Vietnamese Whirl Part 4 – Escape to the Country

Extolled as being one of the best kept secrets of Northern Vietnam, Cat Ba Island lies just south of the more famous Halong Bay.  We had the luxury of time during our stay in Hanoi, and wanting to escape the city for a few days, so we took the bus and speedboat over to see what all the fuss was about.

We had heard that the island was undergoing large scale development by vast Vietnamese hospitality groups such as Vinpearl and Sunworld, and the latter had even built a cable car to connect the island to the mainland.

We were saddened to hear this, as these huge complexes comprising hotels and theme parks had ruined the Southern Vietnamese Island of Phu Quoc which we had visited on our last trip to Asia.

Fortunately, our small hotel was outside of Cat Ba Town where the major building works were taking place and we settled in, taking in the views from the balcony and rooftop pool.  We found ourselves out in “the sticks” but managed to walk along the not-too-busy road (compared to Hanoi!) to our nearest restaurant and enjoyed a pleasant lunch watching the farmers working the fields which led to the sea.

The main purpose of our visit was to commune with nature at the Cat Ba National Park, a UNESCO biosphere, where we’d booked a trek for the following day.

Our guide explained that the cabins and waterpark located in the park had been hit quite badly by a typhoon in 2023 and were in a state of dereliction.  The area was gradually being reclaimed by nature which we admired as we trekked ever upwards through the forest towards the viewpoints.  After an hour or so of hard climbing through dense jungle, we decided that maybe we were getting too old for all this!

Thankfully, we were driven by car to a couple of nearby caves, one of which had been used as a hospital in the Vietnam war, but was sadly out of oxygen!  Last stop was a pagoda where the philosophy of Buddhism was explained to us by our guide, who had previously been a monk.  He lit a joss stick for each of us and told us to make a wish…I’m hoping that “world peace” wouldn’t be too much of an ask for Buddha…

Sadly, we didn’t get to see any golden headed langurs, a critically endangered species only found on Cat Ba, with a population of less than 70.  The massive building developments we saw that evening on a quick visit to Cat Ba town would probably see this reducing even further, although efforts are being made to guard against poachers.

Finally leaving the smog of Hanoi behind, we set off for the next stop on our journey – a couple of hours south to the area sometimes referred to as the “inland Halong Bay”.  The small town of Tam Coc, was lined with bars, restaurants and backpacker homestays, which reminded us a bit of Pai in Northern Thailand.  We definitely felt like the “oldest swingers in town” as we dragged our bags to our accommodation.

We were greeted at the Eden Homestay by our (sometimes too…) genial hostess, Linh who showed us to our rooms after gushing about all the different tours we could book with her!  There were several locations in the area which offered boat trips, and I’d heard that the “rowers” could be quite pushy if you didn’t tip them enough or buy something from the vendors who also frequented the lakes. Put off by this we avoided our local lake and opted for an early morning tour to Van Long Wetlands Reserve.

Armed with his binoculars, Ian spotted kingfishers, spoonbills, herons, several squirrels scurrying up the limestone cliffs, but was most excited to see a Delacour langur atop one of the karsts.  This area was one of the few habitats of this endangered species with less than 300 believed to exist in the wild.  Drifting slowly and peacefully through the morning mists was a magical experience, and almost worth missing breakfast for!

Next stop on the tour was the Cuc Phuong National Park, the oldest and one of the largest national parks in Vietnam. Within the park was an endangered primate rescue centre, where we finally got to see some golden headed langurs that had been rescued from poachers in Cat Ba. Most of the primates were eventually rehabilitated into the wild but the centre also acted as a breeding centre for rare species.  After a stop at the not-so-interesting turtle rescue centre, we climbed up more steps to yet another cave (why can’t they made these caves on the ground floor??) – this one was supposedly inhabited by prehistoric man, who probably wished that the stairlift had been invented several thousand years earlier!

After lunch, we were taken on another long hike through the jungle – our guide’s promise of “no stairs” actually meant that we had rocks and logs to climb up instead.  Chatting to our fellow trekkers from Belgium and France helped take our minds off our aching limbs, and our host Linh kindly offered us a herbal footbath on our return!

The next few days were overcast and rainy – the weather had finally caught up with us – so we made ourselves at home in a little café overlooking the lake.  Watching the boats go by, we were amused by the unusual technique adopted by the rowers – they often used their feet to row – sometimes with a bicycle motion.  I’m not sure how they kept their feet on the oars (maybe Velcro socks??), but their style was impressive.

When the weather cleared one morning we made the trek through town to the Bai Dinh pagoda which was pleasant enough and accessed via a small bridge, but seemed to be full of souvenir stalls and Instagrammers.  There were two more temples built into the mountainside, and another viewpoint – but as you will probably guess, the 500-step climb to the summit put us off!

After a massage for Ian and a pedicure for me in one of the numerous beauty salons/spas spread throughout the town, we decided that we’d had enough of the weather and the lakes, and booked (with some trepidation) the 7-hour overnight train southwards to Dong Hoi, the stop-off point for the Phang Nha National Park.

Next Stop: Where the buffalo roam…