TRAVERSE 91
Ba, a rider on a Kawasaki Versys pulled up. It didn ´ t take long before we were chatting like long lost friends. I had just met Sebastian, an IT professional with Commerzbank in Frankfurt, Germany. He had already spent a month in Vietnam and was also heading north after Cat Ba. We quickly agreed to join forces for the two weeks he was still travelling in the country.
Cat Ba Island and Ha Long Bay are“ must see” places, even if they are busy tourist destinations. Our
Buddhist host on Cat Ba arranged our tickets for Ha Long Bay, and soon we were on our way by boat, drifting past the famous floating villages in the bay, and navigating on emerald waters in between some of the 2,000 limestone islands covered by rainforest.
Sea kayaks were included in our tour, so Sebastian and I took the opportunity to explore the area by kayak for about an hour. Sebastian and I were getting on well, and we both enjoyed riding together, after a few weeks of solo travelling.
A couple of days later we headed north towards the Chinese border, with great anticipation. We had both heard so many fantastic stories about riding in the north. We couldn’ t wait to experience places like Meo Vac, Ba Be lake, Cai Bo, SaPa and not least the Ha Giang loop.
We were soon riding in very mountainous areas on gravel and dirt roads. Sebastian, with limited offroad experience, was really tested, but persevered. On a particularly
TRAVERSE 91