I Spent 3 Days on a Luxury Cruise in Ha Long Bay - Full Review + Price

Ha Long Bay is one of the most iconic landscapes in the world with nearly 2,000 limestone islands rising straight out of the water. It's been named a UNESCO World Heritage Site and it draws millions of visitors every year. But beyond the cruises and postcard views there's hidden caves, quiet corners, and experiences that most people never see. So in this video we're taking a three day two night cruise with P&E Cruises along Ha Long Bay and we're going to see if it actually lives up to the hype. Let's jump into it. To start our journey they sent a shuttle for an early morning pickup from our hotel in Hanoi's Old Quarter. We're getting our shuttle and we're heading out to the boat. Three hours. The shuttle was really comfortable for the three hour drive. They provided waters for us and I had lots of leg room so did each of the kids. We stopped right around the halfway point to use the bathroom and to get some snacks and note that we are told that they don't have toilet paper in these bathrooms so you should bring some if you need it. One of the highlights was a shop that was making these little mini pancakes here and so we grabbed some of those and some other snacks and then got back in the van. Loaded up on pancakes and dried mangoes and now we're an hour away from the terminal. It was an interesting drive with a lot to look at. We started in the city and then we crossed over some rivers and we followed the water. We even saw rice paddies and different mountain ranges and people on motorbikes. It definitely made for an interesting three hour drive. After the shuttle arrived we were directed to the check-in area where we had about 30 minutes to wait for our shuttle to take us to our actual boat. Luckily there were some snacks available to purchase so we grabbed a few things to try. All right we got Texas barbecue chips in Vietnam to try. All right here we go. I don't think the person who made that has ever had Texas barbecue before. That being said it's not bad. It tastes like a very sweet barbecue sauce maybe. Our whole family is going to take down this bag. We all like it. This is our waiting area for about 45 minutes before we get to board a small boat to go out to our big one. After they called for our boat to board we gave them our tickets and then we went and got on the shuttle boat. From here you throw on some life jackets and then you start the cruise out into Ha Long Bay and it takes about 45 minutes on this small boat to get out to the boat that you're going to be doing the cruise on but this is also the first introduction into the beautiful area that you're going to be spending the next two to three days. Also because of the effort just to get all the way out here I would highly recommend you do the two night cruise if you can. That gives you more time spent on the water instead of the three hours each way on the shuttle and then the extra shuttle to the boat. It's just a lot of transportation to get there for only one night. And then eventually our ship came into view and we were greeted by the crew. Upon arrival we were given warm towels and they were actually dropping rose petals on us as we went up the stairs which was a huge highlight for my daughter. I have never been greeted by rose petals ever. We were then given watermelon juice and shown to the lunch buffet to start our time. This is nice. After an introduction to the boat and to safety we were assigned an attendant who was going to be with us for the full three days we were on the boat and then we were unleashed on the buffet. There's all sorts of different food here from American style food to Vietnamese food to soup and fruit and everything in between. The highlight though was that the boat had finally started moving and we were able to watch the bay cruise by us as we were enjoying our lunch. There were some massive yachts and boats in the bay with us but I was so excited to see the iconic rocks rising from the water. I mean these are the views that you see online and in the magazines when you look up Halong Bay and the surrounding area. Here is our room. We actually have a connecting room so they have to move that but check out this view right here and then there's a balcony out there I'll show you in a second and then here is the bathroom which is super nice and look at that tub. Wow here's the balcony out here and there's Jack and Sunny's room back there. They just got to connect the two parts. I can't get over that bathtub. That bathtub is where it's at right there and this is just so incredible. I cannot believe this guys. Never in my wildest dreams would I thought I would have been out here cruising this beautiful area with my family. I've got to pinch myself right now. Hey guys can you give me a tour? What do you got in here? What does it do? There's a secret window behind. Can you show it to me? Yeah. Whoa a secret window and look Jack's in there. There's our official room where they removed that part and we have access to the second bedroom over there. This is so nice. I don't think I've ever seen anything this nice floating on the water. We hung out in our room for a little while and then we just watched the world go by as we sat out on the balcony before deciding that it was time to go and explore the rest of the ship. We got all checked into our room so now we're going on a boat tour. I think it's going to be pretty short. It's not a huge boat. The lower deck and most of the middle deck were all rooms other than the dining area which is on the back of the middle deck. So basically the only thing to explore was the top