Richard's Travel Blog

Maybe I can download pictures! Let’s see.

Woo hoo! Here we are in a relatively out of the way place, Port St. Johns in Eastern Cape, and the connection is fast enough to upload pictures. Great.
One thing for sure, internet access may not be too good, especially after leaving South Africa. It was spotty before, even here, and only exists in Lesotho in the capital. I guess this will make me think a new way about what I blog. Before, I could talk about individual places we’ve visited. Now I think I’ll have to portray the big picture. I know I have way to many pictures to allow them to do the talking.
In short, we spent a few days in Nespruit while I bought a 4 WD pickup with a canopy and supplies for handling our trip without amenities. Myung didn’t want to take the risk of buying something and having a catasrophic breakdown resulting in loss of the investment, not to mention getting stuck in the middle of nowhere (and let me tell you, there is a lot of nowhere around here!). But it’s the only way to go anywhere without a LOT of hassle at best. So, it’s mine. It’s a ’92 Toyota Hilux, a famously rugged off road workhorse. It’s old, but it purrs and feels quite solid. It has lots of new parts, even belts and hoses and new seats.

That tent is where we spend most nights. Accomodation, when it’s available, is more expensive than anywhere we’ve been in Asia except Korea, so usually we’ve been campng even if rooms or dorm beds are available. That tent is really cool. You just let it out of the bag and it pops into what you see. Then it just winds back down into a circle in about one minute.
Myung had never camped before, but she’s adapting well, I think. We’re both getting good at cooking over coals. We’ve been comfortable most of the time, except when it’s been freezing cold in Lesotho. All our stuff goes nicely in the back or in the back seat of this double cab truck. All in all, this is probably going to be fine.
I know I put that picture of the wild animal warning at the top, but it’s pretty obvious that we’re going to have very many wild animal pictures. I’m going to forgo posting more pictures of them for now, even though we’ve seen many. We haven’t seen any big cats yet, but when we do and if I get good pictures, I’ll post them.
We’ve driven well over a thousand miles already. It’s hard to believe. From Nespruit we went down to Hluhluwe-Umofozi National Park in Kwa Zulu Natal, which was beautiful and had lots of animals. Then we went to St. Lucia Wetlands, an estuary on the coast. From there we went to the Drakensberg escarpment east of Lesotho, which is beautiful. Then we went to Lesotho for a week, whigh was beautiful. Now we are back on the coast, in Eastern Cape. I’m going to try to put a southern Africa map link on my home page, but I want to crank this out first.
Despite what I said about having a good internet connection, it’s still quite slow by most standards. Broadband is to be rolled out in south Africa on June 27. So, there aren’t as many pictures as I would have liked to have here. I’m going to skip the wetlands, that park and Drakensberg. Let’s start with the climb over Sani Pass from South Africa to eastern Lesotho. Lesotho is a mountain kingdom completely encircled by South Arica. The eastern part is isolated and the roads are bad, impossible to do without a 4 WD. Here’s the climb to the summit. That zigzag thing is the road.

Lest you forget, it is winter here. Here is the border post. There is very little traffic, for obvious reasons.

Lesotho is one of the poorest countires in Africa, so there are only a few paved roads, none in the east. We slogged across the mountainous middle of the country in two days. Here are some pics of the typical scenery, and one of a frozen hitchhiker huddled in the back seat.

At lower elevations, these are typical scenes.

Most people in Lesotho are subsistence farmers, and the main crop is corn. Many of them eat eat corn meal porridge day in and day out. Here are some villagers threshing the corn, which they allow to dry in the fields.

The climate is considerably more moderate in the relatively developed west. The capital, Maseru, is an absolute dump. I was going to try to use the internet which is allegedly there, but it was so bad with goofballs lurking all over the place, we just bought some supplies and went back out into the countryside, which is like a different country. One popular place, with what toursits there are, is Morijo. It’s a historically significant place, by Lesostho standards, and quite lovely. We went on several walks here and in nearby areas. Here’s a picture of one series on pools and the guide who took us there.

