Halong Bay, water puppets and seafood....

to be
,
Hey again all,
So I am back from Halong bay after a night on a boat! Can I just please say at this point OMG it was THE MOST AMAZING couple of days! Soooooo much better than I expected! To be honest, when I read that we were heading for Halong bay to spend the night on a boat, I had imagined pretty basic accomodation: smelly loos, sleeping in tiny short uncomfy beds, grilled fish slapped onto a plate... that type of thing. Well, let me tell you what eventuated....
First of all, we reached Halong Bay (stunning) and were lead to a 1940s style (I think) old wooden boat, and were greeted by a smiling man with a silver tray of hot towels (!) We were then lead to a simply deluxe restaurant with lovely silverware and, of all things, white tablecloths! You could have knocked me over with a feather. It was so very lovely. We were served in the formal fashion with a tasteful repast of fresh cooked prawns (caught mere metres away, as we afterwards found out) fresh spring rolls, etc. It was so very lovely. And our rooms were great! That afternoon we visited the Amazing Cave where our guide spent a great deal of time pointing out very subjective objects in the stalagmites/tites (I can never remember which is which). It went something like this:
"see that one? It is a baby lion, see the nose and the hair"
Group response, "hmmm, yes of course" (most of us faking it with impugnity). It was very beautiful, probably not the highlight though. I then decided that I was not going to spare the world the sight of my white thighs and go for a swim... which was just fab. How many people can say that they have floated in between islands in a bay in Vietnam!!!! It was the most spectacular scenery, probably up there with the best I have ever seen.
Fish dinner was spec-tac-ular, more amazing seafood and wine.... mmmmmmm. Literally the best meal I have every eaten. Massive prawns, baby limes, crayfish type thingies, crabs, fish cakes, mmmmmmmmm. I don't think, somehow, I'm going to be losing much weight this trip!
Anyway, I was going to write about the water puppets but I think I need
to be polite and let someone else have a go at the free Internet!
Love,
D x x