The day after we arrived in Hanoi we set off on a three day, two night trip to Hal Long Bay and Cat Ba Island. We woke up nice and early again as our tour guide was supposed to be picking us up from our hotel between 7.30 and 8am. Being in Vietnam we should have known better than to actually expect that this is when he would arrive! 7am he was at the door so after a mad rush we were ready for a bus trip to our boat.

We arrived at the boat and were all split up into groups and hoarded (literally) onto boats! To get to ours we had to clamber across a few, which was a bit of a mission with the old rucksacks!

On the boat we eventually headed off and then stopped again to sail round and round in circles while we had lunch! Then we set off properly. There were about fifteen on the boat so we met lots of people - one Swede, two Aussies, a yank, two Canadians and a whole world of English.

Ha Long Bay is one of the most amazing places we have ever seen; it covers 1500km and there are 3000 islets all randomly stuck in the middle for us to sail round. It was absolutely gorgeous. We spent most of the first day sailing around, cooking on the top deck...to say we got a wee bit pink is a bit of an understatement! On the way to our stop for the night we stopped off at a floating village, it was amazing; there was a school and everything! Our boat pulled up at a fish market but we were feeling a bit lazy so admired from afar!

Around 6pm we anchored and went for a swim and kayaking around the islets and over to caves while the sun was setting. We swam around until 7pm and after a few issues with a sinking kayak we all got back on the boat for a shower and some tea and spent the rest of the evening on the top deck until bedtime.

Yesterday morning was a bit of a struggle! Everyone got up bright and breezy at stupid o'clock in the morning to see the sun rise and were feeling the effects when we were told it was time to get off the boat. If only we had all anticipated the day ahead I'm sure we'd have stayed in bed a while longer and perhaps we'd have laid off the vodka!!

From our boat we got onto a little boat and sailed off somewhere, nobody was quite sure what the place was called but we were told it was for a short trek, 3km or so. Somebody didn't do so well at math in school! Our 3km walk turned into a 12km hike in the baking sun and included a mountain climb! And we don't mean just a wee walk up the mountain! This thing was a beast!

Our guide had told everyone it was fine to wear flip-flops because that's what he was wearing and that the mountain was only 300m high. He failed to tell us that he wasn't actually climbing the mountain and that it may have been 300m straight up but we didn't actually climb straight up! It took an hour to get up there in the baking heat and we've never heard our hearts beat so loudly! The view at the top was amazing though and opportunity to take plenty of photos although Jen decided it would be a good a place as any to be sick! (Was it the vodka, was it the heat? Nobody knows). David and David tried to teach our guide that if somebody asked him how far it was to the top, he was to reply with " a f*****g long way". 300 metres my ass!

When we eventually made it back down Everest it was time for lunch followed by a trek back to the boat and a short boat trip to Cat Ba Island for our 2nd night! Little did we know the fun had only just begun!

After tea we decided to go to a pub and meet up with two girls from the trek and play a little pool, where we met Beckham. It wouldn't be at all unfair to say he was a complete lunatic! A random guy on his lonesome in his England shirt, playing pool, talking to himself and head butting pillars were only three of his many talents! After that along came Tony (a crazy local), equipped with wife and trainee pool shark little girl! Happy pills don't even begin to describe this family! All high fives and woo hoos! Over he comes to the pool table 'how do you play this came?' he asks! Hey presto, first shot and he's off potting balls like there's no tomorrow! His little girl just set there watching making sure all was going to plan and picking balls out of pockets and flicking balls across the table where she saw fit which happened to be when Helen and David were playing two of the English girls!

To top the night off, we all headed off to the traditional Vietnamese discotheque! And what a discotheque it was! The excitement was at an all time high as we walked towards it and when we turned the corner, the music...oh the music!! It was no more Vietnamese than my foot! In fact it was about 20 years behind us in music, Chesney, old MJ, the works. It was like school discos all over again! We couldn't possibly have coped with any more excitement so it was time for bed ready for our boat back to the main land in the morning (another bloody early start!)

The boat on the way back today had mostly the same people on apart from some of the English crowd who looked a little worse for wear when they came down to say goodbye! Helen and David have invited us to stay with them when we make it over to Australia and Helen has practically written us another book about Oz so we have loads of places to go and see to keep us occupied!