And here’s an artsy shot of some sheep just up the canyon wall a few hundred meters from the pools.

I could have gone for a few more days in Lesotho, but there really isn’t much going on there. And Myung was cold. So we went to here, Port St. Johns. Except for a little rain, the weather is quite nice this time of year. We’re staying in a typical backpacker’s place again, complete with a chill out bar and restaurant, though we cook ourt own food in the communal kitchen and have let the ganja crowd do their own thing. It’s like a tiny Goa here. There are trails and beaches, though you need a wetsuit to go in the water.

From here we are going to what looks like will be a similar place down the coast, Coffee Bay. The plan is to head west along the coast mostly, and wind up in Cape Town. I’ll do my best to keep you posted. There’s so much to say, this is so different. Here I am saying I’ll change to discussing the big picture, and this entry is about the same as most. I don’t know where to start. I’ll start next time. Maybe that plan will happen when I’m in Namibia or someplace where there is no hope of uploading pictures.
In general, we’re rolling along, singing a song. The experience of having our own vehicle is a big change for us. Africa so far has little in common with Asia where I’ve been for three years now. So I’m well entertaianed again. I have more bright, shiny objects than ever to play with. Myung and I are getting along pretty well. I can’t complain.
Until next time, be well, all of you.

That photo may not seem exciting to you, but it’s holy ground for most South Afrcans. It was Nelson Mandela’s house in Soweto before he was arrested.

From Johannesburg we went straight to Swaziland which, for the geography challenged, is a little landlocked country between northeast South Africa and Mozambique. It’s famous for being the only absolute monarchy left in the world, though there are obviously many absolute dictatorships. The government isn’t any worse there, it seems, than anywhere else. It seems the king is holding up his end of the social contract. That said, the HIV rate has gone from 4% in 1992 to about 35% now. The culture is such that people are pretty carefree about sex. The king has 130 sisters and 67 brothers. He has only 19 chilodren himself. Still, the culture of do it till you drop contiues. So, it’s still Africa, as they say around here.
We stayed there for three days. Transportation isn’t to easy around here, so we decided to return to South Africa and go to Kruger National Park. While we were there, we went to Mliliwane National Park and looked at the savannah and hills there. It’s pretty compact and only entailed about 12 km of walking. There are no lions, so you can walk. There are many zebras, crocodiles, a few hippos, ostriches, different anteopes and othe anmals. We have pictures, but when I was n a place where I could upload them, the connection was so slow I couldn’t upload everything I want. There will be plenty of animal pictures in upsoming blogs, I assure you.
I have a couple of pictures of the market in the capital, Mbabane.

These distances are not great. Jo’burg to Swazilamd is only about 5 hours by minibus. Back to Nelspruit, outside Kruger, was only about 3 hours, including the border stuff.
In Nelspruit we met a couple form Missouri and rented acar with them to go to Kruger. Kruger is a big park the size of Isreal. It is teeming with life and very beautiful. You drive around almost by yourself. There are a few paved roads and many dirt and gravel. You really doen’t see many other vehickles on the secondary roads. You have to stay inside your car except at maybe 20 designated spots. That’s so you don’t get eaten. Some places post a guard.

We didn’t read the rules when we went in, so for a couple of hours we got out two or three times. Then a passerby informed us we would be summarily kicked out if we were caught outside our vehicle. This low quality picture gives you an idea of the perspective we had on most of the big animals.

I have a good rhino picture, but internet access is spotty and the connection is slow. South Africa is supposed to get widespread DSL in a few months. Anyway, I uploaded some pictures, but really, you’ve seen it all on TV nature shows. I’ll show you what I got uploaded before I ran out of time at the place where I could access a USB port.
We left here with out new friends from Missouri at 5 AM and opened the park at 6. The morning and the evening is the best time to see animals. Besides, we wanted to get the most for our money. We spent two full days driving in there.
Here are impalas and wildebeasts.

