I have posted on our stay at Hanoi Gortage Hotel & Travel, so here's another one at Halong Bay where we spent a night on-board.
When you visit Hanoi, you have to stay at least a night at the very popular must-visit UNESCO World Heritage Site. If I'm not mistaken, there are also one day trips on these boats but for sure not so fun le. Heh.
After all the googling and reading on TripAdvisor, we were still unable to decide which one we should go on because everything looks so similar.
The one that I have been on was not too bad. The rooms were nice and comfy and clean. So, I was thinking of going on the same one, except I like to do things differently everytime I travel so kept searching we did.
Then, we settled for the one that was recommended by my company (Holiday Tours & Travel), called Glory Legend Cruise. We went through a local agent called New Orient Tour (neworienttour@fpt.vn).
Usually, for any 2D1N or 3D2N Halong Bay cruise package, meals and sightseeing activities are included. Some may even add in the van transfer for free, but then again they can claim that it's complimentary but have already added the cost into the package price. Heh.
We paid USD 115 per person for this one, inclusive of:
The journey took about 3 hours from our Hanoi hotel and upon 'check-in', we were served free iced tea and not long after that, we were ready to board the ship! Yassss.
At that time, we still thought that we were getting a normal room, and not a suite! Ahhh.
There were a lot of other tourists that they needed to assist and there were 3 boats outside. To be honest, I was afraid for a moment that they may screw up the list and send us to the one that we did not pay for. Hah.
But all is good.
We got on the smallest ship among the three but still we were super excited!
It was only after we got our room that we realized that the other 2 bigger ships do not have any balcony attached to all the rooms. Only our ship had rooms with balcony!
#blessedbeyondmeasure
The view was amazing! The last time I was there, everything was so misty that we could hardly see anything. This time, same temperature but way clearer!
It's as though I was having a first-time-experience here.
Of course with a GoPro, we had to let it stand on its own and take some time-lapse photos endlessly and shamelessly!
But in all honesty, we were a bit shy taking selfies on our own because there were other tourists on board as well and the ship isn't like so big where everyone is everywhere. This one is pretty small, and everyone is either in the dining area, in their room or on top of the sun-deck area. Heh.
It was fun though.
We were at the Ti Top Beach and walked up a lot of stairs to see the panoramic view of Halong Bay. Tiring but so worth it. The wind was best gilerrr.
Then, we walked down and planned to swim.
Koay walked into the water and freaked out. He kept saying, "Too cold! Too cold! Cannot go in!" Then, one girl walked passed us in just bikini and jumped right in.
Of course we had to jump in as well right, no matter how cold that water may be.
I "encouraged" him by going into the water first and loved every moment of it. Very cold yes but so nice okay!
Can you see that in the photo below, he was still standing up? He refused to sit down because it was too cold. After a good 5 minutes of persuasion, he finally gave in, sat for less than 2 minutes and ran out. Hah.
But we did it! We swam in one of the Seven Wonders of Nature! Win!
After dinner and squid-fishing, I went back to the room to rest for a while because motion sickness was slowly creeping in.
I'm not really sure if its motion sickness or being too tired since never really get to rest but I was feeling so unwell.
I wanted to take just a 30 minutes nap because we wanted to share a cup noodle at the balcony and be all romantic again, but the next thing I know, I saw the sunlight when I opened my eyes and my husband still asleep next to me.
He was supposed to wake me up after the 30-minutes nap but he did not because I seemed to be feeling really not well so he sat at the balcony throughout the night, listening to acoustic songs, alone. All by himself. I FELT SO BAD OKAY!
We were supposed to be romantic and all.
I guess there's always next time because he kept mentioning about coming back. Hah.
Ahh, I love this man.
Till next post, bye now.
When you visit Hanoi, you have to stay at least a night at the very popular must-visit UNESCO World Heritage Site. If I'm not mistaken, there are also one day trips on these boats but for sure not so fun le. Heh.
After all the googling and reading on TripAdvisor, we were still unable to decide which one we should go on because everything looks so similar.