deck and up here there were lots of different chairs that you could sit in. There was a spa and a small pool. By small I mean it was literally like a foot deep so it wasn't really much of a pool. There's a bar up at the top and there's a happy hour with get one free drinks right before dinner each night. There's also a great place to sit and relax right on the front of the ship with that view. Those little boats out there are people who are selling stuff and they'll actually come right up to the boat and they'll sell you a snack or a beer if you want. We didn't have any real cash with us so unfortunately we couldn't partake in this but it was really interesting to see how the boats come around and all the different things that they have for sale plus how they can hoist it up to the second floor. There's a full itinerary of activities when you're on the boat and so the first thing that we were doing was going kayaking. Here we go first kayaking experience with kids. This is our first experience kayaking with the kids and unfortunately Jack and I took a dip in the water when we were trying to get into our kayak. Luckily we both laughed it off and the second time was the charm. There's our boat right there. We're paddling out into the bay. Getting out on the water like this was a true bucket list experience. The Halong Bay area was designated a World Heritage Site in 1994 and in 2000 it was actually given a second recognition for its outstanding geological value. One of only a few sites in the world to receive dual UNESCO recognition. I have to say kayaking in Halong Bay is just as good as I hoped it would be. I mean look at these views all around us. The only bummer is that there's actually a decent amount of trash out here. I wish that there wasn't as much of that. This would be just a little bit more beautiful. We had about 45 minutes for kayaking. We spent the entire amount out on the water. Plus on the way back the kids decided that they wanted to paddle and so we both got to take a little bit of a break and let them do it. I like this life. My five-year-old is paddling me right now. We're not going anywhere too fast but he's paddling me. There's our boat right there. We're gonna go around to the other side so we can show you which room is ours. All right so we're on our side. So our room is that one and that one on the boat. After we got back they gave us the opportunity to jump in and since I was already wet I decided to do it. It was an awesome time to watch them kayak for the first time and it was so beautiful. All right now we're heading to the spa. It's worth jumping in for this. The spa was only lukewarm which is a little bit of a bummer but how do you beat sitting in the spa looking out over these views. By the time we were done with the spa it was about to be happy hour and so we grabbed our cards and then we all ordered drinks. Virgin drinks for the kids of course. This was one of the highlights for our kids was getting to have these special drinks every night. So how long bay? Uno and happy hour. I think that's as good as the sunset's gonna get tonight just because it's a little bit cloudy but it is still beautiful. I still can't get over how many boats there are. I mean look at all of those boats out on the horizon and then there's another four or five I don't even maybe more than five next to us. This was definitely the biggest surprise of the trip for us is just how many boats were out on the water here. I'm guessing there must be 30 or so different cruises you could do here. After watching the sun fully go down and the boats around us start to light up it was time for our next activity which was making spring rolls. This was a fun little appetizer for dinner and just a cool experience to have on the top of the boat learning the entire process of making spring rolls and then rolling them yourself. Here we go my expert rolling skills right here. I don't even know where to start. From the back? Wow it is so beautiful. Bobby said it's the best one he's ever seen. Yeah sure it's a bad one but you forget to close two sides. I don't feel like that's the way a spring roll is supposed to look. I mean it's pretty good. I do say so myself. Another shout out to the staff on this boat they are incredible. Now we're putting the kids to bed before our late dinner. The way that they do dinner is that it's multi-course with a couple appetizers and then a main entree and then dessert to finish it off. There are two options for dinner. Amy got the salmon and I got the chicken. Overall it's a really fun dining experience and they even do different celebrations for anniversaries and birthdays. After dinner I took the opportunity to walk around the boat a little bit and just to see the different lights of the boats all sitting out in the water around us. You can also go squid fishing off the back but I didn't do that on the first night. And with that our first night on the cruise is done we will see you tomorrow. I have to say this is a pretty amazing view to wake up to in the morning. Before starting the day we have to talk about our sponsor Surrey and something I've learned from traveling is that the way that you start your day sets the tone for everything that follows and that applies to whether I'm at home or on the other side of the world and that's why I use Surrey on my trips. Most electric toothbrushes are bulky, plasticky and feel like an afterthought but Surrey is different. It's got an intentional minimal design, plant-based brush heads and a UVC travel case that keeps everything clean and self-contained. It genuinely feels like a product they spend a lot of time