Halong Bay - How long?
 

Hi,
Trying to decide whether to do a 1 or 2 night trip to Halong Bay - looking into Handspan's overnight camping/kayak trips or nice boat trip and then one night on Cat Ba. We have a limited time in the area and need to use our time wisely. Please let me know if you have any suggestions as to how much time would be nice in Halong Bay.

We did a 1 night trip to Halong Bay in May with Santa Maria. I think 1 night is good enough to experience Halong Bay. There were 16 of us and we all did 1 nt. except 1 couple who did 2 night with 1 nt on Cat Ba.
We arrived at boat 12:30, did kayaking for 2 hrs. Next day, hiked up to Amazing Cave. Excellent food and great group of people. We thought 1 nt. was perfect.

Do not spend more than one night in Halong Bay, it's not really worth it, especially if your itinerary is tight.

can't imagine doing more than 1 nite....i day was more than enough for me

Hi,

If you have not too much time. do one day in Halong be ok. Boat rent around 10usd, lunch included
then back to Hanoi at 18:00

Good luck

Hi,
one night on the boat, one night in the hotel in Cat ba is enough, it''s worth!

I have another idea. I love 2 nights in Halong bay. You can not imagine how great is this. You will have whole day to do kayaking, have alfresco lunch on the boat with 360 degree view.
So great.
Not too much boat in Halong have program for 3 days/2night. I travelled with Bhaya Cruises last time in 2 nights. Great!

hi, folks

I'm new to this forum, though not to fodors. I just logged on here because of watching Top Gear [UM programme for petrol heads and assorted others] today and their trip from south to north of Vietnam in [very old] motor bikes.

they ended up on/in the Halong Bay which looked fantastic.

my question - just how would one fit such a place into a visit to Vietnam which didn't involve motor bikes and homemade rafts?

regards, ann

PS - sorry to hijack your thread, missViv!

Ann, most people go to Halong Bay from Hanoi driven in a minibus or a car. There are boats on Halong bay, and you book your time on the boat as a part of the whole trip - transfers to/from Hanoi and a short cruise or an over night or even two nights on a boat. Halong Bay is well on the tourist track. It sounds like the tv program made it look hard to get to and like there was only primitive transport - not true!

hi kathie

thanks for the info.

part of point of the programme is the the presenters are set wacky challenges by the producers - like driving two-wheel cars across the south african desert, or across the arctic, racing snowboarders downhill etc. - so 8 days to travel from south to north Vietnam on ancient motor-bikes was relatively tame.

but it's really set me thinking about a south asia trip - I need to go and do some reading and research before I venture back here, I think.

regards, ann

My 2 cents: we did 2 nights in Halong last year and LOVED every minute of it!

The 1 night tour is basically what everyone under the sun does when they go to Halong, so you almost feel like part of a very overplayed itinerary on that 1st day (same tourist sites, same hike up to the viewpoint, etc, etc.) But the 2nd day is when things got really unique: all the 1 nighters were brought back to port, a smaller junk came and picked us up and we had the entire boat to ourselves! It was wonderful--private kayaking all day through very secluded areas, visting off-the-beatn path fishing villages, ate a wonderful seafood lunch (cooked just for us) and had a lot of quiet time and well-deserved relaxation to just sit and take in the scenery with no one else around.

If that doesn't sound like something that'd interest you, then maybe 1 night would be fine. For us, though, I think the highlight of Halong was staying that extra day.

Of course we did our trip on the Halong Ginger (so I'm not sure how Handspan plans their 2 night itineraries, but I'm assuming it's something similar.)

Best of luck figuring it all out!

hi filmwill,

sounds like you did this with a tour company.

mind telling me which one?

regards, ann

We actually booked direct with the boating company itself.

www.cruisehalong.com

Other travel agencies, I believe, do book the Cruise Halong boats, but we dealt with the vendor directly.

I should say that I don't think we got any kind of special deal or anything, but last I had heard, they were offering steep discounts as occupancy is WAY down this year.

May be worth a try.

Filmwill had a great two-day experience at Halong Bay. We've had more than one report from someone who said their two-day trip was really two one-day trips, they did identical things both days with a boat full of people. So beware! Not all two day trips are created equal.

I'm with Filmwill. The one day trip to Halong Bay, IMHO, is an excruciating waste of time. I've done it.

A TWO night, three day trip to Halong Bay is way better. I've done it. It's on the second day it gets good.

try www.bhayacruises.com

Highly recco'd.

FYI missVIv!
http://www.halongjunkcruise.com/vi-v...6/default.aspx
http://www.halongjunkcruise.com/vi-v...2/default.aspx

hi will, dogster and Kathie,

thanks so much for the links.

i can feel the germ of an idea gradually emerging; next stop our local library.

how easy is it to travel individually around Vietnam as opposed to taknig a tour?

regards, ann

I took the overnight boat cruise through Handspan and enjoyed it, except for the drive back. Adding a second night just to go cruising would be a wast of time.

Adding a second night for camping/kayaking is an excellent idea. Might want to do that first and then relax on the cruise.

Note: I didn't actually spend a second night, but wished I had.

ann, there is no need for a tour in VN. You can easily travel independently. You may wish to use an agency for particular things (maybe booking Halong Bay or whatever) but no reason at all to take a tour. IMO, there are lots of reasons not to take a tour.

Vietnam is quite easy to travel around without a tour. You will only need 1-2 days in Hai Long Bay. You can rent a private boat for around $50 and it'll take you to the major island with a stop at Stop Island for swimming. It's a very small town and you can easily see it all in a day.