Here is a cape buffalo.

Here are hippos and an elephant. After that , you’ll recognize them.

That mother and her calf got irritated with us being there and started movig toward us. I experienced an elephant charge in India. We boogied, preempted any close encounters.

There are so, so many animals. There are a few places with accommodation and camping sites, which we utilized. My father once said about my mother, “Her idea of roughing it is breakfast on the veranda.” Here, you can rough it on the veranda and have an espresso or beer, like Myung and our friends here, and look at the crocs and hippos. Ahhh, it’s sweet.

We left the park I the nick of time. It turns out that if you are on the road and not in a campground by 5:30 closing time, you get fined $110 per person. Yow! We were trying to get to the gate on time, but had to wait for herds of buffalo, impalas and giraffes while they crossed the road. We got out at 5:28.

We camped at a lodge in Hazyview, just outside the park. The downside of traveling now is that it sure gets dark early. Shoot. Oh well. This camping is great. So far, South Africa is really set up for it, with nice ammenites at places which bill themselves as having campsites. I think it will be like that most of the time in Southern Africa. The next day we set out on a drive called The Panorama. It’s a series of views along the edge of the Drakensburg escapment west of Kruger. That was a nice daylong drive. Here are the photos.

I’m sorry, but that’s all I’ve uploaded. It really is very beautiful around here. And what I like the most is it just seems different from what I’ve seen before. I’m getting a little jaded so different is good. Even the plants and flowers are different.
Right now, we are hanging out in Nelspruit. I want to buy a car in Mozambique, where they are cheap. A guy here who buys a car every time he comes form Mozambique, which s often, was going to give me his car dealer, but he hasn’t done it yet. Now I hear he’s not returning from whatever he’s doig in South Africa until tomorrow. I guess I’ll go to Maputo the day after tomorrow.
That’s really where we are at at this moment. I’m going to send his off. Be well, all of you.

Greetings from southern Africa. Something tells me we aren’t in China anymore, Toto. We are just getting our feet wet and learning a few ropes. Don’t expect any real insight soon. So far, here’s what we’ve done.
We got into Johannesburg after a 2 AM departure from Beijing and 18+ hourws of travel with a connection in Qatar. Even I got jet lagged. We picked a backpacker place off the net and rested up. the only thing we did was go to a nearby mall to buy a Southern Africa Lonely Planet. Resting up would have been a lot more pleasant if they had running water. THE main water line in “Jozi” broke and the whole city was without till just before we left for Soweto. We didn’t do much in Soweto. Actually, there isn’t much to do there. There is no downtown. There are only places of interest regarding the civil rights movement. We did go to Nelson Mandela’s and Desmond Tutu’s house nearby, and walk around some safe areas. My, it is huge. I didn’t know it had 4.5 million people. Obviously, we didn’t go everywhere. I took a little tour of there and Jozi. That’s about it for that area.
After that we went directly to Swaziland. We have stayed there for a few days and are about to leave for Nelspruit in South Africa. Wé’ll go to the famed Kruger National Park from there and look at the big cats, rhinos, giraffes, etc.. Things change rapidly for us sometimes. Getting around is proving to be a big hassle. We may buy a car. Or, I may. Myung is very cool to the idea. Stay tuned on that one.
There is not enough bandwidth here to upload photos, so that will have to wait. Hopefully, that can happen in SA, but I sort of doubt it where we’ll be. The pictures aren’t that great yet anyway. We went to a national park here is Swaziland yesterday and saw many antelope, a big crocodile, a couple of ostriches and some zebras. If I had a schmick camera, the animal shots would be good, maybe. You’ve all seen National Geographic shows anyway. This park, Mlilwane, east of Mbabane, the capital with 60,000 people, is one of the few that are easily accessible without a car or without buying an expensive safari. We got a ride to the gate and strolled for about 10 km looking at the scenery and critters. Then we hung out till it cooled off, then managed a ride back to where we could get a minibus to where we are staying. If we had more money, getting a car would be a no-brainer.
Other than that, we went around the area and looked at the towns. I went to a village and got a tour and cultural program. I’ll put up those pics if I ever can.
I wanted to blog something, so here it is, for now. I have to go get the minibus to Nelspruit, so I’ll talk to you later.
Be well, all of you

