Karsts, karsts, karsts!

The Yellow Kayak Was Mine

As I've said, Hanoi is charming in its chaos and insanity and I really like it.  But the four-hour trip between Hanoi and Halong Bay is a different story.  First, some observations:
Why is there a bread vendor every fifty feet over a bridge and nowhere else?  Wouldn't it be better to spread out more?  After the bridge, there is no one anywhere selling bread!
Just about every square foot that isn't buildings is used to grow things.  I saw amazing gardens, even on highway medial stripes with beans, squashes, greens, etc.  The other part is rice, rice, rice.
The rivers are, for the most part, mosquito infested mud holes.  I believe this is because most of the water is diverted to a very efficient aqueduct system for the rice paddies.
Any other mud puddle is filled with white ducks - most likely dinner.
The road is being widened to handle Halong Bay traffic, but in so doing many people lost their yards, their living rooms or their entire home.  The bulldozer made a straight shot.  Because of this, the towns along the way are very dusty and laundry is a yellowish orange color like the soil.  There are also many factories and some mining of the surrounding hills.  This appears to be for the brick foundries (I counted 3) and possibly for the marble as many carvings are for sale in this area.
All in all, it's not pretty, except for the rice paddies.  But then you get to Halong Bay.  I had intended to rest since I got up early, but it's impossible to stop looking.  It is more beautiful than I imagined.  The boat is also amazing with beautiful teak walls, floor and gorgeous Asian influenced decorations - probably the nicest room I've had this trip.    There are some very nice people on board from Australia, Norway, England, Canada, Lithuania and New York.  It's a great group and I am really enjoying myself.  Peter and Berend are from Amsterdam but have lived in Bangkok for seven years and own a boutique hotel in Luang Prabang.  The food is totally over the top with a seven course meal for lunch including grilled prawns.  Delicious!  We kayaked through some karsts this afternoon and it was lovely, spotting and hearing the elusive hornbills that I've been searching.  They must have known I wasn't carrying my good camera!  What an amazing, incredible place!  Wish you all could see it. Yesterday was Women's Day in Vietnam so the crew, including captain, engineer, chefs sang to us and all the women received long-stemmed red roses and the most beautiful heart shaped box with a shell necklace after our nine course dinner of seafood.  Then there was cake for the newlyweds and the couple celebrating their 25th anniversary.  It is, as always, the dinner that is awkward.  I have ended up with a couple from New York (Sue and Michael) who are traveling with their daughter, Sandy.  It's a great situation for me and hopefully they don't mind me at their table.  The newlyweds, Katy and Tim are so nice.  He's a reporter for the BBC.  There are several Australians including Belinda and Brandon who "looked after" me on the kayak yesterday.  The Aussies all like to party.  Woke up this morning to birds.  The water is like glass and now one of the staff is singing in Vietnamese.  Lovely!
I have returned from Halong Bay and, after 3 kayak trips, amazing food, dinner in a cave, great people and total luxury and relaxation, I am very happy I went.  Tonight in Hanoi with someone trying to coerce me into drinking snakes blood (really), tomorrow in Bangkok, then home.  I'm ready.