Halong Bay is a body of water of approximately 1,500 square kilometres in north Vietnam with a 120 kilometre coastline, in the Gulf of Tonkin Gulf of Tonkin near the border with China, and 170 kilometres east of Hanoi. Ha Long Bay - means "Bay of the Descending Dragon" in the Vietnamese language.
Ha Long is one of the most spectacular sceneries in Vietnam, it looks like a paradise due to its charm and beauty with beautiful limestone for marions, rock arches, clean water, beautiful scenery, strange caves, peaceful small is land, straight cliffs, strip of white powdery sand and thousands of limestone islets. With its 3000 island on an area of 1.500km rising from the cry stall line emerald waters of the Gulf of Tonkin, the Ha Long has been a major attraction for tourists and film makers. It is one of the natural wonders of Vietnam. Visiting Ha Long Bay, you will see and discover many well – known caves with beautiful stalactites and stalagmites. They are magnificent. Among these caves are Thien Cung cave, Dau Go cave and Trinh Nu cave.
The Halong Bay was World Heritage listed by UNESCO at the 18th meeting of the Committee of the World Heritages of UNESCO (in Thailand on December 17th, 1994). It is one of Vietnam's most popular tourist destinations.
Halong Bay has been the setting for local naval battles against Vietnam's coastal neighbours. On three occasions in the labyrinth of channels between the islands the Vietnamese army stopped the Chinese from landing. In 1288 General Tran Hung Dao stopped Mongol ships from sailing up the nearby Bach Dang River by placing steel-tipped wooden stakes at high tide, sinking the Mongol Dubhai Khan's fleet.
A cruise in Ha Long Bay - or the Bay of the Descending Dragon - for many represents the pinnacle of their experience in Vietnam. easily one of the most popular destinations in the country, UNESCO World Heritage-listed Ha Long Bay is both mystical and magnificent, an incredible feat of nature that almost never fails to impress.
It's not the cliffs themselves that make Halong Cruises unique, but rather their sheer number. A huge bay, dotted with nearly 2,000 mostly uninhabited limestone cliffs, the breathtaking scenery is very similar to that of the Andaman coast of Thailand, Vang Vieng in Laos and Guilin in China.
In what constitutes one of the most fascinating cultural features of the area, some of these fisherman still live on the bay today - on floating fishing villages, where houses are set atop barges year round, the inhabitants catching and cultivating fish throughout.
Halong Bay cruises mostly run out of Hanoi or the coastal town of Halong City (which faces out and over the bay). There are hundreds of agencies selling tours on the bay, but very few actually run their own boats - instead most are consolidators or resellers. Organizing a tour is very much a buyer beware scenario -- talk to other travelers and shop around - if you're paying $15 a head for a two day tour of Ha Long Bay rest assured it will be pretty dodgy. Try to include a stay on Cat Ba Island if you can.
Halong bay
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Nah, Clutchen Mentus...the OP cut and pasted from here: http://halongbaycruisesvietnam.net/page ... ay-vietnam