We’ve decided to go to South Africa and are leaving tonight at 2 AM. Ugh. Our tentative plan is to go get used to the African scene in South Aftica, then tour the countries of southern Africa. After that, it’s up in the air. If we like it, we’ll likely go up the east coast, maybe all the way to Egypt, Jordan, and Syria to Turkey. But that all is way in the future. We aren’t all that informed right now, so we’ll have to wing it while we’re down there. Should be interesting. We’ve been killing a couple of days here in Beijing, not doing much of anything. Yesterday we just went around doing a little shopping and sat in Starbuck’s for a while. Myung finally got to see Mao’s body. I uploaded the photos you are about to see. Today is nothing. We’ll get rid of our Chinese money, probably walk around, eat, and get out of Dodge.
Three days ago, I went to the Qing dynasty summer palace. Most of it was built in the 19th century, as previous summer palaces were destroyed by fires and Opium Wars. It’s really quite nice. Rater than give you boring tour guide info, I’ll just post the pictures.

Two days ago, I went to a couple of places along the Great Wall, Jingshan and Simatai. They are about 100 km northwest of here, about 20 km apart. It was nice up there. Often grand vistas in China are obscured by the air pollution, or “Great Pall of China” as LP puts it, You could see pretty well. There were few people at Jingshan, which is not a very popular site. It is rather less dramatic than Simatai. It was about 10,000 km of long, though only maybe 1500 km still exist and most of it has not been restored. No wonder it’s one of the seven wonders of the world. It may not be the technical achievement the pyramids in Giza are, but the amount of work required to build it over hundreds of years is unimaginable. You’ve seen many pictures, of course, but here are some more. At Simatai, you can walk up, which almost no one does. Or you can take a tram about 3/4 of the way up and walk the rest, then walk up to the wall (or not), and return down by tram. Or you can take a tram up and walk along the wall, then down. That’s what I did. Most proplr just look up at it from down low where the wall goes over a river. The picture with the tram gives you an idea of how rugged some of the ridges are, and how you can really sprain an ankle walking up and down. Those are watchtowers along the top.

For what it’s worth, we went to the Olympic park. What a nice set up for the Olympics they had, with the Bird’s Nest, some other stadiums and the Water Cube. There is a huge square, too. Too bad it’s almost completely unused now. It all just sits there looking forlorn. The first even scheduled at the Bird’s Nest isn’t until November. What a bath they took, unless you count the intangible value of publicity.
Anyway, see you in Africa. Be well, all of you.

Myung and I are taking it pretty easy in Beijing. We’re staying a half hour bus ride away from city center at one of China’s answers to Motel 6. It’s called 99 Inn because the standard, clean room with bathoom/shower, TV and hot water pot is 99 yuan, a good deal compared to in the city center near Tiananmen Square/The Forbidden City where rooms are at least double. The grub and everything is cheaper out here, too, not to mention it’s way less hectic during this May Day holiday weekend. She, especially, doesn’t need to gallivant around Beijing. She’s been here several times. I didn’t even know it till yesterday, but she spent a couple of years in nearby Tianjin. I’m up for doing the usual stuff tourists do in Beijing, and she’s accompanying me most of the time, whenever it doesn’t entail an admission.
I had to post the obligatory pictures of Tiananmen Square and the front of the first gate into the Forbidden City. I know, you’ve seen it. The last picture is taken back down the square. The poster is of Sun Yat Sen, who is much revered here. He is honored for establishing modern China. The big building to the right is Mao Zedong’s mausoleum. You can walk by rather briskly and view his preserved body. (Well, you can view his head. The rest is covered with a red hammer and sickle flag. I guess showing everything would be considered disrespectful.) You know how formaldehyde makes a body look red? Well, he’s a red red. Maybe it was the light. Anyway, his face sags like the bods in anatomy class. But I saw it.
A block over to the right from that last one is the Theater of the Performing Arts. I think it’s a really attractive building. It changes with the slightest change in light.