thinking about and I like it so much that I bought one for Amy as well. Ever see a better place to brush your teeth? Plus the battery lasts over a month and the pressure sensor means I'm actually brushing the right way. It's a product that I've been relying on for my travels and using every day for the last year. If you want to check out Surrey for yourself use my code THREW15 by clicking the link in the description and you'll get 15% off your first order. Alright now back to the video. We started day two with breakfast and they had a lot of different options like an expanded continental breakfast that you would get at a hotel. And then from there we had about 30 minutes to kill before our shuttle picked us up to take us to our day boat which was going to take us on a different adventure somewhere that the bigger cruise ship couldn't go. This time we were only on the shuttle for about 15 minutes before we got to our adventure boat and that was a lot bigger and it was nice for our two and a half hour cruise which took us to where we were going. There's about 40 or so of us on the second boat and it was big enough that it could easily accommodate everybody with tables on the bottom floor and couches and things like that on the second floor. There was also places to sit on the upper deck but it wasn't a nice day it was very windy so I was the only one outside. It's windy today but you know that's not going to stop me from being 100% on the top deck taking in these views. So this day is what I was hoping for on this cruise being able to come so close to these massive rock formations. This area we're approaching right now is what I think of when I think of Ha Long Bay. I mean look at all those jagged mountains the different layers so cool. This day was definitely the highlight of the entire cruise for me. We were able to walk all around interact with the captain and just watch the world go by. I know I've said this already but I could not believe how many boats were out on the water. It almost feels a little bit like over tourism here and I'd love to hear if anybody has additional information on that in the comments. This place is so epic everywhere you look there's massive rock formations just jetting out of the water. I mean look at over there and then every time we turn a corner there's more to see. This is definitely my favorite part of the trip so far. About an hour and a half into the journey everybody was getting a little hungry so we decided to see what type of snacks they had on the ship. So we found these and we figured we had to give them a try. Hot chili squid chips. Who's trying them? Jack's gonna try them. All right you gonna be the first one? It kind of sounds weird but it smells good. I like it. Oh you do? Does it taste like squid? Well I guess if they ate it I'd try it. Hot chili squid chips. The name makes me not want to eat it. There's a little bit of an off flavor. All right well I thought nobody in my family was going to be excited about that but apparently everybody likes it. My turn. Maybe like the slightest hint of calamari maybe but basically not. After killing the entire thing of squid chips we were arriving near our destination and for a lot of today we were actually in Lon Ha Bay not Ha Long Bay. By this time we had also and we were arriving at Viet Hai Jetty which is where we were going to be hopping on bicycles and visiting a remote village. After getting an introduction we were set up with bikes and they had bikes where the kids could sit on the back which was perfect for us. That being said if you don't want a bike you can take a golf cart to the village as well or you can take the bike one way and then the golf cart back which is what we decided to do. It takes about 20 minutes to bike to the village and it was so cool as we got to go over some small hills we got to go through a tunnel and the views just kept getting better and better as we made our way deeper into the island. Eventually we made it to the small village and then we all got off of our bikes and we got an introduction to what life was like in the village and we got to try some local wine. All right so check this out this is snake wine and Amy's going to try a little bit. Do you like my glove? Oh thanks but am I brave? Am I brave? Does it taste like a snake? It tastes like like fish oh yeah like a scale. Oh yum. But I did it. After Amy's reaction I opted not to taste the snake wine and we explored a little bit more of the village. The last thing we could do in the village was a pedicure fish or also known as a fish massage. Look at how many fish are down there there's so many fish. Oh it's so gross. All right my turn. You guys this is the craziest experience it feels like they're like a little nibbling on your feet. Oh that's a lot look at how many you got right there well done. There's like hundreds of them on you. It's so weird. Wow Jack nice work buddy. Jack how many you got on there? A thousand. You're so brave. We probably spent about 25 minutes getting our fish pedicure and Sunny was the only one who didn't put her feet in. Let me know if you'd put your feet in in the comments. So they said that there's only 300 people that live in this small village right here we're exploring and it is just a lot of fun to see kind of the local culture. To get a couple suckers and to test out the fish. Now we're heading back to the boat and we're gonna have some lunch there. We said goodbye to our bikes and we hopped in the golf cart and I would say that half the tour opted to do that as well. The golf cart is great but if you have the physical ability I would say to bike at least one way it was