Northern Vietnam

4/9 we woke up STARVING and with only 5 hours of sleep. Plan for the day was to book out Ha Long Bay tour, hit up the pizza shop down the road and then take a gander of Hanoi!!!!

We went back and forth between hostels and information centers trying to find the best bang for our buck on our 3 day Ha Long Bay tour. We ended up going with Hanoi Backpackers Hostel package tour. We went to their BBQ on the rooftop for buy 1 get 1 drinks and free burgers! 2 vodka/redbulls were $1.50 USD! We had a fun night and then hit the hay so we could wake up and be ready at 6am for our bus that left at 6am.

4/10 Allie and Elena both woke up sick :( We think it was something we drank or ate the night before. It could have ben so many things. Ice is sometimes made with contaminated water, red bull (as we LATER found out) has amphetamines in them in Asia, or it could have been undercooked burgers :/ Whatever it was hit Allie and Elena really hard! It was a miserable 4 hour bus ride for them! Somehow I dodged it and was happy as a clam.

We made it to our sleeping boat and made our way to our little secluded island. Before we got to the beach they left everyone who wanted to jump off the boat to do it then. It wasn't great weather and it was a little chilly and we honestly didn't bring that many clothes so we opted out of that one... We all then hopped in some kayaks and made our way to the caves. The scenery was beautiful on the way there! We were surrounded by massive rocks that look like they have just plunged out of the water. Incredible. A lot of people didn't wear shoes in the kayaks, including myself, to the cave because the instructors didn't tell us to wear them. Okay, those rocks in and outside the cave were LETHALLY sharp. The cave was neat, but completely dark and we only had one torch (flashlight) for the whole tour of about 30 people. We were stumbling on each other and scattering when we hear creepy sounds, but that's all part of the fun! On the way back from the cave the instructor told us how Ha Long Bay got it's name. I can't really remember too much except for the fact that there was a dargon that protected the city and he blew fire that turned into the rocks that we were kayaing through.

Dinner on he boat. Shower. SLEEP!

4/11 Made it to the island! Signed up for wakeboarding. Doesn't mean that I actually DID it. I tried. 5 or 6 times and I just couldn't stand up! I know, I know... But to defend myself it was a little bitty boat with a small engine so they had to gun that sucker at the start to have enough speed to keep you up later on. Soooo, I basically face planted 5 or 6 times in a row! I bet it was entertaining watching from the beach... The boat revving, slowing down and turning to get me. rev, slow, turn. rev, slow turn.. haha.

Played volleyball and badmitten on the beach, lounged around and got some sun. We stayed up really pretty late this night and had a fantastic night of card games and shaky faces. Shaky faces are so entertaining! It's when you relax all the muscles in your face and spin your face side to side and someone takes a pictures of you with the flash on so it freezes all of the movement. Your top lip is on the left, bottom lip on the right and your nose and cheeks are just flying. Got try it! It's hilarious. Maybe it was just really funny to us because we had a few.. Ok a lot of drinks...

4/12Headed back to Hanoi and got some much needed laundry done. I think at this point it was the first time I had laundry done at a hostel. I had just washed my clothes in the sink or tub every other time because we were on the move so much.

4/13 SHOPPING

4/14 Sleeper bus to LAOS.... to be continued...