The Forbidden City is quite big. I walked around in there for about 3 hours, and could have spent more time but it closed at 5 PM. There are lots of people in there because of the holiday. Chinese workers get few days off, and hit the tourist places hard when they get a chance. You’ve also seen many pictures like these, I’m sure.

That marble slab going up to the hall is one piece. It was transported to Beijing by covering the road from where it was hewn to Beijing with water during the winter, letting the water freeze, then sliding it all the way. I don’t know how far.

There are lots of gargoyles and dragons, which were believed in the 15th century to protect the buldings and inhabitants. They must have been asleep on duty because right after the original Forbidden City was built during the heyday of the Ming dynasty in 1420, it burned down in 1422, I think. That was a momentous event, as after that, China closed itself off to the outside world and remained isolated until dragged out of it’s isolationism by the western imperialists. Until then, China had the highest level of advancement in the world.

The place goes on and on like in the pictures below.

Another good place is the Temple of Heaven, another Ming dynasty site.

Yesterday evening we went to the antiques area, looked around in an antique furniture “mall” and the antiques flea market. I wonder how much of this stuff is really valuable? I wonder if there are undercover police looking for items which really shouldn’t be sold. I was quite interesting. I had one of those days where I imagined having a house again so I could fill it with so many things I’ve seen over the years. There are also lots of new things there under the roof.

That brings us up to today. It’s Sunday, the last day of the long weekend tourist crush. Tomorrow should be mellower. I’m doing this and Myung is off walking around the University of Beijing area, which should be pretty deserted, and getting a haircut.
We may be nearly decided about our next move. Pakistan is just too dangerous, or at least that would be on our mids if we went. We went to the Iranian embassy here and got a somewhat different answer to our inquiry about how to obtain visas to Iran. Instead of dealing with all that, without known light at the end of the tunnel, we are strongly considering going to South Africa. With Pakistan and Iran off the table, we have to go somewhere. I brought up going to Africa, as I’ve wanted to go there for a long time. To my surprise, Myung has warmed up to the idea. She doesn’t like the difficulties we would face there but, if you ask me, she compared returning to Yangsan and watching it on TV with living it, and decided to live. She’s made it clear that she won’t stay or go on to other African countries if it’s no fun. Fair enough. I agree. One thing that helped us decide was that airfares are not too high to Johannesberg, only about $550 one way. It was $450 one way to Iran, if we had decided to fly over Pakistan. She still wants to go to Turkey and the Near East, so very tentatively, we may go up the east coast of Africa, figure a way through or around Sudan, and go through Jordan, Lebanon and Syria to Turkey. I’d love to go to Isreal, but I also want to go to countries which don’t want to see an Isreali visa stamp in my passport. If we go to South Africa, it will be this Saturday or next Tuesday. I’ll see the Summer Palace and the Great Wall between now and then, and probably something else. I’ll keep you posted. Until then, be well, all of you.
Speaking of Myung, I think she has such an expressive face.

This will be a quickie. I went to Pingyao while Myung went to Beijing. (She’s about had it with China. It’s not like she hasn’t spent years here already.) Pingyao is an old walled city which, unlike other cities in China, is almost entirely intact. There are few new buildings there, and they are “new-old” buildings which don’t stick out like sore thumbs. that said, it looks the same all over town. The wall is, if I am remembering correctly, 12 km around. The picture below has a bit of the all and a typical street scene. I put in the picture above to give you an idea of what a backpacker hostel looks like in the middle of a place like this. Actually, I stayed in a YHA hostel across the street from this one. I was having a beer at a table in front when I took this of the YHA place across the steet. About four of the streets look touristy like those. Otherwise, it’s a real town with real people with real, everyday lives.

