Culture · 2026-10-21
Ha Long’s three-plank boats are rehearsing a fishing song
Dân trí reported on 19 October that hát đối, the bay’s call-and-response singing, is being prepared for three-plank sailing boats. The boats launched on 29 June and have carried about 2,000 people. The singing is not on sale yet.
Reported 19 October 2026. The song is not offered to visitors yet.
The next thing on a Ha Long boat may be a song you answer. On 19 October, Dân trí reported that visitors should soon hear hát đối on traditional three-plank sailing boats. Hát đối is the call-and-response between men and women that grew up in the bay’s fishing communities, often about love and ordinary life. Operators are rehearsing it on the boats so it fits a tour. A representative told the paper that more preparation is needed before anyone can book it, and hoped it would open soon. The aim is sightseeing plus a local art, especially for cruise passengers who want more than the view.
The boats themselves are already out. The same report says the three-plank sailing tours launched on 29 June 2026, and that six boats have since carried about 2,000 domestic and international visitors. It describes the hull as three wooden planks and the sails as bat-wing shaped, a form tied to coastal fishing communities in Quang Ninh and particularly Quang Yen, able to work against the wind in a way a modern tourist boat does not. The photograph is a vendor with fruit on a wooden boat in the bay. It is the working water. It is not the rehearsal, and it is not a three-plank sail.
