Fancy meeting you here

We said to Clare and Sarah. We met them yesterday over lunch as they asked who we had booked our trip with. We told them and they booked on the same one so we met up again this morning! Hope it's not rubbish - we feel kind of responsible now!

Anyway, we had three things we wanted to do and only really time (and money) for two so we picked one each! Today was the first of Martyns days. Well not really true - I changed his mind a bit but he says he is very pleased I did. His choice was Ha Long Bay - for the classic picture of the limestone islands (karats) and a go on a junk. We negotiated and instead headed to Bai Tu Long Bay which is virtually exactly the same scenery but has about 50 tourist boats that mostly Vietnamese use as opposed to the 600 boats that Western tourists use of Ha Long bay.

5 hr drive to get here, best trip lunch yet on boat, kayaking around limestone islands, making our own spring rolls for dinner (we are experts now!), stunning scenery and way too many photos later it's time for bed so we can be ready for tomorrow. Whatever that may bring as we explore the land of 'the children of the dragon' some more - Ha Long means mother dragon and Bai Tu Long means 'dragon children'

Oh and have discovered that in vietnamese my name means tree. It's spelt cay but pronounced the same!