Vietnam 2013: Tam Coc Province

My last travel post for my Vietnam series has got to be my favorite of them all! On our last day, we visited the Tam Coc Province to experience the famous boat ride on their river. It's a two hour drive from Hanoi, but it's certainly worth the wait! :)

We arrived around mid-afternoon because we did a little shopping in the morning so we headed here after lunch. From the big fancy boat at Ha Long, we were now going to try the smaller ones that could only seat two guests at a time. I rode with my sister and the two of us snapped away on our SLRs. #BloggerMode LOL

My mom and my younger brother clearly enjoying the ride so far. Unfortunately I was battling the cold since I didn't expect it to be freezing in Tam Coc. So that's definitely a note for all you planning to visit! It's significantly colder here than in the city. I actually got a bit sick for a little while because of the weather.

Aside from this, though, it was one of the most amazing and surreal experiences I've ever had with nature. Literally, there's not much else to do than take everything in, and I assure you, it's a LOT.

So lucky to have caught the golden hour during our boat ride. :)

The cool thing about a lot of the boaters is that they use their feet to row! Genius exercise. Not even kidding. I noticed how toned and slim all the boaters' legs were. #Jealous Haha!

Not really sure what this man was doing. I think he was fishing? :O

You also get to enter a few caves in your journey. Nothing to see there but the pitch black darkness. It's cool to touch the rocks every now and then, though.

This boat ride really gets you thinking all sorts of deep thoughts. It's an incredible serenity that you're going to feel.

The end of the river where the boat makes a U-turn back to the docks.

Even still, the ride back still had so much for you to see. I didn't realize that I missed so much until we were headed back!

My last shot before I got too overwhelmed by the cold. I only had a cardigan and gloves and a scarf on at the time for layering and it was the absolute worst time to not have my leather jacket with me. When we arrived at the docks, the wind started to get stronger which made everything all the more unforgiving. Thank goodness I started to feel better upon boarding the tour bus. Lesson learned, indeed.

Before the airport, we had dinner and it was actually the first time in this trip to finally have some Pho! Anyways, it was absolutely lovely and our tour guide said some touching words and even bought us a cake to eat for friendship according to him.

And that pretty much concludes my December trip! I absolutely cannot wait to travel more this 2014! Already have two trips lined up in the next few weeks and I can't wait to take a bunch of photos to share with you guys!

'Til next time! :D