I had booked myself on a two days one night trip to Halong Bay on a junk boat for an outrageous 70 USD which I thought was a total rip-off. I was picked up from my guesthouse early in the morning the next day and taken to a bus containing other passengers also headed to Halong.

On the way to Halong city, all of our receipts were taken (I didn’t know it at the time, but it was probably to check how much each of us had shelled out). It was also clear that one got what one had paid for. I was probably among those who had incurred a larger damage to my pocket, as I was taken to a super deluxe junk. Most of the other passengers on my junk were on a 3 days, 2 nights cruise.

Our dragon-headed junk

My other co-passengers were Fanar and Ali (Iraqi cousins living in the UK and Dubai), John (a retired commercial aircraft pilot from the UK), two Swiss girls (whose names I forgot to ask) and an elderly couple from Turkey.

Early morning fog

Unearthly lanscape revealed when the fog cleared

En route we saw huge mountains sticking out of the calm sea, almost as if some giant had planted them there. They were so alien and seemed unnatural, but were also quite breathtaking. The junk docked at a small port, where we got into kayaks in pairs. Ali lost his footing while getting into his kayak and fell into the icy cold water. Ali was a heavy-set guy, and the scene reminded me of the upturned kayak with the massive French guy in Koh Samui. But unlike the French guy, we managed to pull Ali back into his kayak, but he was completely drenched. For some reason, he chose not to go back to the junk to get a change of clothes, but decided to row soaking wet. We kayaked to a large cave where we discovered a huge, badly injured jellyfish. It was still moving, but there was nothing anyone could do to help it. It was way too risky to try and put it back into the sea. Once back in the junk, we sailed to Sung Sot cave. The cave was simply gigantic, and was split into three enormous rooms. The fine finish of the ceiling looked so much like concrete that it was really hard to believe that it wasn’t man-made.

View from Sung Sot cave

Inside the colossal Sung Sot cave  

The junk then took us to a peaceful lagoon where it dropped anchor. Ali and Fanar decided to take a dip in the calm (but freezing cold) water. When I see people swimming, I get an irresistible temptation to also jump in. This is despite the fact that I really am quite a pathetic swimmer. So, as has happened innumerable times in the past, I peeled off my clothes and jumped in with a splash. The first impact with the cold water was a rude shock, but later it was very refreshing. On encouragement from the others, I climbed back onto the boat, went up to the deck, and jumped in from up there - several times. It was a LOT of fun!!!

Later in the evening, we all went to the topmost deck of the boat for a few after-dinner drinks. The guys had an amazing sense of humour, and we were all in splits for the next several hours. This was the first time ever that I was having so much fun with a bunch of people who were so much older than me - something I had never thought was even possible.

Vietnam