Halong Bay and Back

Hello - Sunday we left for a two day, one night trip to Halong Bay in the northern part of Vietnam in the south China Sea. It is a UNESCO World Heritage site and is really very pretty with spectacular limstone karst mountains and a calm bay with many junk boats. The photos are really nice. We will post later. Right now we are dealing with a major banking problem. Seems someone stole my debit card number and took or tired to take about $75000 out of my account. No, I did not have (nor do I think I've ever had )that much money in my account at any one time. How does one make a withdrawal in the 10s of thousands of dollars range any way? The problem and the stress was compounded by me finding this out about 3 minutes before we were supposed to board the bus for the trip to Halong Bay. My cell phone refuses to work here and we could not use the prepaid phone card. I probably spent $200 on phone calls to the bank after we got back today trying to get this worked out. Note to self, when traveling aboad, do not bring a debit card and do not allow any hotel to take an imprint. Prepay in cash.

On the good news front, Hung seems to be dealing with the transition and all th travel better than any of us. Not only is he not shy, he does not likely have the expressive speech delay we were told he had. He jabbered up a storm with our very nice Vietnamese guide on the boat. He is also saying "please," "thank you" and "up." Nothing but smiles on this road/boat trip. Yesterday was the first time he had been on a bus, first time on a boat and first time his feet had been in sand. He loved it and we loved watching his joy. We went on quite a hike today into some caves and he stayed with the group and was filled with excitement. We are quite sure he had never seen anything like it at all. We were with a group of 11 other people from around the world. Lily latched on to a charming couple from Australia and she talked their ears off. The gentleman John was everything a grandpa should be - he lavished her with attention, played tea party with her, talked about her pets, and held her hand on the steep walk. He also showed Hung how to run into the ocean while Jim and Marshall climbed to a high peak to get a better view. John and Carol - you really made this trip very special for our children and us and we hope to see you again soon! Marshall is getting more adventourus with eating. He had two helpings of beef cooked on lemongrass with coconut rice at a nearby restaurant, Indochine, which we loved. He is making some progress on the homework but not as much as he probably should be. :) Say a prayer we get this bank mess straightened out quick. Love, the Dudas in Hanoi