so cool to explore this area on bike. As soon as we got back on the boat again they seated us and they were serving us a multi-course lunch. There's our chicken and they've been so accommodating they just put out french fries for the kids. We didn't even have to ask for it. Even though our kids will eat anything it's nice to know that that's an option. It was a good meal with a few different food options like chicken and beef and then they also served us fish and they served us a lot of different fruit. Amy's the dragon fruit monster she's eating more dragon fruit than a normal human being consumes in their life I think. And then as soon as lunch was done it was time to kayak. This is our kayaking spot for day two and check that out we can go through that arch right there or we can kayak up onto the sandbars. This is a pretty incredible spot for kayaking. Jack and I were able to get on the kayak this time without falling in so that's a plus. Are we the kayaking girls? Girls and girls. One of the best things about this kayaking area is that there was a little rock arch that we got to go through and the water was really smooth so it was very easy to maneuver around. I can't believe how amazing the kayaking is here look at this thing we just went through and there's basically no one around but our little group so cool. We only had about 45 minutes to kayak here and we were trying to make the most of it so we headed back through the arch and then we made our way over to one of the beautiful beaches that was right next to the boat. This is probably the coolest beach I've ever been to in my life. This is definitely one of those areas we wish we could have spent the entire day at but unfortunately we only had about 20 minutes and so we just made the most of it running all around looking at all the different seashells and just taking in the views. It's all sorts of little caves that you can explore. I still can't believe this is real life. This is blowing my mind right now. I don't even know how to describe it. I have no words. This is just no words. Only problem with this beach is that there's a large tire in it and some trash which is unfortunate. That's our boat right there that we came in on just waiting for us. We got about 10 more minutes that we can explore out here but man can you believe this? Look at this beach that we're on. There's that tunnel arch thing that we went through. I don't know if I've ever been as sad to leave a place that I've only been at for 15 minutes in this place. It was a very short time for how amazing it is. After hanging out on the beach for as long as we could we got back in our kayaks and we headed out onto the open water to go back to our boat. From here we had about an hour and a half of sailing to get back to our main cruise ship and so we just made the most of it playing games doing some art and just taking in the views. Made it back to our boat and as you can see Jack picked up a new outfit while we were on the island. Hanging out the rest of the day same as yesterday but it should be fun. By the time we got back to the boat it was just starting happy hour but unfortunately it was cold and rainy on the top deck so we did happy hour below in the dining room and then we also got dinner. Another shout out to the crew providing a nice easy dinner for the kids at 5 30. I have to say the kids were pretty joyful about the happy hour especially the fact that they got little tiny umbrellas in their drinks. And then for our dinner we had an interesting collection of food this time including fish prawns and even steak. Honestly we were pretty impressed with the food. The only thing that was a little strange was a scallop pumpkin soup they served. So it's not the season for squid fishing but I figured I'd give it a try before we left. They turn the light on and then you just basically jig it up and down and I guess the squid are attracted to the light. There's some other little fish down there that are attracted to the light. Not squid though I don't want to catch those guys. I got zero instruction in what to do I'm not sure if I'm supposed to go up and down fast or slow or what. I think they don't think I'm going to catch any right now. I actually caught a squid. Oh no he got out. All right so apparently there are actual squid down there when I pulled that one up which you can see for like a second on that video. They said that they hadn't seen one in two weeks so I guess I got really lucky but wasn't able to pull it all the way in. Crazy how it was like shooting ink and water and all sorts of stuff. But yeah a lot of people came out to squid fish so I'm going back up to the room. That's it for tonight we have a half day tomorrow we're going to visit a cave before we end the cruise. I'm definitely going to miss waking up to views like this. We're going to get breakfast and then we're heading to a cave. Once everybody was awake we headed down to breakfast which was the same thing that we had the day before but there's a lot of good options. Jack has become a fan of having pho for breakfast right buddy are you going to miss that when we go home? Having pho like this is more of a traditional Vietnamese breakfast but Jack was the only one of our group who liked doing it and then after breakfast we got in the shuttle and we took a 15 minute ride over to the island where we'd be catching a bus to go to the cave. After getting on the bus it's about a 15 minute ride into the interior of the island where you'll get to the Trung Trang cave. We got lucky and right when we arrived there was a monkey up in the tree who was looking down on us. I didn't think I was