Cat Ba, Dog Ahhh!

Cat Ba Island, Ha Long Bay, Vietnam  August 4th - 7th

The ocean was calling us, so like hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of other tourists we headed to the wonders of Ha Long Bay, an area delineated a World Heritage site due to its unique beauty of karst (seems to be a theme) jutting up out of deep blue water. After much investigation and discussion we decided to opt out of the typical overnight stay on an “authentic” junk boat and instead did a do-it-yourself package. We headed over to the bus station and secured a bus-boat-bus combo with the help of a handwritten note from our hostel rep. By 7:40am we were off heading first to Haiphong, a droll sea port town and then on to a ferry that would take us to the Southern end of Cat Ba Island, only then to be loaded up on another bus to head to the main drag of Cat Ba on the entire other side of the island.

Waiting for the bus, we met our third set of Americans who happened to be from….you guessed it, Atlanta, Georgia. To make this world even smaller, two of the three were affiliated with Emory and were training to be nurse practitioners. The trip went really smoothly, with us pretty much mindlessly following the crowd from one vehicle to another with random stopping points here and there. About mid-day we arrived at Cat Ba town proper and dropped our stuff at Slo Pony, an adventure tour company we knew we would be using later on while we looked around for a place to stay.

I had some how managed to talk Pearce into not pre-booking, the first time on our trip so far, thinking that a resort town would not be difficult to find a place. I was oh so wrong. Apparently, Cat Ba turns into a raging resort town on the weekends in the summer, when all the Vietnamese come to party like its 1999, which made it especially challenging to find a place. We hiked over to Cat Co 2, a beach that reportedly had picturesque bungalows along the water. Turns out they jack up the costs to $20 for no air con, no internet, no security…no thank you. After hiking the 20 minutes back to the main drag, Pearce re-gathered his strength while I hiked up and down the main strip to try to find a room in one of the ubiquitous hotels facing the ocean. After six tries, I tagged out to Pearce who ended up scoring a 3rd floor balcony room facing the ocean on his first try. Only problem was it was only for two of the three nights. We decided we would figure it out later.

After grabbing some orange soda, Pringles, and an ice cream (siesta apparently is not only limited to Spain) we headed back to Cat Co 2 to enjoy the rest of the afternoon. We were joined en masse by what it seemed to be the entire Vietnamese tourist population on the island. Luckily, most of them stayed at Cat Co 1, which seemed to be more a Vietnamese version of Daytona Spring break environment, sans the “Girls Gone Wild”. That is unless you count fully clad women laying in the surf getting their pictures taken in various Glamour Shot poses. Our beach seemed to be reserved for the more laid back Vietnamese, including families looking for shells, groups of friends splashing in the water, and the handful of other Western tourists. Pearce and I decided to get in the water and were disappointed to see trash strewn all across the beach and floating in the water. Apparently disposing of rubbish where you like is not a Chinese-specific phenomena. That evening we headed back to Slo Pony to arrange our tour for the next day. There we met some other adventure bound Western tourists, two of which were Englishmen.  We would run into them repeatedly throughout our stay.  Dave, one of the Brits, was an adventure consultant who leads an unique and enviable life traveling the globe taking rich people on climbing and other sorts of wild expeditions. While sharing some Tiger beer with our new friends/”chaps”, we decided to try the kayak-climbing excursion which would take out us to Han Long Bay, more specifically Lan Ha Bay which was much less visited by swells of tourist boats.

The next morning hopped on a minibus with about 12 other people and headed to the dock. The people in the group were doing some combo of kayaking, climbing or beaching it on one of the deserted islets out in the bay. It was a gorgeous ride on smooth water passing amongst the green karst peaks. On the journey we passed fisherman, a few tourist boats, and whole villages of people who spent their lives out on the water. It was funny to pass a dog or two on those collection of boats and think they probably had never stepped foot on real land. On the ride out there we made friends with Katelyn and Gordon, two lovely Canadians from Vancouver who were traveling through a lot of the same places that we were headed and gave us lots of good tips. (Pearce’s suits and shirts are brilliant Gordon!!) They also have a very amazing tale of how they “met”.  Katelyn and Gordon’s mothers were in the same prenatal classes together and became friends, even joking about how their children (not yet born) should date.  Very long story made short, they are a couple that met before birth!

After picking up the kayaks from one floating village, we headed off to a remote section of the bay where the climbers would break off and the kayakers were free to explore for the rest of the morning, with the only caution that there were a lot of jellyfish in the water if we were to swim. Pearce and I struck off towards a distant beach that looked promising, but gave it up half way when we realized it seemed to be on a more heavily trafficked channel. We headed back towards the boat and twisted our way through the mountains that were all around us discovering little alcoves and other hidden beaches. We even found one section of mountain that made an arch that we could cut through. After getting a sufficient work out, we headed back at the boat to do some swimming. The water was just like a warm bath. Katelyn and Gordon (and the rest of the gang) came in soon after us and joined us in the water for a swim before we ate a delicious lunch. 

At the half way point, we headed to the rock wall via this cute little boat that looks like it is made of a giant tortoise shell flipped upside down. It is in fact a large woven basket, made in the traditional way and got us to our destination successfully. And what a destination.  Our climb site was a small beach between to faces of a karst peak island.  Although during the climb our eyes and attention were trained on the limestone holds, the view from the top yielded beautiful vistas of the bay.  This was going to be and was a spectacular way to be introduced to climbing.  The climbers, an assortment of skilled and unskilled (us) were quickly suited up and walked through the basics of climbing. Our getups consisted of shoes, harness and helmet and key phrases include slack (you need rope to be loosened), take (you need it to be tightened) and rock (if you dislodged something heading to your bela-er). The staff set up a series of climbs that ranged in difficulty and believe it or not, Pearce was the first volunteer to step up. He did an excellent job and worked his way all the way to the top where you hit the pins to signify that you completed the circuit.

