
Thao, our couchsurfing host in Ha Giang, went out of her way to make our experience enjoyable and comfortable! Such an adventurous spirit, and despite what she may tell you, an excellent cook!
After a week of exploring Northern Vietnam, Lisa and I headed to Cat Ba Island. Our journey started in Ha Giang on our first overnight sleeper bus followed by an immediate connection to a five hour bus/bus/boat/bus trip from Hanoi to Cat Ba Island. As I’m writing this a few days later, that trip doesn’t seem bad when compared to our 25-hour bus journey from Cat Ba to Hoi An (budget travel!). We chose to skip the usual tourist route of spending a night or two on a Vietnamese “junk ship” in Ha Long Bay, to instead craft our own adventure in the area.
As we stepped off the bus with only a vague idea of a hotel to check out, we quickly found that it was low season in town so every hotel was begging for our business. We checked out a few places and for $6 a night we got a room with two beds, wifi, and a hot shower — some of our cheapest accommodation in Vietnam outside of couchsurfing, but pretty typical in terms of quality. The bathrooms here are always all-in-one shower, toilet and sink areas which means everything including the toilet paper gets soaked when you shower.

View from our hotel in Cat Ba, Vietnam
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