While Halong Bay is world-famous for its multitude of craggy emerald-green limestone karsts emerging from the waters off the coast of Vietnam, you’d be forgiven for not knowing that just around the corner are the decidedly less tourist clogged Cat Ba Island and Lan Ha Bay. We quickly decided that Lan Ha Bay would offer a more laid back and off the beaten track experience compared to being crammed onto one of the hundreds of overcrowded boats which sails out into Halong Bay each day.

The nearest place to stay when visiting Lan Ha Bay is Cat Ba Island, the largest of 367 islands in the Cat Ba Archipelago. Happily, Cat Ba island is more than just a spring-board for cruises to Lan Ha Bay. Despite Cat Ba Town being a burgeoning concrete tourist town, the rest of the island is still covered with dense jungle, about half of which is protected as a National Park. It’s even home to the highly endangered (less than 100 left in the wild) Cat Ba Langur, which we did (just about) manage to see!

So that is why we chose to say…So Long Halong Bay, Hello Lan Ha Bay, Vietnam!

Getting There

Getting to Cat Ba Island is fairly simple, it’s a bus/boat combo taking a few hours from Hanoi. We advise asking your accommodation Hanoi to buy you tickets as there are a lot of agents to navigate in Vietnam’s busy capital. We didn’t return to Hanoi, instead choosing to take a catamaran from Cat Ba to the port town of Haiphong, before hopping on a cheap flight to Hoi An.

A Note On The Weather

We visited in January which is a dry and cool month, but we were still supposed to have temperatures of around 21 degrees. Unfortunately for us, Vietnam was experiencing some very unseasonable cold and unsettled weather. That meant no swimming, and putting up with some really very chilly and rainy days and nights. Luckily we still had the warm clothes we brought with us to go to the Himalayas!

Where to Stay

Most of the accommodation is in the small Cat Ba Town.

Getting Around

Cat Ba Town is small enough to walk around comfortably, but you will need to rent bicycles or a scooter to reach the sights. Note- when we were there some rental places were asking for an international driving license in order to rent a scooter. We eventually found someone who would rent to an EU license, and never had any problem in any other country, but this is perhaps something to consider getting if you are traveling abroad for a period of time.

When not on land you will be booked on to a cruise which will take you out to Lan Ha Bay and also normally include some (in our case freezing) kayaking action.

Lan Ha Bay

We don’t advise booking any tour until you arrive on Cat Ba Island as agents in Hanoi will probably overcharge, and it’s nice to be able to speak to and assess the agent when you are there. Although the town is very small, there is a huge amount of competition between agents for cruises and tours. We chose to use Cat Ba Ventures who are well established, have received many good reviews and are not the absolute rock bottom cheapest. As it was so cold, we decided just to do a 1 day trip with kayaking and sightseeing in Lan Ha Bay. There are multi-day tours where the boats are larger and you sleep in cabins.

Our cruise

Our day involved an early start as we were taken from the tour office to the nearby port and loaded, along with a small group onto our boat for the day. As we sailed out of the port we travelled through some traditional fishing villages nestled at the foot of the karsts, where we could observe the fishermen and their families dealing with the night’s catch and going about their chores.

This area of Vietnam is famous for squid fishing, so you can see lots of colourful boats with powerful lighting rigs for attracting the squid at night.

As we sailed along, we were struck by the wonderful colour of the water, a vivid turquoise which would have looked gorgeous in the sunlight – if there ever was any! Also many of the lush green islets that we passed came complete with their own little sandy beach and shrine.

After sailing further around the island, we stopped at a fish farm/fish restaurant to take a look at their floating operation, and see some huge ‘lucky’ fish that they were keeping to show to tourists. There were also plenty of cats and dogs to keep the place free from predators descending from the sky! Fish farms and traditional floating villages where families have lived for generations are becoming less common now, and we were told that some of the elders had literally never set foot on land.

It’s not exactly an easy life and younger generations want to, and are encouraged by the government, to move to land where there are schools and the glittering city lights. It also means that families can be safe in the event of devastating typhoons. If you are feeling adventurous then it is possible to stay the night on one of these farms – mind you, they are very basic!

