Vietnam
Lan Ha Bay
Floating fish farms anchored between hundreds of jungle-capped karst pillars rising from jade water.
The karst towers are the same impossible pillars as Ha Long Bay — jade water, jungle-capped limestone, morning fog — but here the water still works for a living. A woman hauls nets from a platform bolted to the base of a cliff; her raft house floats on drums beside it.
Lan Ha Bay scatters more than three hundred karst islets off the southeastern edge of Cat Ba Island — geologically one body with Ha Long, jointly UNESCO-listed since 2023. Floating aquaculture persists through its channels: fish-farm rafts, pontoon houses in sheltered coves, boats standing in for roads. Sea kayaks slip under stalactites at water level into lagoons sealed inside vertical rock, and the coral below, scarred by old dynamite fishing, is recovering under protection.
Couple
Waking at anchor beneath karst towers, mist on the water and the day's first boats moving between the rafts — the bay at its most intimate.
Friends
Kayaking through cave mouths into hidden lagoons, then watching the karst turn to silhouette from the water — the bay rewards a shared day afloat.
- More than three hundred karst islets scatter off Cat Ba's southeastern edge — one geological body with Ha Long.
- Fish-farm rafts and floating houses work the channels between the limestone pillars.
- Kayaks duck under stalactites at water level into lagoons enclosed by vertical rock.
- The coral below is recovering under protection — the bay's second life, this time guarded.
Bánh đa cua, Hải Phòng's rust-coloured crab broth with broad noodles and greens.
Order cuttlefish balls made from squid landed around Cát Hải and Cát Bà.
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