Bolger Family Travels: How Long To Ha Long Bay?

After our visit to the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum area, we boarded our small bus and headed to Ha Long Bay. One of the most scenic places in the world, Ha Long Bay is famous because of the approximately 2,000 islands made up of karsts.

According to Vietnam, the number of islands is 1969, because that’s the year Ho Chi Minh died. The number of islands has never been accurately and thoroughly counted, and I’m certainly not the man to do it.

The first (and only time, until this trip) was back in 2019 during on trip to China. Click the link to see my post on the Li River karsts – the photos, particularly in the light fog, will amaze and delight you.

Having never seen karsts before, they were a geological revelation. I knew what to expect at Ha Long Bay, but it is still a magical panorama, reinforcing the stunning variety of our Planet Earth.

So far, the only bummer about my two days with karsts is that neither in China nor in Vietnam did the sun show up. The photo section below is nice, but the scenes would be even better lit by the sun.

I will let Wikipedia give the geological detail about karsts and how they were formed. I’m certainly no rock expert like niece Ally Bolger. From Wikipedia:

"Karst (/kɑːrst/) is a topography formed from the dissolution of soluble carbonate rocks such as limestone, dolomite, and gypsum. It is characterized by features like poljes above and drainage systems with sinkholes and caves underground.^] More weathering-resistant rocks, such as quartzite, can also occur, given the right conditions.

Anyhow, the drive to Ha Long Bay took a bit over three hours. We had a MITIE “More Interesting Than I Expected” stop at an artisan’s shop featuring artwork by disabled artists.

As we piled off the bus, many members of the group were proclaiming they would not buy anything. Most everyone did. Poor Carol stayed on the bus, as she was alternating between various shades of green with various shades of pale.

Inside was a cornucopia of cool stuff to look at (and buy). Not just artwork, there were lots of things that would have looked fabulous in our backyard, such as heavy carved lions and carved dragons you see on each side of many South Asian entryways.

I have to assume the cost of shipping for something of that weight would be pretty expensive, so I didn’t even think about buying that. And I saw the coolest fountain about the size of our current fountain, but much cooler and heavier.

(Editor: So you described the fountain using the word “cool” twice over. What’s your point. Writer: Obviously, that it is cool).

I did take a picture of the fountain and have contact information for the company, just in case something happens to the Italian fountain we’ve owned for 17 years.

As we got closer to Ha Long Bay, the highlight was passing by a couple on a small motorcycle. That's not the highlight. The highlight was the dead pig in between the couple, stretched out across the seat. I made eye contact with the young woman on the back and gave her an enthusiastic thumbs up. She happily waved back.

A boy, a girl, a motorcycle,

and their dead pig for the

impending feast.

I would tell you that seeing little pigs go to market on the back of a motorcycle is pretty typical in Vietnam or even Southeast Asia, but nope. This was the only one we saw, which made it extra special. And probably extra tasty.

Once we got to it, the area around Ha Long Bay surprised me. I thought I’d seen Ha Long Bay three times in James Bond films (“Man With The Golden Gun,” “Tomorrow Never Dies,” and “No Time To Die”) but it turns out those scenes were filmed in a karst bay in Thailand.

It makes sense that the Sean Connery film was NOT filmed in North Vietnam in 1974 (given that there was a war going on!), but the Pierce Brosnan and Daniel Craig films were obviously much later.

Anyhow, the town of Halong City is overbuilt as a tourist attraction. There are hundreds of unfinished condos and unoccupied business fronts. It’s a combination of overheated property speculation and the impact of COVID landing a gut punch to the area’s economy.

There are a lot of ships that cruise the bay. We were on one that spends the night out on the water. It’s also far smaller than most (the twelve of us plus Bun and Sonny were the only non-crew on the ship, and we filled every bedroom.

Because we were on a smaller ship, we were able to spend a bunch of time in pockets of the bay (surrounded by karst mountain islands) so we were able to spend some time communing with the karsts ourselves (except Carol – after throwing up at the Ho Chi Minh Mausolem that morning, she puked – my word, not hers! – three more times on the water, and not due to seasickness, just to whatever had gotten to her).

The bedrooms are so small that everyone hung out together in the dining room, occasionally venturing out to admire the karsts before getting cold and going back inside. An already close group of travelers got even closer that night (Carol felt bad because she was sick, and felt worse because she couldn’t join the fun).

Both times I’ve seen karsts the sky has been dark and gray. So I haven’t seen the spectacular sun-splashed look of karsts that existed in the Bond movies.

The point is, if you are near karsts, go see them – they aren’t like anything you’ve ever imagined.

(We also did two activities while in Ha Long Bay, which I will post about soon).