Vietnam: Leftover Photos

So this final post on Vietman is not too exciting, but I wanted to add some more pictures that didn't fit in with the other posts.

Come to think of it, there is one story I meant to tell which I forgot:

While in Hanoi on our second night, Kelsey and I were heading back to the hotel. It's easy to find, but we would occasionally walk right by it because there is just so many other things to look at. That night, we walked right by it, but for good reason. A gate was pulled down over the front door. This presented a problem, that we couldn't get to our hotel room, and we had a flight the next morning. We searched all around the building for another entry and tried to pull up on the gate, but to no avail. This is one problem that we could not have possibly forseen. How can you plan for your hotel to disappear? You can't.

So we walked looking for other people, hoping that someone out there could help us. We walked to a cafe where a few people were eating, and finally a waiter at a restaurant was willing to talk to us. We communicated through a series of gestures, pointing, and noises that the gate was locked at our hotel. The guy, very polite says "oh, just knock on the gate!" Well he didn't actually say this, but he communicated it with gestures anyway. We went back to the hotel, knocked on the gate, and sure enough, it opened. We walked into the darkened hotel to find two sleeping mats where hotel employees were sleeping. I am guessing that this is fairly common in Vietnam.

I'll get to the photos anyway, now. This one is is a potato chip logo that I enjoyed. The man, Mister Potato, is very similar to another American tube contained potato chip mascot, but with a hat:

I have a few more photos of Halong Bay. It was a bit overcast so the colors aren't as vivid as I had hoped, but it's still pretty cool:

And another ship and mountain:

This is the houseboat where we went kayaking. On this boat lived both a cat and a dog. I'm wondering what the life of a houseboat cat is like:

Just the back of a hat that I liked on one of the bus rides:

A great sign, "Say no with smoking for your health!":

Riding in a taxi in Danang on the way to Hoi An:

This is a Vietnamese crosswalk sign. They were all blue and white, but every single one was a little bit different from the other ones. I'm not sure if each one is hand made, or what:

A chicken in a park we went to in Hanoi:

This is just a giant worm, nothing more:

I'll blog again shortly!

Halong Bay, Vietnam

Our second day in Vietnam, Kelsey and I visited a location on the Northeast side of Vietnam called Halong Bay. This is probably my favorite part of the entire trip because of the amazingly beautiful sites that we had an opportunity to see.

Halong Bay is a bay. What makes it amazing is that there are dozens of island-mountain-rock formations spread out around the bay. We booked a half day tour due to time constraints, and set out bright and early at 8:00. Unfourtunately, the bus has to circle around the hotels in the area to pick up people which takes more than an hour. Then its a two and a half hour bus ride to get to the bay, in optimal traffic. It was a little longer for us, including a stop at a gift shop for a while. We didn't really need one, but I think the tour gets a kick-back for taking us there.

Finally arriving at Halong Bay, a great and beautiful land was in store. We first boarded a boat for a short ride to where we would eat lunch and kayak. Our boat was really nice, it had two stories and was easy to get a view of the bay. Our boat was similar to the one pictured below:

It was so great to cruise around all of these tall, craggly rock formations peppering the bay.

On the boat, we met some interesting people. A girl who we shared lunch with, Hannah, was a teacher in Japan. We also met a group of three girls who were good friends. One each from Korea, Thailand, and Vietnam, who all met while studying Japanese in Japan. We spent some time talking with them and learning about their lives. I also got a great photo of the Korean and Thai girl recreating a certain scene from Titanic:

Our cruise first stopped at a floating house where we could see some live seafood and buy from a mobile floating fruit vendor. There were two vendors there, and each had a cute little boy along with to help sell the fruit. Kelsey bought a few mangosteins from the lady in the photo. They tasted great despite the fact that the lady refused to give her the correct change:

After a delicious seafood lunch, we were taken to another floating house where kayaks and kayaking equipment were stored. This was the exact moment where I knew that I loved Vietnam. I managed to take some photos and video while Kelsey was paddling:

One of the other kayaks

A view of the bay, with Kelsey's head

This is a video I took while kayaking through a tunnel in one of the rock formations:

An interesting part of the experience was at the end of our kayaking. I was paddling again, and suddenly the paddle broke in half in my hands. I continued to paddle with one of the halves, and upon reaching the house again, I was demanded to pay for the paddle. I insisted that a paddle failure is due to many, many uses and routine wear; not one single use. They still insisted that I pay for the paddle. I was already sick of having every dollar sucked out of my pocket that I made a fuss and the tour guide payed for it. A minor victory, but I felt bad that it may have come out of his or the tour's funds.

With that occurance behind us, we set off toward a massive cave located within one of the rock formations. The group of girls, Kelsey, and I decided to sit on the front of the boat with our legs hanging over the ledge. On the left side is me, next to me is the Vietnamese girl, and then Hannah:

The cave was amazing, though I didn't like any of the pictures that I took of it. I guess if my readers are interested they will have to go and see it for themselves.

After the cave, we cruised back to the bus and then had a sleepy ride back to Hanoi during the sunset. Another fun part of the trip was when we stopped at the gift shop for a second time and found these kittens. I held on to this absolutely tiny little kitten who was the youngest kitten I had ever seen. I had to snap a photo of it because it was ridiculously adorable:

That night we went out for some pho, and had a fairly quiet night in preparation for our flight to Ho Chi Minh, which will be featured in the next post.