city so it is river in the city...and this is where I was born and I love my city. But this is not the Hanoi city tour so I will stop now and we can get on our way to Halong Bay."

Yeah, you're right Nicky this is not the Hanoi City Tour, so shut the fuck up because some of us are trying to complete Angry Birds and your incessant yapping about this ancient city and it's temples and lakes is hardly helping me concentrate.

Thankfully Nicky gave it a rest and I completed 10 new levels by the time we arrived at Halong Bay. I had forgiven him for his constant waffling earlier and put it down to the excitement of having a real Englishman in his home town. I was glad he had kindly chosen a name that was "easy to remember and easy to say" for English speakers, because I had to check a couple of things about the days events and when I got to go kayaking through some caves.

Little Spoon also had some questions that she needed answering.

Little Spoon: "Hey, can you ask Roger what time we have the seafood lunch I'm quite hungry."

Me: "I beg your pardon, what are you talking about?"

Little Spoon: "The lunch stupid. Ask Roger when we have it."

Me: "Who the HELL is Roger?"

Little Spoon frowned. She bit her lip and then enlightenment shone across her face and she rolled her eyes at me...

Little Spoon: "Okay okay, I don't know why I said Roger. Kenny. Ask Kenny when we have lunch."

Me: "Who the fuck is Kenny and how does he know when we get lunch?"

Little Spoon: "KENNY! The guide Kenny! Who do you think?"

Me: "Do you mean Nicky? Nicky the guide? Nicky who chose the name Nicky because it was easy to remember? That Nicky? The Nicky who is not called Kenny and has definitely never been named Roger?"

Little Spoon: "Oh. Yeah him, ask him please."

Me: "No. I'm playing Angry Birds, you ask him. Or ask one of the Russians they look like they've been paying attention."

As it happened the lunch was very soon served as we sailed through the peaceful waters of Halong Bay. The picture does not really do it justice, and when the clouds moved away it was truly beautiful. We kayaked, I got some customary sunburn and then Kenny oops sorry Nicky took us to a recently discovered island with some caves inside. Apparently there were many stalagmites and stalactites that looked like animals.

He carefully pointed out the one that looked like a dragon "if you use you imagination" as he put it. Indeed,if you also used a large dose of LSD it would probably be helpful too; as the stalagmite looked pretty much like a stalagmite, arguably you could say it looked like a a bunch of stalgmites.

The one that "looked like Buddah" looked like a blob of ice cream. Still they were quite nice caves and I also got to see an idiotic woman wearing high heels twist her ankle on the slippery rocks which was nice.

A relaxing day came to a close and after our journey back to Hanoi we headed out for Bia Hoi and prepared ourselves for the return to Korea. Little Spoon's mother was due to meet us in two days and then I had ten days of living with Chess Champ and Chocolate Orange before I would return to England.

A round up of Korea and back again will be with you when I can be bothered. Goodbye for now.