The one that I have been on was not too bad. The rooms were nice and comfy and clean. So, I was thinking of going on the same one, except I like to do things differently everytime I travel so kept searching we did.
Then, we settled for the one that was recommended by my company (Holiday Tours & Travel), called Glory Legend Cruise. We went through a local agent called New Orient Tour (neworienttour@fpt.vn).
Usually, for any 2D1N or 3D2N Halong Bay cruise package, meals and sightseeing activities are included. Some may even add in the van transfer for free, but then again they can claim that it's complimentary but have already added the cost into the package price. Heh.
We paid USD 115 per person for this one, inclusive of:
- Upgraded to Suite Ocean View (we booked for a normal room).
- A balcony!
- Welcome drink and a cold towel.
- 1 breakfast, 2 lunches and 1 BBQ dinner (drinks are chargeable)
- Cave exploration to Luon Cave and Sung Sot Cave.
- Kayaking and swimming at Ti Top Beach and Luon Cave.
- Cooking class (how to make fried spring rolls - Vietnam style).
- Squid fishing.
- Van transfer from Hanoi-Halong Bay-Hanoi.
- Bottled water daily.
- English speaking Tour Guide on board.
The journey took about 3 hours from our Hanoi hotel and upon 'check-in', we were served free iced tea and not long after that, we were ready to board the ship! Yassss.
At that time, we still thought that we were getting a normal room, and not a suite! Ahhh.
There were a lot of other tourists that they needed to assist and there were 3 boats outside. To be honest, I was afraid for a moment that they may screw up the list and send us to the one that we did not pay for. Hah.
But all is good.
We got on the smallest ship among the three but still we were super excited!
It was only after we got our room that we realized that the other 2 bigger ships do not have any balcony attached to all the rooms. Only our ship had rooms with balcony!
#blessedbeyondmeasure
We never wanted to leave our room pleaseeee! The temperature was about 17-degrees and it was windy and romantic. It was perfecttt.
The view was amazing! The last time I was there, everything was so misty that we could hardly see anything. This time, same temperature but way clearer!
It's as though I was having a first-time-experience here.
Of course with a GoPro, we had to let it stand on its own and take some time-lapse photos endlessly and shamelessly!
But in all honesty, we were a bit shy taking selfies on our own because there were other tourists on board as well and the ship isn't like so big where everyone is everywhere. This one is pretty small, and everyone is either in the dining area, in their room or on top of the sun-deck area. Heh.
It was fun though.
We were at the Ti Top Beach and walked up a lot of stairs to see the panoramic view of Halong Bay. Tiring but so worth it. The wind was best gilerrr.
Then, we walked down and planned to swim.
Koay walked into the water and freaked out. He kept saying, "Too cold! Too cold! Cannot go in!" Then, one girl walked passed us in just bikini and jumped right in.
Of course we had to jump in as well right, no matter how cold that water may be.
I "encouraged" him by going into the water first and loved every moment of it. Very cold yes but so nice okay!
Can you see that in the photo below, he was still standing up? He refused to sit down because it was too cold. After a good 5 minutes of persuasion, he finally gave in, sat for less than 2 minutes and ran out. Hah.
But we did it! We swam in one of the Seven Wonders of Nature! Win!
After dinner and squid-fishing, I went back to the room to rest for a while because motion sickness was slowly creeping in.
I'm not really sure if its motion sickness or being too tired since never really get to rest but I was feeling so unwell.
I wanted to take just a 30 minutes nap because we wanted to share a cup noodle at the balcony and be all romantic again, but the next thing I know, I saw the sunlight when I opened my eyes and my husband still asleep next to me.
He was supposed to wake me up after the 30-minutes nap but he did not because I seemed to be feeling really not well so he sat at the balcony throughout the night, listening to acoustic songs, alone. All by himself. I FELT SO BAD OKAY!
We were supposed to be romantic and all.
I guess there's always next time because he kept mentioning about coming back. Hah.
Ahh, I love this man.
Till next post, bye now.
