Dawn gathering, Pearl shopping, and off to Halong Bay…

Quyen suggested a dawn walk to Ly Thai To Park – named after the emperor of the Ly dynasty 1010 AD.

The road was closed to traffic from the Metropol to the Lake. In the early Sunday light, there were about 300 people doing Tai Chi, Falun Gong meditation, salsa dancing, aerobics, badminton, hackysack, and laughing-yoga – the mix of sounds, music and voices was cacophonous. There were also another couple hundred running a 1/2 marathon along the lake. It was 6:15 AM.

At 9 we’ll leave for a 2 and a half hour drive East for three days in Halong Bay.

But first, a stop at the Legend Pearl farm. We had a cool (if somewhat canned) tour and a live demonstration of seeding individual oysters (a lot like IVF), then harvesting and removing the finished pearls (2-10 years later) and finally sorting the pearls by shape, quality, size, color and luster. The highest rating is AAAA.

So here’s some proud history from the locals. The Mongols under Kublai Khan dominated all of China, India, Asia and much of Eastern Europe. Two exceptions were Japan and Vietnam. The fleet invading Japan was destroyed as two storm systems collided. (The Japanese considered this a Divine Wind and coined the phrase Kamikaze).

In 1285 the Vietnamese navy lured the invading Mongolians through Halong Bay deliberate grounding their larger ships on shoals and rocks. They then lured the balance of the fleet up the Ben Binh River in their small boats, and stranded them as the tide retreated. The invasion failed and the Mongolian admiral was, of course, beheaded for his loss.

Halong is close to the GuangXi province of China, in the Gulf of Tonkin, on the Northwest end of the South China Sea. Halong Bay is also a UNESCO heritage site. The predominate (and stunning) feature are Karsts – tall mini mountains of limestone pushed up by continental shifts. Over millions of years tides, rain and wind carved the karsts into fascinating forms and mushroom-like knobs with undercut bottoms.

We have two nights booked on a private boat and we’re promised very little connectivity so no idea when this will post.

Boats are limited in Halong to local fisherman, and tour services using (somewhat) traditional junks of various sizes. Our boat, the Princess 4 (the crew call it the L’ Amour), is a single cabin beauty. The effect of the boating limitations is a very serene and quiet journey – no jet ski’s, bubbas, cigarette boats, or college chicks.

What a day! An amazing 6 course tasting lunch on board, cruising through the karsts. Leo, our new guide educated us, and pointed out highlights as we went. He is great. But his English is very poor and we may be missing somethings. He’s new to the firm, nervous and a bit too obsequious. We’re slowly getting a friendship but he’s no Q.

We took the tender boat ashore on Thien Canh Son (sky view mountain) to climb the karst and explore one of the many caves in Holang. The cave, beautiful, was followed by a short kayak ride around a few karsts and back to an adjoining beach. One of the cooler observation as we went along was the new coral forming at the bottom of the karsts.

Bird check: We saw lots of black “eagles” (more likely kites), and a few pacific reef herons fishing. Large billed crows were everywhere and a few other birds we were too slow to identify. Juju has her Merlin app humming and we heard a light vented bulbul, and a thorn-tailed rayadito. Brightly colored kingfishers are on the lifetime list but no sightings yet.

Dinner was, again, awesome. We’re kind of embarrassed that we forgot (but not disappointed!) that our boat has a dedicated chef.

Pleasant, silent evening with 500 Rummy, bourbon and some very good wine. Nothing like sleeping on a boat!