Surprisingly, it wasn’t that crowded. I thought it would be like Lijiang, especially since it can be reached from Beijing in about 6 hours, but it isn’t. It’s not even jaded. The people are nice and it isn’s full of touts and “Come into my shop”. Even better, there is no admission to enter, though they sell an 80 yuan pass to some 20 buildings, museums and access to the top of the wall. I just moseyed around, spending one night, and took the traian the next night to Beijing. Here are the other pics I uploaded.

We’ve been in Beijing for a few days. We are basically hanging out and trying to come to an agreement on what to do next. I’ll write again probably very soon.
Be well, all of you.

We are in Kaifeng, Henan, now. This area is steeped in history, as most of China’s dynasties have called the cities of this region their capitals. The Henan capital, Zhengzhou, about 80 km wwest of here, was the capital of the Shang dynasty 3500 years ago. Xian, with it’s terracotta wariors from a couple thousand years ago, is west of Zhengzhou. If you include Beijing, about 300 km northeast of here, almost all China’s governments have been here. Kaifeng was the capital, off and on, for hundreds of years. Little remains of anything more than a few hundred years old in kaifeng because it has a history of flooding eveery few years, and much of the acncient ruins are under several meters of sediment. There are no highrises here because they know there are ruins deep underground and don’t want to drive skyscraper supports into them. The nicest thing in Kaifeng is this temple, built in the 1600’s. You’ve seen so many temple pictures, so here is just one shot of part of it.

The best thing in there is this thousand eyed and thousand handed Avelokateshvara, or Guan Yin. She is the goddess of compassion who sees the suffering of the world with a thousand eyes and lends a thousand hands to help.

An hour and a halaf west of Zhengzhou are the famous Longmen Caves. This place is one of those World Heritage Sites that deserves the billing. It’s no Ellora or Ajanta in India, but it is the third best rock carving site of this kind I’ve ever seen. The earliest of these were carved out of the mountain in the late third century AD, The latest was in the 11th century, just like at Ellora and Ajanta.

We can feel the end of the China phase of our travels coming. Myung’s about had it with
China, and is looking forward to Pakistan and Iran. We haven’t heard back about our “reference numbers” for Iran yet, but we are hopeful. Right now, we are hanging around Kaifeng until our train leaves for Taiyuan, Shanxi, at 8-something tonight. We’ll go to the museum there, at least, tomorrow because it’s supposed to be the best provencial museum in China. Then I will go to Pingyao,, about an hour and a half southwest of there. It’s a famous old city. “Raise the Red Lantern” was filmed there, if you want to picture it. I’m sure it’s on my cctv link under “Shanxi”. Myung may not go because she’s been there and resents the admission costs. That’s understandable. Over time, these exorbitant fees take their toll. Other than that, China’s not too expensive. Then we will likely hang out in and around Beijing. Myung wants to bag Beijing and stay in Tianjin even though there is nothing in particular to see there. I haven’t decided. Then we’ll head out west, stopping at Xian.
I’m still debating whether to go to Pakistan. I think it’ll be alright, but how good is “I think…”? there’s a fatwa out against americans, but I don’t plan to go to any real hot areas. Mehenjo Daro and Harrapa are pretty close to Pashtun, so I may stick to those big tourist sites. Yeah, Swat Valley is out. Myung is particulary looking forward to taking the Karakoram Highway through the Hindu Kush from Xinjiang to Islamabad. That would be beautiful, and having just read “Three Cups of Tea”, well…. I think I will tentatively go and get the lay of the the land, then decide whether to stay. Maybe I won’t stay long. The other thing is that Pakistan is between China and Iran. If I can get into Iran, I hope not to have to fly there.
Nothing is easy.
That’s about it for now. Be well, all of you.

