May Holiday Part 3 - on the way home

I guess I must post this before it is too long overdue! :-(

Ha Long is located about 3 hours drive from Hanoi. The road and traffic is not so friendly (more small road than highways) but the scenaries along the road are beautiful.

Ha Long is very beautiful and natural and I would strongly recommend to take the 2 days/1 night boat trip. Many people are worry about the boat but it turned out to be a stable boat.

Our boat name was Santa Maria cruiser arranged by the hotel in Hanoi. The food served was very good but the room is just ok for a one night sleep. It's clean but not that sophisticated. Anyway you will not stay in the room the whole day. The boat has a nice sundeck where we hanged out most of the time. My dad was so connected to the nature that he always went to sundeck whenever he had the chances.

The travel agent has a program set for us. They will arrange when you have to have breakfast/lunch/dinner and they also took us to kayak trip. In the beginning I was not that sure about kayaking but ended up enjoying it alot. There is also a designated place where you can swim in the bay which is good after some hours kayaking. The next day we went to the caves to see many stone formations but for us it is not that interesting as this is very normal tourist places that you'll find in China.

The only downpoint was the night. They parked the boat in a quite bay together with many other junk boats. However 2 junk boats decided to make a karaoke contest night and that was just hillarious but yet terrible to hear that loud music and (many times!) not synchronize lyrics. I must strongly suggest that they forbid karaoke to better enjoy the nature. It's not very often we can sit under the sky and enjoying nothing but the sounds of wilderness!

But all in all, I still vote for Halong bay to be one of the 7th Wonder of Natural World!

I will also not post extra about Hong Kong and Macau. It's heaven for shoppers and gamblers as everyone knows it, but just in case you want to see other side of Hong Kong then just take a train ride to Lantau Island (about 30 minutes train ride) and you can see the giant Tian Tan buddha. It was a nice city break especially for the men and they can worry less about their credit card bill for a day! :-)

Enjoy the photos;


Create Your Own

Rio de Janeiro – It’s all about caipirinha and beaches

After some flight rerouting confusion in Iguazu, we finally arrived in Rio by 6 pm (originally scheduled at midday). Some other couples we met in Iguazu didn’t arrive until 8 pm. The weather in Rio was raining and heavy thunderstorm, but the next days were no longer raining but with lots of clouds. We stayed for 5 days and only starting from the third day that it turned to be sunny and blue sky. As for the temperature goes, Rio de Janeiro is located in the southern hemisphere so it was around 31 degree. Warm enough to be at the beach in January.

Our hotel was located in Ipanema beach, which we like a lot better than the Copacabana. But if you are into partying days and nights then the Copacabana beach is the one you want to go to.

The beach was good in terms of waves and sands. The only problem is that there are too many street sellers in the beach area which I found quite annoying if you just aim to have a nice relaxing nap. Perhaps this is also the reason why you are advised not to bring expensive items to the beach areas and of course, topless sunbathing.

We stayed mostly at the beach. We spent only one day touring the city of Rio, mainly to the two biggest tourist attractions, Corcovado Mountain where the Cristo Redentor is located and the Pão de Açúcar (Sugarloaf Mountain) where you can take good panoramic picture of Rio. We were not very lucky in the Corcovado Mountain as it is always covered with clouds. Oh well...

The city center of Rio is not really interesting (sorry to say). Perhaps the only two things worth to see is the Sambódromo where they hold the annual Carnival (we were surprised to find out that the size of the Carnival street was only 700m long, it sure looks longer than this in the TV!) and the Favelas, the place where the poor community people live in Brazil. They are located also in the city, just side by side with the skyscrapers and it is strongly advised to the tourists not to go near these areas!


PS: Cristo Redentor is recently named as one of the seven wonders of the modern world.

Pictures from the trip.