Getting to Ha Long Bay from Hanoi

The expressway cut this journey roughly in half and it is now around two and a half hours of actual driving. That is the number operators quote, and on the road itself it is accurate.

What is not in the number is the pickup. A shared transfer collects from several hotels across Hanoi before it leaves the city, which reliably adds an hour, and if your hotel is first on the loop you spend that hour on the minibus.

If you are in the Old Quarter you will usually be collected early in that window. If you are further out you may be last, which is better.

A private transfer removes the loop entirely and is the single best value upgrade on a Ha Long day trip, particularly for two or more people where the per-head difference narrows.

Most Ha Long Bay boats leave from Tuan Chau, a marina on an island joined to the mainland by a causeway. It is large, busy, and the boarding process at peak times takes a while.

Boats working Lan Ha Bay frequently leave from Got Pier instead, which is further along the coast and about half an hour more driving. Your itinerary will say which.

This matters if you are making your own way there: the two are not close together, and arriving at the wrong one is not recoverable in the time available.

Ninh Binh sits south of Hanoi and Ha Long sits east, so the two-in-one tours are not a straight line. They work by taking you out to Ninh Binh, back through or around Hanoi, and on to the coast, which is a lot of road.

Done over two days with a night on the boat, that is a reasonable trip and a common one. Done as a single day it is not, and anybody selling it as one is selling you a coach tour with two brief stops.

The reason people pair them is that Ninh Binh's limestone is the same geology as Ha Long's, seen from a rowing boat on a river instead of a cruise on the sea. Doing both back to back is more repetitive than it sounds on paper.