As we record the highs of our journey, we must also record the lows of the journey. The drive from Ha Giang to Cat Ba, which takes more than 10 hours, was notorious. The duration was not the problem, but mainly what happened on the trip. On the one hand, the bus drivers were extremely loud and shouted through the bus. On the other hand, people were constantly being taken onto the bus on the journey, so that the bus was packed and people were already sitting in the corridor at night and you had to climb on top of each other to get to the toilet.
We also met familiar faces on the bus ride. Henrik and Julia from Wuppertal, who we met on the bus ride from Sapa to Ha Giang, joined our little tour group.
Cat Ba itself is an island in northeastern Vietnam from which one can visit Ha Long Bay in a day, made up of stunning rock formations in the sea. On the other hand, the island also offers climbing on natural rock formations or beaches for swimming. Since we mainly had rainy weather during our stay, all of the above options could only be enjoyed to a limited extent. But that's how it is sometimes when traveling and we decided to shorten our Cat Ba stay to just 3 days instead of 6.
The bathing experience was limited to visiting the beaches, the rock climbing was done on the damp partly wet rock and the Ha Long boat tour offered only a limited view of the landscape.
One of our highlights was the Secret Garden bar, where live music was played almost every night at a bonfire. Kim herself sang 3 songs in the bar.
VietnamCát Bà20°43’28” N 107°2’59” E
VietnamCát Bà20°43’28” N 107°2’59” E