Ha Long Bay Cruise - Stellar of the Seas

There are dozens of cruise companies that operate tours along Ha Long Bay, anything from budget to high end luxury to suit your wallet. You can also choose to go on a day cruise, overnight cruise or 2 nights cruise if you can dig deep into your wallet.

I found Aclass, a group that operates a variety of luxury cruises along Ha Long Bay. I chose the Stellar of the Seas ship, a cheaper option among their group, but it does still cost just over USD$300 for an overnight cruise.

The package includes hotel transfer, which they were supposed to pick me up by 8am but I got an email the day before departure that it got pushed back to 8:30am. The office staff came over to my hotel 10 minutes before to get me to meet the bus which rolled up on the main street as it is difficult to navigate through the narrow side streets to stop right outside my hotel. I was the first one on board, before they went to pick up the others along the way. Our last stop was a 5 minute stop outside their HQ to pick up the rest of the passengers and loaded up with supplies, and each passenger got a bag of snacks and a bottle of branded water inside. I wish they customise their bag as there were a few passengers who are vegetarian/vegan and the snacks contain meat floss and dairy, since they already knew in advance of the dietary requirement it wouldn't be difficult to get that ready.

We then went on our just under 3 hours drive to Ha Long, with a toilet break ⅔ of the way. There are plenty of these break stop along the way, with convenient stores and restaurants set up. We rolled up to the port around 12pm, with utter chaos as there were passengers who have just completed their cruise wanting to get on the bus back to Hanoi and there wasn’t any instruction as to what we were supposed to do. I just follow the crowd and waited by the tables, after a couple of minutes a staff member came to check me off their list and told me the time they will be transferring us from their small boat to their ship, it was roughly a 20 minute wait from our drop off to our boarding, there were self service tea and coffee available.

At 12:15pm, we started boarding the boat that will transfer us to the ship. The trip takes about 10 minutes or so, as the ship is anchored further out in the sea. We arrived at the ship around 12:30pm with the crew waving to welcome us. We were instructed to head over to their restaurant where we will begin our first meal on board. While waiting for our meal, I was greeted by my butler Sam, who offered a tour of the ship and also checked my dietary requirement. I had a 5 minute tour of the front of the ship where the pool and sundeck are located. I was then escorted back to the restaurant where Sam offered to change my table so I can get more comfortable and can have an easier look out to the view.

The first meal was a mixture of cooked and deep fried food, I was not a big fan of deep fried food as they are very filling and also unhealthy, not to mention it’s a cheap option which I did not expect to see in a $400+ a night cruise. There were 5 plates in total which was way more than what I normally consume, and also a theme for the rest of the meals provided for the rest of my time on board.

After lunch, I was given my room key and Sam escorted me to my room located on the 1st floor the bottom deck. The room is spacious, not soundproof much though, there’s a King/Queen size bed, a generous bathroom with bathrobe, Japanese style toilet, and a combined bath shower with a window to admire the view. There’s also a work desk opposite the bed with a smart TV, and a balcony to enjoy the view outside while sipping on a cup of tea or coffee complimentary from the minibar. There’s a safe box located inside the double size closet with lifejackets in case of emergency, I couldn’t figure out how to use the safe box though and luckily I didn’t try to lock it with the door closed because I couldn’t unlock it after trying it with the door open, and I had valuables left inside the safe.

The activity for the first day will be heading over to Lan Ha Bay, where a floating house was set up to allow people to go on a bamboo boat with a local paddling the boat or using a kayak to self paddle. I chose to get on the bamboo boat as I’ve done kayaking during my stay in Lang Co and it’s a very tiring activity. We went on our way to the dark and bright cave, going through it and out to the otherwise where we took a few pictures before heading back. The kayak or boat will take an hour roundtrip, while we were waiting on the floating house for everyone to get back, the assistant manager helped me to take some amazing photos.

We went back to our ship where we get to relax for 2 hours before dinner starts. I went into the pool for a bit but it was fairly cold so I didn’t swim and only stayed in it for a while to admire the scenery. At 6pm, a cooking class is set up to teach guests how to make fresh spring rolls, I didn’t join this as I was having my bathing time inside my room looking out to the sun setting. At 7pm, dinner service starts with a BBQ style buffet, Sam was in charge of bringing me food and it was way more than I could handle so I had to tell him to stop bringing more. Towards the end of the dinner service, lights were turned off to surprise the guests who were celebrating a special occasion such as honeymoon and birthday. It was a very interesting experience and also the surprised ones were very blushed towards the end of it. 8:30pm onwards, there was squid fishing activity, I had a quick look but wasn’t too interested plus I was tired after a full day of activity and eating.

On the second day early morning there are yoga and Tai Chi exercise but I didn’t wake up to join, breakfast starts at 7am which I did go at the very beginning as there was a speedboat tour of the surrounding at 8am. After a filling breakfast (self service with some help from Sam) I went on the speedboat which was only a quick 20+ minutes tour of the area, the speeding part is only the last 5 minutes of the tour to give you some thrills. After the speedboat tour, the assistant Manager offered to take photos, I was assuming it was him taking photos of me until one of the staff pulled out a drone. Only 1 family and myself took the opportunity to do the photoshoot, and it turned out fairly great.

We had an hour after to relax before we had to check out of our room. At 9:45am, we had to return the key and head back to the restaurant where we have another buffet breakfast, and this time Sam brought out a whole lot of food again, specially cooked for me. After 5 plates were put in front of me, I told Sam to stop bringing more food because it was getting ridiculous as I only had breakfast 3 hours ago. An hour of dining later, we were on our way to the boat to transfer back to the port, and then directly on the bus back to Hanoi.

My overall experience on Stellar of the Seas was great, the staff was professional, friendly and able to personalise the experience for each guest. The meal could improve as I felt there was an emphasis on quantity and variety rather than quality and catering to the palette of the person, I think they could upgrade their system to personalise more on catering so that they do not have to waste food as the majority of the meals provided to me I couldn’t finish it. The 2 days cruise also felt a little short as we only had less than 1 full day onboard the ship, with so many activities that I was barely able to make use of. The 3 days cruise may be better to allow some more time to enjoy the amenities onboard and explore more of the region. I would like to give another shoutout again to my butler Sam who has been fantastic and the assistant Manager Yu, also the rest of the team on board to make this a great experience.

Video review coming soon