We went down to Hong Kong to get new visas and stayed there for two nights. Myung lived just across the water from there, in Shenzhen, for a long time, so she wasn’t too excited about staying. I think it could be interesting, but for the casual tourist, it’s mostly about shopping and looking at the fabulous glass and steel skyline. Well, there are a couple of pictures. One was taken during the nightly light and laser show you can watch from anywhere high up or from Kowloon, across Victoria Harbor where we were. The other is from the tram to Victoria Peak. The view from the peak is the other big touristy thing to do.
Compared to China, the shopping is great and the prices of quality things is less. I’ve heard and I think it may be true, Bangkok is better for bargains. Whatever, it’s not my thing.
It was nice to be in a developed “country” again. China’s coming up in the world, but it has a long way to go. You kind of get used to China which, in turn, is way more developed than India. But Hong Koing arrived a loong time ago. Stuff works well and the people are more modern. I wonder how it will be when it becomes completely Chinese in 40 more years. Will China ever catch up? Everybody is watching.
We got out visas this morning and came right over to Shenzhen. Tomorrow we are going to Henan Province to look at the heritage sites there. Click on my cctv link and then click on Henan for a preview. The pictures will be a lot better than mine, anyway.
Speaking of pictures, my friend, Renato, suggested a way to make my “vertical” pictures not pixilated. It means the picture will appear little on my website, but you can click on it and it becomes big and not pixilated. My other pictures get big if you click on them too.

The big news about our travels now is that we spoke to a woman at the Iranian consulate in Hong Kong. She said flatly that Americans do NOT need to be part of a tour to travel in Iran. What a difference that makes!. She said all tourists need a “reference number”, and told us how to get one for each of us. We’re working on that. So, if that is possible, we’ll go to Iran. That also means I’m reconsidering going to Pakistan which, for you geographically challenged persons, is between China and Iran. If it seems hairy, I’ll not stay long in Pakistan. The only thing I must see is Mohengodaro and Harappa. It was an Indus Valley civilization almost contemporary with civilizations of southern Iraq, 6000 years ago. The way things are going in Pakistan, I think it might be a good idea to go before Pakistan falls into civil war and visiting there becomes as difficult as visiting Iraq. I don’t want missing Iraq to happen to me again. Shoot, something bad could happen in Iran, too. Like, Nut-case Netanyahoo might nuke it.
That’s it for now. Talk to you later. Be well, all of you.

In the States, we’re used to businesses proudly stating they have been in business since 1949 or something. This pharmacy in Hangzhou has been in business at this location since 1647. It’s been modernized since then. You can get your wing of bat, eye of newt Chinese med, or Tylenol PM, as you like.

While I’m at it, I think this bronze water buffalo in the lake is cute.

It was raining yesteday, so we sat for quite a while in Starbuck’s.

We really are off to Hong Kong now. Talk to you later….

After going to Jungdezhen and before coming to Hangzhou, we visited a couple of old towns. “Old town” in China is as likely as not to be one of the few remaining places where buildings more than a hundred years old remain. Usually they are a small part of a large new town. Sometimes they are by themselves. Often there is a charge to enter. Often there is a charge, but you can walk around the entrance and go in some other way. This was the case in Likeng, Xidi and Hongcun in Anhui. They are famous in China because they are so well preserved. Here are a few pictures. Likeng is the place with all the canals. The white walls and dark tile are typical traditional Huizhou architecture of the area.

And this city is Shexian. It is a mixture of old and “new old”, as well as new.

When we went to Anhui, we went up to the capital, Hebei, and met up with a couple we met along with Pipi and Xie Xie in Lijiang. For my sake, they are all going by their nicknames. Here are Xuan Xuan and Wie Wie. They are cute newlyweds who were honeymooning in Lijiang. The older guy is Shuan Shuan’s dad. They took us out to a spectacular dinner in Hebei. Ah, Chinese food is so exotic. China is a gastronomic thrill seeker’s paradise. You gotta love the pink and peach decor in their apartment.

That’s probably it for now. See you in Hong Kong. Be well, all of you.