Wooden sailing ships represent one of the most successful shipbuilding designs in the history of world navigation.
Ingenious and flexible, wooden sailing boats ensure stability in stormy seas; curved sails help the boats glide quickly across the sea surface... and their beauty on the waters of Ha Long Bay is undeniable.
Wooden sailboats on Ha Long Bay are about to completely "die"
However, after a number of fatal accidents and fires, including a 2011 tragedy that claimed 12 lives when a boat capsized in Ha Long Bay, the Quang Ninh provincial Department of Transport announced in 2017 that it would phase out sailing boats over five years. The deadline was extended by two years during the pandemic and will take effect later this year.
To learn more about Vietnamese sailing boats before they disappear, a Japanese reporter from Nikkei Asia went to Ha Long Bay to meet Nguyen Van Cuong, who owns a small fleet.
Cuong had predicted a boom in tourism in the early 1990s. At the time, in 1994, Ha Long Bay was recognized by UNESCO as a world natural heritage site, and the result was global attention for this beautiful sea. Seizing the opportunity, Cuong used his life savings to build the Cat Ba Imperial, a magnificent 27m wooden sailing ship with four en-suite cabins and two 12m sails.
Wooden sailboats were once popular with international tourists because they created beautiful scenery on the bay.
By 2019, a record 18 million foreign tourists visited Vietnam, and Mr. Cuong’s fleet had quadrupled. The sector was hit hard during the pandemic but is recovering. Vietnam is on track to welcome more than 8 million tourists this year.
“My sailboats were inspired by the small sailboats I used to go fishing with my grandfather when I was a kid, the type of boats that fishermen in Ha Long Bay still use to survive today,” Cuong said as he drove out of Ben Beo, a port on the southeast corner of Cat Ba, the largest island in the bay. “They are different from Chinese sailboats. Their hulls have flat bottoms because the waters in Ha Long Bay are very calm, and their rectangular shape gives them more deck space than the curved Chinese boats.”
Mr. Cuong is regretting his sailboats.
At first glance, the Cat Ba Imperial is a complete “scrap.” Paint chips are coming off here and there. Some of the wood is rotten, while there are rust stains on the metal railings. But the ship makes up for it with beautiful craftsmanship. Bronze lamps light up the deck at night, and handcrafted woodwork decorates the eaves and is carved into the window frames and cabin doors.
At the bow, a circular teak staircase leads up to the observation deck, where visitors lie on sun loungers and marvel at the natural landscape of Ha Long Bay unfolding before their eyes - emerald green mountains, clusters of conical peaks and limestone towers covered with dense jungle stretching...
After fires on converted wooden cruise ships, in 2017, Quang Ninh province issued a roadmap to stop the operation of this type of cruise ship to ensure absolute safety for tourists.
A sailor appeared on deck and raised the sails, which had been dyed crimson with tannin to protect the cotton from mildew. Fluttering in the wind, they created a magnificent and charming picture of the old world.
There are wooden yachts in many places around the world, such as the Maldives, Indonesia, Tasmania and New Zealand, but perhaps nowhere has the combination of wood and water as photogenic as the sailboats in Ha Long Bay.
Enjoy the sparkling scenery of Ha Long Bay from a sailboat
"The boats that sank in the past were badly designed. The owners were greedy. They added two or sometimes three decks on the deck to have more cabins. But the hull was not big enough to support the weight. All it took was one big wave to sink them. Flat-bottomed sailboats should only have one deck, like mine. This will be the last generation of wooden sailboats in this place," Mr. Cuong confided.
On shore, Nikkei Asia visited the shipyard where the Cat Ba Imperial sailboat is pulled out of the water twice a year for restoration. "My family has been building wooden boats for six or seven generations," said Nguyen Dinh Chuong, a representative of the shipyard.
A family's traditional wooden boat building workshop on Ha Long Bay
Explaining why the sailing boats in Ha Long Bay have a bad reputation, Mr. Chuong said: "They are cheap tourist boats, not regularly maintained and the people working on them know nothing about sailing. When a fire starts or the boat starts taking on water, they don't know what to do. They jump into the sea to save themselves. They leave the passengers behind."
But one tragedy should not create another, although Mr. Chuong could not hide his emotions: "It is sad to see the sailboats go because they are part of our family tradition."
At noon on February 17, 2011, authorities recovered 12 bodies, including 10 foreigners, after the Truong Hai ship sank in Ha Long Bay in the early morning of the same day. The cause was that the ship's bottom shell was broken, causing water to flood in while the ship was anchored near Ti Top Island. At that time, there were 27 people on the Truong Hai tourist ship, including 21 guests, including 19 international guests and 2 Vietnamese guests. When water was discovered, 9 foreigners and the crew jumped into the sea and were rescued. The authorities of Quang Ninh province later initiated a criminal case...
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