14th March: Cat Ba, Vietnam

We woke to the rare pitter-patter of rain on the cabin roof. Poking my head out of the door, the tops of the limestone peaks were all obscured by cloud and fog. Tinh, the hotel owner, tried to assure us that it would get better later but it seemed set in to me. Today was consistently forecast to be the best weather of our three days on Cat Ba, so we’d planned accordingly and booked our boat trip for this, our final day here. However, as in much of the world, maritime weather here is tough to predict. We had no idea of what to wear for a boat trip in the rain!

Soon, our taxi was due. I plumped for swimming shorts and flip flops, with a change of clothes for later. Kaja wrapped up in waterproofs. We were dropped at the busy tourist harbour and met by our guide for the day who made sure we were on the right boat. This company had two and, thankfully, we ended up on the smaller and quieter one of the two. Leaving Cat Ba, out through the floating village, the rain continued to fall, and the marine cloud layer thickened. This weather wasn’t going anywhere! If anything, though, it elevated the scene unfolding in front of us on the boat. The karst peaks were ethereal cloaked in clouds.

After navigating slowly out through the foggy limestone islets, our first stop was on the southeast corner of the main Cat Ba Island. This is the access port for Viet Hai village, in a small valley isolated by the mountains from the rest of the island. As it was still raining, we left most of the group to cycle the 5km inland and instead jumped on an electric buggy. Pleased with our decision, we watched them all roll in, thoroughly drenched!

The village was set between karst peaks, with a flat valley used for agriculture. It was a bit of a tourist trap but did include the chance to try local ‘happy water’. The fruit infused shot was much like a sherry, and the jungle root version similar but with a touch of the harshness of whisky. They also had a ‘fish massage’ pond out the back. I’ve had this done on a small scale once before in China about 15 years ago, but in this tank my feet were immediately swarmed by dozens of fish. Their mouths felt like having an intense episode of pins and needles! I couldn’t hack more than about 6 or 7 seconds at a time. Kaja decided to pass on this treat!

Back on the boat, we continued into Lan Ha Bay. The views of the cloud-wrapped peaks in the flat calm sea felt more like being on a reservoir than the western fringes of the Pacific. It reminded us of Little Three Gorges in China, which we’d coincidentally seen in similar weather. Unfortunately, the sea was specked with the plastics which are now omnipresent throughout our planet.

Pulling into a secluded bay, there seemed to be much less plastic pollution. This was the designated swimming spot for today. After a number of false starts, I tackled my fears of both open water and heights by jumping from the upper deck of the boat! Before I even hit the water, I was panicking and quickly scrambled my way back to the ladder on the back of the boat. Still, I did it! The water wasn’t overly warm and seemed to be highly saline. I wasn’t even remotely tempted to go back in, despite snorkelling equipment being available. Nobody seemed to have seen any fish today.

Lunch on board was a feast of spring rolls, tofu, potatoes, rice, noodles, salads, and fresh pineapple. We also had a very friendly group to chat with about our various trips. Whilst we were eating, the rain finally abated too.

The afternoon began with kayaking. Kaja was in the front and me the back of a two-person carbon fibre boat. We paddled our way through three caves – Bright Cave, Dark Cave, and Bat Cave – which all had fascinating rocks visible from the inside. It was tricky to get photos because it was very damp and, therefore, we had everything in dry bags. We spent about 90 minutes paddling to a hidden lagoon and back out through the caves to the boat. It wasn’t too peaceful though as a few other groups had the same plan.

This was the point at which our day trip from Cat Ba into Lan Ha Bay crossed over with those in Ha Long Bay. Cat Ba is the quieter option as over a thousand sightseeing trips depart from Ha Long every day. Looking over our left shoulders, there were so many boats! We turned right instead back into Lan Ha and along the more exposed side of the islands. There was a minor swell, but enough to make Kaja feel a little queasy.

Our final stop was Monkey Island, to which it is possible to swim to see the macaques which were introduced here as part of now-abandoned animal testing. At this point, we met the larger sister ship again. Our little boat was going back a little early to drop off a few people, but we could stay on the big boat until our planned time to go back. Taking one look at the people dancing to shite music, we stayed on the little one. There wasn’t going to be a sunset today with this cloud, so it didn’t make sense to sit on board for an extra hour given the boat had no further places to call at. It was a great decision as on the way back we spotted a pair of much rarer monkeys. There are thought to be less than 60 critically endangered Cat Ba Langur left on their only habitat – the islands of Cat Ba, Lan Ha, and Ha Long. Yet, here were two of these golden- and black-haired creatures using their long arms and tails to leap between trees high above the bay on a limestone outcrop. That was totally unexpected, and we felt very fortunate to have seen them.

We jumped into the arranged taxi back to the hotel and chilled in the garden, listening to the sounds of the island. We ate pho and sweet-sour vegetables with mango smoothies, whilst playing with the dogs and cats. At 9pm, Tinh brought us a final herbal footbath to enjoy in the garden and send us off to sleep on our final night on Cat Ba.