One of the must see places in Vietnam is Ha Long Bay. Hạ Long Bay is known for its thousands of towering limestone islands topped by rain forests. The confusing part is knowing where exactly to go in the Ha Long Bay area. We decided to post up on the beautiful island of Cat Ba. To get to Cat Ba from Hanoi, you have to take a bus about four hours to the coast, where you jump on a ferry to the island. Once we got to the island, we could already tell the affects the virus was having because the crowds were very small.
There are plenty of activities to do on Cat Ba, but mainly it’s a place you go to relax and soak up the rays. There are a few different beaches on the island, but a couple of the main ones are looking pretty shoddy because of hotel construction. However, we did find an awesome beach that we pretty much had to ourselves each day.
Our favorite activity during our time in Cat Ba was motorbiking to Cat Ba National Park. Cat Ba is small and quiet so it was the first place that we felt comfortable jumping on the motorbikes (mopeds) that we had been seeing in Southeast Asia for the last couple of months. They are a blast and an excellent way to see the island and get from place to place. We drove them to the middle of the island where the national park sits. In the national park there was an hour hike that took us to the top of a mountain overlooking the island. The admission to the park also allowed us access to a cave down the road that was worth the free admission.
Like I said above, there are not a lot of things to do on the island except relax and take in the incredible scenery. It was fairly empty most days, but there were quite a few restaurants and bars and they would get crowded at nighttime. We didn’t get to see any other islands, but we did see the mainland town of Ha Long and Cat Ba is by far and away a better destination. If you aren’t the type to get antsy, then you could spend a lot of time on this cute and quiet little island.