On the boat

Some of our fellow travellers took the opportunity to do some diving from the boat and swimming, but as it was so cold, we did not join in! We were waiting for the Vietnamese lunch which was warming, tasty and plentiful.

The kayaking was the highlight of the day, despite us not wanting to get out in the cold and sit in a damp kayak at all! It was only the second time that we had done kayaking, so it was still a novel experience for us, and we quickly warmed up as we paddled along. Our guide navigated us through some tunnel caves which led into enclosed lagoons which were very peaceful. We were also lucky enough to see some langurs, but as we only had the iphone we couldn’t get a picture of these gangly creatures and their bright orange young.

Whilst we enjoyed our cruise, the weather really wasn’t on our side. Sadly the cruise felt more like sailing through the Patagonian Fjords at some points, and it was quite a long drawn out day, especially as we didn’t want to do the swimming stops. We also encountered some rough sea on the way back and ended up feeling a little woozy, but thoroughly enjoyed the beautiful scenery of the hundreds of islands.

One thing we had really been looking forward to was seeing a famous Vietnamese junk boat with its striking red sails up. Sadly this was one of those real life traveller moments where your picture postcard idea doesn’t quite work out! We only say one junk and its sails stayed decidedly down. Thank you very much!

What else is there to do?

Cat Ba Town gets a bad rap because it has been developed with concrete hotels and karaoke (Vietnamese love karaoke!) bars. The bay and its fishing boats are however very pretty if you can get up high in a restaurant to enjoy the view.

Cat Ba Town possesses 3 beaches. Due to the weather, we didn’t really feel like sunbathing, and one was closed for redevelopment anyway.

The town’s fresh produce market is worth checking out for its variety of seafood and collection of weird stuff in jars (we gather these are for drinking – yikes!). In the morning there are also fishermen selling their catch around the bay.

A short uphill hike (30 minutes) from town is the Cannon Fort which is worth visiting later on in the day so that you can also enjoy the epic view and sunset. For a small fee you can wander around the fort and its tunnels which were built during WW2 and were used during subsequent conflicts with the French and Americans also. There is also a small museum and café and a couple of excellent viewpoints.

On the road out to the Cat Ba National Park, stop by the secret Hospital Cave which is an eerie and haunting warren of concrete tunnels in the hillside. It was built and used during the American War with help from the Chinese. We found it a welcome respite from the rain and cold and enjoyed taking some arty pictures in the tunnels, although it was a bit spooky being totally alone there!

Cat Ba National Park is the protected area of the island which is covered with rich jungle and teeming with diverse life. On a rather rainy day we did part of a trail, but as it was so misty we didn’t feel like making the effort to climb the mountain for the view.

Food

Cat Ba Town is not going to win any culinary awards, and it’s certainly not comparable to Hanoi’s specialist cuisine, however you can certainly eat very well and very cheaply. We enjoyed the small friendly family run restaurants where you could pick up a quick pho or warming noodle soup. We also enjoyed hot-pot which is a typically Vietnamese communal dish. You basically get served a broth on a little gas stove and then raw meat/fish/veg/herbs to cook in it. Nothing out of the ordinary, but it definitely seems to be the dish of choice for Vietnamese families who gather in their shop/livingroom each night to share their meal.

In the centre of town there are several very large seafood restaurants with a plethora of tanks of live catch outside. They seemed pretty much empty (the tanks and restaurants!) but they may well come to life in high season. Also probably worth a try in more lively times would be the floating restaurants which you need to catch a little boat out to. They seem like they can become quite rowdy with drinking and karaoke!

We felt like we only glimpsed Cat Ba Island, mostly because we were hampered and frustrated by the weather. The opportunities for eco-tourism and adventure sports such as mountain biking, hiking, rock climbing and kayaking seem incredible. Like many places in Asia, Cat Ba is probably headed for a tourist boom, especially from Chinese travellers as they become more affluent and mobile. Hopefully it can manage to protect it’s largely untouched and unique habitat for many years to come, by accommodating those who wish to enjoy its wonders without suffering from the unchecked expansion of tourism. We did see a certain amount of rubbish in the water and on the shores during our cruise and the proximity to the major port of Haiphong must always be felt.

We’d definitely go back to Cat Ba for some further exploration, but would need some strong assurances on the weather!