Travel in march to Vietnam, 2nd March, Dragged myself out of bed, with Sarah’s
help, and just made it to the Kangaroo Café for 8.30am
- I felt like I was dying. You name it, stomach ache,
headache, arse ache the works! Slept on the bus most
of the way to Ha Long bay, which Sarah was pleased about
as it meant I wasn’t harping on about how crappy I
felt and she could read her book in peace! I managed
to force down some dinner en-route, which turned out
to be a big mistake - I won’t go into detail. We set
sail on a boat out of Ha Long city bound for the bay,
the scenery here is just stunning. Legend has it a
Dragon made the 2000 or so Islands by whipping them
out of the sea bed with his tail – if you believe that
you’ll believe anything! We visited several caves cut
into the limestone by the sea and they really were
impressive, some even had resident colonies of bats
roosting in the roof. Again, these had been made by
Dragons – however, they must have been out or
something when we got there because we didn’t see any.
This was possibly a good thing as my ‘trots’ were so
bad by this time I doubt I’d have been able to run
away anyhow. We cruised the bay all afternoon, there
was a low lying mist which really set an atmosphere
about the place. By nightfall we’d reached a quiet
natural harbour in, we ate on aboard (not me
unfortunately – I was downstairs ramming imodium down
my throat!) and then slept on the boat which was
really great.

Travel in march to Vietnam, We woke around 7.30 am
after a humid night on the boat. I have to admit that
we had no problems at all with our berth, but some of
the group had actually had rats running over their
legs and face during the night! Felt slightly better
but I was still having severe stomach pains and the
worst headaches I’d ever experienced, I guessed I may
be dehydrated so I started eating re-hydration salts
by the shovel full and drank everything I could get my
hands on. The bay looked great so early in the
morning, we had Sea Eagles snatching fish just feet
from the boat – they were awesome to watch. We sailed
on to Cat Ba National Park, then onto Cat Dua
(Pineapple) Island, it was still quite misty but warm.
We rowed to the beach there and found a spot to chill
out. Within 10 minutes we were under siege by the
monkeys that live on the island. One tried to take a
chunk out of my arm but a right hook saw him off. One
lady in the group was not so lucky though, as she was
being relieved of her nice handbag by the monkeys she
resisted and got a nice bite out of her leg – not
pretty. I have to say though, that despite being
little sods the monkeys were bloody funny to watch -
reminded us of Alfie one of our nephews a little bit!
Didn’t eat all day today as felt that 24hrs starvation
may sort out my guts - fat chance, just made me feel
more tired than ever! Met a top guy called Carl from
Melbourne Australia. He’s kindly invited us to stay
if we pass that way later in the year. Carl had
traveled just about everywhere years ago when was
travelling was hard going – reminded us both of Uncle
Ron a bit. If you’re read this Carl, thanks for the
offer and we look forward to seeing you later in the
year. We finished days sailing back at Cat Ba and
spent the night in a nice hotel on dry land. I had a
good shower and immediately felt a bit better.
Imodium doing great so far - just worried about the
Barnes Wallis effect!

4th March, Managed some
breakfast and boarded boat, Sarah managed to polish
off enough for four people as usual. The sun was
shining as we sailed back to Ha Long bay, what a
fantastic view. The rock formations are just
incredible. Jane, Anna and Jane kept us entertained
on the way back, three great ladies who’d done so much
travelling it was incredible, we could have listened
to them all day. Hello, if you read our journal! We
got back travel to Hanoi late, ate as I was feeling a touch
better, then headed over to the rail station to catch
the overnighter travel to Hue. We shared the cabin with two
Vietnamese, a girl and a guy named Binh - neither of
whom spoke English. Binh could see that I was
suffering and hopped off the train at one of the
stations and got me a bottle of water (yeah – yeah, we
know they warn you not to accept gifts from strangers
– but it’s OK we’re grown ups we can look after
ourselves!) how kind is that. Second thoughts maybe
he was a bit worried about me leaving a “Tramps
breakfast’ on the cabin floor?! Still feel terrible,
but at least we’re out of Hanoi which is a cool place
and en-route to Hue – let’s see what that brings!

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