KayakHalongBay.com

Rugged, craggy and jungle-clad Cat Ba, the largest island in Halong Bay, is straight out of Jurassic Park. Lan Ha Bay, off the eastern side of the island, is especially scenic and offer numerous beaches to explore. While the vast majority of Halong Bay’s islands are uninhabited vertical rocks. Cat Ba has a few fishing villages, as well as a fast-growing town.

Except for a few fertile pockets, the fertile pocket is too rocky for serious agriculture; most residents earn their living from the sea, while others cater to the tourist trade. Life has always been hard here and many Cat Ba resident joined the exodus of Vietnamese boat people in the 1970s and 80s. Although the island lost much of its fishing fleet this way, overseas Vietnamese have sent back large amounts of money to relatives on the island, fuelling the hotel boom of the past decade. Cat Ba is still relatively laid-back, despite about a 20-fold increase in hotel rooms (and karaoke machines!) since 1996.

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