• Chelsea & Dan’s Gap Year 2025
    Oar blimey
    The bat caveOn top of the national parkInspecting the construction site, just men doing manly thingsBlinding light showLan Ha Bay kayakingLan Ha Bay kayakingLan Ha Bay kayaking2One successful dive to disguise all the failuresFloating fishing villageOne of our island excursions in the bayOne of our island excursions in the bayFireworks at dinner (and lanterns made from beach buckets)Dan smashes 'Foreigner' at karaokeLeaving the island before the horde arrives!They built the world's tallest cable car towers for Cat Ba, but the cars stop moving every 9 mins 🙃

    Cat Ba

    May 28–31 in Vietnam ⋅ ⛅ 28 °C

    Our next stop has been on the island of Cat Ba, on Vietnam's northern coast. We wanted to visit Lan Ha Bay, which connects to the famous Ha Long Bay, two birds one stone. We hoped that doing it from Cat Ba would mean smaller crowds... we were both right and wrong in that regard!

    The Vietnamese government is clearly ploughing an enormous amount of money into developing Cat Ba as a tourist destination, to increase their capacity for visitors. So much so, they have completely destroyed the main bay and reconstructed it 500m further out to sea, in order to build a huge resort complex on the newly reclaimed land. The grand opening of the new beach, and the start of the Vietnamese summer holidays, was the day after we left. So luckily we *just* managed to avoid the big crowds that were descending on the weekend. We got a glimpse of the mob on our way off the island, and think we were very lucky to just about steer clear.

    Cat Ba town is going through a huge development, but the island itself is mostly protected by a national park. On day one we went for a hike up to look around the caves and hills. A leaf-nosed bat flew straight into Jason's head, and we eavesdropped a Vietnamese man explaining 'Don't Stop Me Now' by Queen to a non-plussed German tourist. We also finagled our way into a rooftop pool in the evening, where we could see the speedboats and flyboards rehearsing for the bay’s opening performance.

    The next day we took a cruise from Lan Ha Bay into Ha Long Bay, with kayaking and swimming excursions. Dan tried and failed about five times to do a 'gainer' backflip off the boat, including landing flat on his back. A backflop?

    We wrapped up the visit with a karaoke night, where Jason wowed us with ‘Take On Me’, Jess did a few sassy Supertramps, Chelsea managed some Florence & The Machine and Dan showed off his encyclopaedic knowledge of the Flight of the Conchords.

    This was the end of our overlapping holiday with Jess and Jason from the UK, so we're back to being just a double act again 🥲 next stop, mountains...    Read more