Halong Bay: Part II

Written on August 26th

The next morning, I woke up drenched in my sweat. Not a fun way to wake up!  It turns out that, yes, the air conditioning was turned on at 10pm.  What I wasn’t told was that it was also turned off at 5am.  So I hopped in our shower and headed up to the middle deck where breakfast was already being served.  I picked at the spread of food on the table before heading up to the top deck to relax. 

Luke came up to tell us that this morning the 2 day tour people would be staying on the boat and the 3 day people would be transferring to another boat that would take us to the private island that we’d stay on that night.  Yay! Private island!

The view from our island.

Shortly after, we got all of our stuff out of our rooms and made the switch to the smaller boat that would bring us to the island.  About half of the people from the big group ended up coming, making it a smaller, more intimate group for the days and night on the island.  

When we got there, we were introduced to Jordan, our other guide who also doubled as the wake board instructor on the island.  He basically looked like Tarzan.  We were shown our accommodation which consisted of big wooden platforms with straw roofs overhead, sleeping mats, and mosquito nets.  There were no doors, you just bent down to sneak under the low-hanging roof and would then climb onto the platform. We ate a quick lunch as a group and got into the water to help deal with the intense heat.  At this point, all 22 of us basically knew eachother, or at least knew where what countries we were from so that a group could be referred to as “the German guys” or “the English couple.”  

Jordan instructing on proper banana boat technique.

We were instructed to sign up on the blackboard for either wake boarding or banana boating.  I had never been on a banana boat, but was told it was a ton of fun.  I’d also never been wake boarding and thought if I learned here, maybe I could do it again when I got back to the States.  So I signed up for the wake boarding while Tarzan explained that most people don’t end up being able to stand on the board the first time out on the water.

The first group and then second group of wakeboarders went while the rest of us relaxed on the beach, played card games, or played ping pong (I am terrible, apparently.)  When it was my groups turn to go on the boat for wakeboarding, we all got on the boat and took off to deeper waters.  The first person up, one of the German guys, got in the water with Jordan while Jordan instructed him on what to do and got him set up on the board.  Jordan got back on the boat and the boat took off.  Face plant.  We looped around and gave the German guy the rope to hold again.  Face plant.  And a third time. And a fourth, and so on.  The poor guy couldn’t stand up on the board and eventually Jordan told him he’s have to come back on the boat for the next person to try.

My turn was next and I chickened out.  Really, I wasn’t scared, but actually just knew myself well enough to know that if I didn’t get on the board, I’d be really frustrated.  The next girl went and couldn’t get up either.  The third girl bailed like I had so she could do the banana boat instead.

Wheeeeeee!

Back to the island we went and my friends greeted me by asking if I’d managed to stand up on the board.  I told them that I’d opted out so I could go on the banana boat too, and Jordan gathered us banana boaters around him to explain the few rules there were:

When the banana boat starts to roll to a side, lean to the opposite side.

Try not to kick anyone when you fall off. 

Stay on as long as possible.

Armed with our new rules, the 8 of us got on the banana boat.  We posed for a few pre-banana boat photos and then took off.  Wheeeee, how fun... at first.  We stayed on for maybe a minute before the boat took a turn and the banana boat flipped on its side, taking all of us with it.  I caught a knee to the jaw as the 8 of us flew in every possible direction.  

Second try.  Again, wheeeee! Then, a turn, and BAM!  This time, a foot to my thigh.  What abuse this banana boat ended up giving!  Would you think a boat named after a tasty, funny looking yellow fruit would be so violent?  I hadn’t.  

This continued for about 45 minutes. About 30 minutes in, I quit and got on the boat, not really eager to get any more leg on face action.  My Dutch friend Carola got stung by a jellyfish.  Another two people came on the boat.  Near the end, I guess having less people on the banana boat helped things, and the group was able to stay on the boat successfully for a while before falling off.

After that exciting violent boat ride, we got onto the island and showered up.  Dinner was served shortly after and it was yet again delicious.  This time, a BBQ of various meat and seafood along with side salads and french fries.  

Gathering around for some more games.

We all gathered around the tables to play card games with the group.  Now that the group was down to 25 people, we all played together and it ended up being one of the most fun games I’ve ever played.  When we were done, we all swam out to the barge with only the moonlight above us and the sparkling from the plankton.  Everyone climbed on the barge, jumping and diving in and generally acting like 10 year olds.  

Some people stayed in the water for a while (Tarzan, some went back to the dining/bar area to have some more drinks (my friends), and others went to bed (me.)  Apparently the party raged on until about 4am while I was passed out on a mat under a mosquito net in a hut.  

The next morning around 7am, we were awoken by one of the Vietnamese island workers yelling that we all had to get up and pack quickly because a typhoon was going to hit the bay soon.  We all scrambled about and got ready for the boats to pick us up to get us off the island.  

This poor dude got stuck in the rain.

The first boats came and brought us to the original two ships that we had been on.  We joined another tour group who had just gone through the day and night itinerary that we had on the first day and together we all made our way back to shore.  Because the storm had already hit in some places around the bay, we took a convoluted way back, hopping from boat to bus back to a boat and so on.  About 10 minutes after we landed on shore for good, the storm hit and the rain came down in buckets almost horizontal to the ground.  

As we watched it come down, we all laughed at how lucky we were to have not been affected by the storm.  We got picked up by our bus and started the 3 hour drive back to Hanoi, now feeling like we had 24 new best friends with us.