My first one, a step up in difficult from P’s, did not go as successfully. I made it with 2 feet of the top of a very long climb but got stuck in a rock chute that had no where for me to grip.  Having never climbed before I didn’t know all the creative ways to get up a wall. Watching other people, I now know I should have used my back to press up against the back side of the chute and shimmied up. Still, I was proud of what I accomplished and was much more successful on the rest of my climbs. It was really fun to do something different and challenging, but I have a feeling we are going to be spoiled now as the setting was breathtaking (above and beyond the heights). I believe we both have been bitten by the bug though and are hoping to climb in other parts of Asia as well.  After the two of us successfully climbed the rock several times without injury we made our way across the shore back to the boat.  It was only then after the climbing that Pearce slipped and fell, slicing his hand on a sharp boulder.  Although the cut was small it bled like crazy and for a moment we thought it was much worse.

A video of Pearce climbing the karst peak on Moody Beach.

On return to Slo Pony, we set up a trek through the National park/jungle on Cat Ba for the next morning with Katelyn and Gordon and actually secured a room for our last night on the island. Well kind of. We met a random Scotsman who had a double/single bed he was willing to share. We only had to meet him at 6pm the next day after his climbing tour. Still, it felt nice to have that all sorted out, especially because it felt like I was coming down with a cold. That evening we met up with our new friends Katelyn and Gordon again.  We bonded over dinner and drinks and whiled the night away talking about national politics, travel, religion, love, life and everything in between. Good times.

The next morning my throat had moved from bad to worse, but I didn’t want to miss the hike so we headed to Slo Pony where our bus was going to meet us. It didn’t. Apparently, “Slo” had forgotten to arrange our tour for us and so scrambled to get us a ride. He quickly procured four scooter drivers for which we would ride on the back.  This was a nightmare scenario for both Pearce and Katelyn, made worse because it had just started to drizzle. I think the only reason I got Pearce on the scooter is that it all happened so quickly he didn’t have time to say, “hell no”. I (and I think Gordon) had a wonderful drive out to the middle of the island and actually enjoyed the warm rain hitting my face as the scenes of the countryside passed by. Katelyn and Pearce were happy to have made it in one piece.  Well Pearce did have a slight mishap with the driver’s helmet flying off and hitting him in the face. Whoops.

We waited for a bit and eventually our “guide” who spoke three words of English (slow, low, cow) led us out on our adventure. His name was “Dat” and Pearce could not refrain from making “Who Dat?” jokes a few times.  In the end I am not sure if Pearce enjoyed our scooter tour or our hike better. I would call it more of a barely recognizable trail in the middle of the jungle where you had to scramble over razor-sharp rocks and under enormous spider webs (and spiders) which both Pearce and Gordon are afraid of. We did this for three hours. It was hot, it was sticky, and each of us fell at least once. On the other hand we did get to see two random, bright red crabs, some stick bugs, a leaf bug, a blue cricket and we heard one monkey off in the distance. Our effort was also rewarded with a nice view at the top of the mountain where we balanced on an outcropping of spiky limestone rocks.

Watch our sweaty and triumphant glory at the top of Cat Ba Natl Park. Also witness Pearce calling Katelyn, Stephanie from Montreal (they’re from Vancouver)

After surviving our own episode of Lost, we headed back to Cat Ba Town and rewarded ourselves with an incredible meal at the Green Mango. Shortly there after we had to say goodbye to our friends.  In our travels we have met many people that we like or simply find fascinating (see Australian guy in Yangshuo post), but we think Katelyn and Gordon are people we would most naturally be friends with. Hopefully we will stay in touch, which may depend on how much offense they took to Pearce’s calling Katelyn, Stephanie for the whole first day. She was so sweet she did not correct him until I called him out the next day. (See you in Argentina, you crazy Canadians)  After our farewells, I was in desperate need of a place to rest. Since we were still without a room until 6pm we headed back to Cat Co 2 where we let the sounds of partying Vietnamese carry us off to sleep. After waking we headed back to the strip to meet up with the Scottish dude which I greatly looked forward to as my sore throat had escalated to a fever. We followed him up to his place to only find out that he didn’t actually have the room. You see in Cat Ba, first come first serve doesn’t necessarily hold any weight. So there we were, without a hotel room and it was already dark. After some negotiations with the hotel staff, the Scottsman followed a staff person in hopes of securing something else. He came back about 15 minutes later and said that he had found adequate accommodations for both of us albeit no longer together and not in an actual hotel. Duh-duh-dah.

At that point we didn’t care. As we walked toward a restaurant, he warned us that they were doing “something unsavory” with a dog.  Walking through the seating the area, kitchen and backroom of the restaurant, we found ourselves in the back alley behind the restaurant staring at a bunch of people who were surrounding a dog. This dog happened to be dead, was lying on its back with his tongue hanging out. It appeared a family of sorts were roasting its hair off with a blow torch in the middle of the street. Apparently you only need to go one street over to escape tourist Vietnam.  This was a very surreal scene to behold after a grueling day and we were both near delirium.  Needless to say, Pearce and I hurried past as quickly as possible, followed the person up some super sketchy stairs and down a dark hallway and finally entered our room. It was perfect. Clean – check; air con – check; and comfy bed – check. I was so happy I slept until 12:00pm the next day which meant we only had a few more hours before catching a ferry to Haiphong where we were going to catch a plane to Denang/Hoi An.