Whatever you do DON’T bother going fishing in the Pacific Ocean for the next couple months! We have pretty much eaten all the seafood that lives in it in the past two days on this boat!!! Seriously, I’m not kidding....I love shrimp but honestly if you offered me the perfect bite of shrimp right now I’d 100% guaranteed say “not a chance!”
Our time aboard the Treasure Junk has been outstanding. We’ve been treated like queens and fed like kings. Our little cabins are super cute and comfortable. Each has two twin size beds, two large windows (that open), air con, and a full bathroom. We have access to all the fresh water we want right outside our rooms and on deck 3 (there are just 3 decks) we have sun loungers aplenty. Deck 2 is the dining room/bar and the front outdoor deck which is where I’m sitting tonight to type this post. It is 8:30 pm now and we just finished dinner. Being aboard has definitely been an eatfest! Today the four of us skipped out of the activity as we all agreed we’d much rather spend a little time lounging on our “private” upper deck (everyone else was off doing the activity) as the boat made its way back to Halong Bay to restock and to pick up and drop off passengers. Some folks are just on here for one night....we are sooo glad we opted for the two night package! The temperature outside right now is warm....maybe about 25 degrees with a fairly high humidity so it feels a tiny bit warmer than that. But it is comfortable, there is the gentlest of breezes coming off the water as we sit anchored here for the night. There are just 10 of us on the boat tonight with our staff of 22! Yes, you read that right...there are more than 2 staff per guest at the moment! Last night there were 29 guests but tonight it feels like we are on our private yacht. :-). A couple of the folks are down on the main deck squid fishing off the tender. Last night they caught a couple so there was much excitement in the air. Tonight everyone is much quieter though....whether that is because there are fewer of us or because we are just too full to move any faster than a snails pace I’m not sure.
I’m talking a lot about the food because really that has been a highlight. The day we arrived (yesterday) we started with a lunch that consisted of 7 courses! That night we enjoyed a dinner outside on the front deck that was served buffet style. This morning there was an early morning small bite at 6:30 and then there was the full brunch buffet at 9:30. At 1 pm there was another 7 course served lunch and tonight there was a served dinner that seemed to be never ending. At one point I assured Lynda that dinner must be finished as they’d just cleared our final plate. But I was wrong! They brought another plate that had an entire meal on it....and then of course there was dessert after that. All four of us literally rolled away from the table tonight. Gail and Darlene have already gone to bed and I’m pretty sure neither Lynda nor I will be far behind!
Yesterday was a full day which was part of the reason we opted to stay on board today. We left our hotel in Hanoi by 7:30 in the morning. From there we walked the couple of blocks to the Handspan office where we waited for the bus that would take us the four hour journey to Halong Bay. There would be one rest stop along the way at a place where people with a disability are creating handicrafts and art to sell. Some of their handwork was stunning! As well, they had such great bathrooms there I can see why the buses all choose to stop. LOL...
OMG! It is now happy hour (2 for 1) on the boat and so Lynda has just ordered she and I a couple of brandy Alexander’s. She had one earlier and said it was so delicious that I had to try one too. As full as I am I’m looking forward to it.....the one she had earlier looked so pretty and she said it was super yummy. :-). OMG again! The drinks just arrived and she was right...they are toooo delicious! The perfect blend of brandy, creme de cacao, and cream. I commented that we should have watched them make it to see what the ratios are that they used and Lynda’s response was....well.....I guess we’ll just have to have another one. I think her comment was, “anything to help out my friend”....LOL.... :-)
Speaking of LOL....yesterday’s activities were full of laughter. Everyone was to go kayaking but neither Darlene, Gail, nor I wanted to (or maybe its more accurate to say...none of us were interested in getting in and out of those skinny little boats). Lynda said she was game and so she climbed into the front of a kayak with Dung (pronounced Zoong), our guide. She was sooo happy to be there. She was at the front of the group and as she was in the front of the boat she had nothing but open ocean and limestone pillars as her view. Dung had made arrangements for the tender to take Gail, Darlene and myself to the beach where the kayaks were headed so we could meet them there. We really loved our little boat ride through the limestone pillars and when the tender dropped us on our private beach we really were excited. That is until the tender pulled away as soon as we were off the boat! It left the stairs we’d used to get off the boat but it pulled a long ways out and just left us on the beach! None of the three staff on the tender could speak any English and so we really had no idea what was going on. In fact, at that point we didn’t even know that the kayakers would be coming there. For the first half hour or so it was great on our little private beach. We had a few laughs about being stranded there and what would we do... etc etc. Gail found a piece of coral that looked a lot like a skull and so we laughed that perhaps this was the remains of the last people the tender dropped off here. Then we laughed some more as Darlene fashioned a fish hook out of some coral and I located a fishing pole. Gail found a bit of discarded fish net on the beach and then she spied a couple of ghost crabs! It is getting close to Hallowe’en after all...perhaps they’re dressed up for it already. :-). As Gail tried to point out these nearly invisible little creatures to us she tossed Little Rock’s in their direction. Interestingly, we discovered that Gail is a pro at rock tossing! She must have had a misspent youth where rock tossing was a part of it!
After another full hour had passed, one of the staff hand paddled in from the tender on a kayak. We honestly thought he was coming to rescue us as we were long ready to leave this little beach but no...he was just coming in to go pee so off he went in search of a private place to do his business! Once we’d realized that he wasn’t going to be of any help Gail decided that she’d had enough! She got up and made an SOS in the sand on the beach, then she washed her shoes and put them on the stairs ready to go. Then she gathered up her water bottles (she had 2 “just in case”) and put them on the stairs with her shoes. Then she donned her life jacket and shook out her towel. Darlene and I were beginning to think we were going to have to knock her out to keep her from trying to swim to the tender! It wasn’t too long after this that Darlene and Gail spied the first of the kayaks coming around the corner. They’d been out there for more than two hours which meant that we’d been stranded on that beach for the same amount of time! I guess if we’d have wanted to go swimming or something it might have been okay but none of us wanted to and so that is a long time to be there not knowing what’s going on!
Lynda’s kayak was still in the lead. She was dubbed the queen and Dung the king of the kayaks. Today Lynda is still able to lift her arms...tomorrow may be a different story! It turns out that the kayakers ran into some problems with low tide and so had to backtrack a long way round to get to us which is why their one hour paddle turned into something more like 2 1/2 hours. Once all the kayakers had a chance to swim on our little beach the tender came back in and picked us all up for the long ride back to the big boat. We were all pretty glad to see that big boat - perhaps Gail most of all!
So I’ve been sitting out here typing for about an hour now and I’ve finished my brandy Alexander and morning is going to come early.....we have to be ready to go back into the tender by 7:20 as we’re headed to a little fishing village where we’ll climb into another little boat that will be paddled around by a local fisherman. Could be good for another laugh! After that we’ll return to this boat in time for a 9:45 brunch and an opportunity to pack up, pay our bar bills, and get ready to head back to the bus for our return journey to Hanoi (another 4 hours).
Treasure Junk has been a great adventure - one that we’ll long remember and one that we highly recommend to anyone planning a trip this way.
Till next time....when we’re back in Hanoi.....
Darlorlyngai
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