going to see a wild monkey like this in Vietnam so it was incredibly cool and then from there we got an introduction to all the bats that live in the cave and then we started making our way to the cave entrance. Heading up to the cave we got a hundred steps we gotta climb but we got to see a monkey on the way in that was so cool. Climbing up like this to the cave entrance was a pretty unique way to start an exploration like this plus when we got up there we got some great views over the valley and the unique mountain range that was around us. And then it was time to enter the cave another first for my kids with the kayaking experience. This cave is accessed by a self-guided tour you can basically take as long as you want inside. Jack do you think I'm gonna fit through here? No problem. It's only me that can't get through. You gotta be under six foot. While the rock formations were pretty cool my kids were most excited about trying to see if I could fit through the narrow and short passageways. I'm way too big for this one. Oh I made it. No problem. That thing is a little narrow. What makes this cave particularly interesting is that it doesn't have the wide open chambers like many of the Vietnamese caves have and then it's actually like a big tunnel going through the side of the mountain and it's 300 meters long and you go in one way and then you go out the other way. They found evidence inside of the cave of people being here thousands of years ago but it was only recently rediscovered in the 1930s. We'll say in terms of caves that I've been in this one's a little a lot more narrow than most of them are in terms of what you have to duck down on but uh it's still pretty cool. I think my group is laughing at me. It is a tight squeeze for sure. They were waiting to make fun of you. You gotta love that right. Also I would say for the caves I've been in this one is not super impressive with the formations and stuff that it has but it's really cool to be able to come over to this island and just explore a cave. It's a good thing I did my yoga this morning. This cave actually has a full living ecosystem inside of it. We saw some plants growing and there's even colonies of bats. We were told that some locals just call it the bat cave because of how many are in there. Wow it is humid in this cave. I feel like I gotta take my sweatshirt off. Look at that there's an altar here and that rock looks like a person so I wonder if that's why the altar is there. About 20 minutes after we entered the cave we were exiting out the other side and back into the light. We made it out and it feels 100 times better out here. It's like 20 degrees colder. That was awesome. After you exit the cave it's about a half mile walk down a bunch of stairs back to where we started. In 100 meters they got free wi-fi, cold beer, and food. I still can't get over how blessed we are to be able to have these experiences so I just want to give another thank you to all of you who are watching these videos. Never in my life would I think that I would be in Vietnam on a cruise going to caves on an island like that just absolutely blows my mind so thank you from the bottom of my heart for watching the videos and just allowing us to continue to have these adventures. At the end there's a place called the jungle bar where you can get some snacks and drinks but it's a little early for us. We didn't have much more time left and so they told us to get back into the van and head back to our boat to check out. How come nobody wants to sit with Amy? I got the whole crew up with me. Not complaining. From here we rode the bus back down towards the water and then we got back on our shuttle to go to our cruise ship. Here's what one of the back rooms looks like. You can see there's some pretty awesome views in this one with that tv and that patio out there. Bye spa you were awesome. Once we got back we had about an hour and a half before it was time to check out of our cruise and then it was time to say goodbye to our crew and make our way back to civilization. I want to give a special shout out to Bobby he was incredible and one of the highlights of our entire cruise. All right as we head back let's talk about the pros and cons and let's talk about the price. So first off for the price we did the family premium deluxe cabin with balcony which is the two rooms that were connected and this was right around $1,100. That didn't include the tip that we gave to our attendant and it didn't include the $30 a person for the shuttle from Hanoi and then it also didn't include the happy hour drinks that we bought. There are lots of cruises in Halong Bay so let us know if you've been on another one but it seems like a lot of the companies had varying reviews which is why we stuck with this one my sister had gone on Mon Cherie which is the sister company before and she loved it. The main con that we had on the trip was just how many boats were out on the water it felt kind of weird to see so much traffic in such a beautiful natural area so i'm not sure if they're going to start limiting that or if it's not that bad from an over tourism point of view i'm not really sure how all that works. There also was some trash in the water in some of the more popular beaches which was a bummer to see. Other than that it was a pretty amazing experience and it was well priced for what we got. My kids will be talking about this for a long time. Let us know what other questions you have you can click here to check out our Hanoi video which is what we headed to next or you can see all of the Vietnam videos in the description. Alright we'll see you on the next one!