Thursday, March 1, 2012

A Little More Island Hopping - Cheung Chau

After getting back to the Central Piers, we met up with Gallagher and Amy and hopped on the next ferry to Cheung Chau. Cheung Chau was on the other side of Hong Kong Island (away from Lamma, towards Macau). It is also a fishing island with no motorized vehicles. This island was WAY more developed then Lamma Island. There was a 7-Eleven, a zillion grocery stores, street markets, etc.

 Wellcome is my favorite grocery store here. This one smacked you in the face when you got off of the ferry.
This is our ferry.
Fishing boats!
Street signs that point to different tourist attractions
Temple
So beautiful and ornate :D
 I love the conical incense!
 Lovely... Nothing more scenic then a slaughter house
 Josh on his bike. We rented bikes for two hours. For the first hour, Gallagher carted Amy and I around in a carriage bike. For the second hour, we all had our own bikes.
 Bikes were not such a good idea on one side of the island... We literally walked them for about 30 minutes of our first hour. This was one view after climbing up a steep hill.
 You know. Just chilling on top of the highest peak of a tiny island.
Gal planking...
 Not sure whats going on with the awkward lean thing, but a lovely view of an uninhabited, geologically beautiful island behind me. Even with the not great day, still a breath taking view in person!

After leaving this point, there appeared to be a lovely route down to another viewing point. Therefore, Gallagher convinced Amy and I to get back onto the bike so he could give us a ride down. Then, the path narrowed... Our rather wide bike barely fit and there was a cliff off to one side. Gallagher tried his very best to stay on the path. He did a pretty good job. THEN... drop of death... This was still the path, however was extraordinarily steep and with three people, we had A LOT of momentum and Gallagher lost control and Amy and I actually thought we might die. But good news!!! After bloody-ing his heels and me destroying the tread on my left sneaker, we were able to regain control and stop the bike at the bottom of the slope.
 Soooooooooooo once we got to that point, we decided going back that same route would be suicide. Turns out there was no other way down... except for this staircase... which was really long... and the bike started to fall apart. Anyways, this is Gallagher trying to walk/ride the three person bike down the stairs. After finally reaching sea level, we went back to the bike shop and traded in the three person bike for three individual bikes. Then we went to the other side of the island to try and find the mini Great Wall. In the process we got stuck in pedestrian traffic, passed by a funeral and biked up a steep hill that had signs for no biking. After realizing that we had a limited time before we had to pick up Andrew from the ferry, we decided to try and find the beach and then return the bikes. At the beach, we learned that Gallagher and three-year old British twins are essentially identical. Gal would run towards the water then run back as the waves came in. Literally 50 meters to the left, these two adorable twins were doing the same thing. Gal didn't notice until we pointed it out to him... Then we returned the bikes and met Andrew. Then we had a wonderful seafood dinner.
This is one potato, cut into a curl and stuck on a stick and stuck in a fryer. Essentially, a stick of freshly made potato chips. You then had the option to sprinkle different flavors on it. I had cheese and curry. So yummy!

Friday, February 17, 2012

A Little Island Hopping - Lamma Island

On Saturday, several of us went island hopping. The hopping portion was spur of the moment as the original plan was to spend the day at Lamma Island. Lamma Island was cool but we hit all the major things in the first half of the day. So a few of us opted to hop on a ferry to a different island!
We left our apartment at 8:30 in the morning to go to Central to catch a ferry to Lamma Island.
 This was our first impression of Lamma Island. A giant, lovely coal-burning power plant. Isn't it pretty? This power plant provides the power for all of Hong Kong Island...
 Fishing Village
 Wind turbine :D
 Ferry Pier
 Fishing sampans (their little boats)
This is for mommy and auntie Linda :)
 Street sign. Did I mention that their are no vehicles on Lamma Island? It is strictly footpaths and bicycles
 Temple
 Incense cones
 OK so I lied. We found ONE motorized vehicle. This teeny-tiny ambulance!
 I liked that this is a church "hang out"
From here, we started to hike across the island. It took about an hour and a half. We stopped several times for pictures and to check maps (we wanted to find the caves to explore in!).
KITTY!!!!!!!!! There were actually a lot of dogs on Lamma Island...
 This is what you can NOT do on the beach. No flying discs! Paul was very upset...
Pretty beach
 I love my letters <3
 Look how huge that plant is!!!
 Fishing village with cargo ships in the background
 Another fishing village :)
 Cave!
 Inside the cave. What you see is what you get. These caves were not very big or exciting. Apparently this is where the fishermen store their boats during typhoons.
Puppy!
The next series of pictures are what I spent $350 HKD on (over $40 USD)! It was expensive but SO GOOD. We got a giant seafood buffet essentially meant for 6 to 8 people. There were 6 of us. We left no survivors...
 Steamed scallops with minced garlic. Seriously, the best thing EVER!!!
 Salt and Pepper Prawn
 This is our order!
 Mmmmmmmmmmmmmm!!!
 Greg using the finger bowl. Not sure what it actually is but it is magical. After peeling apart those prawn, our fingers were so sticky and covered in every manner of pepper, fried bits, prawn brains, you name it. Dunk your hand in the finger bowl and instantly clean!
 Sweet and sour fish. Yup, if you thought that was a fried fish head, you were right! It was so good...
 Steamed abalone... Kinda weird and bland tasting but I'd eat it again.
 Seafood fried rice
Rainbow seafood restaurant! This is where we ate our delectable lunch. After eating, they provided us with a free ferry ride back to Hong Kong Island.

2.6.2012 - 2.10.2012

So I got really behind in this blog... and I can't honestly remember what I did during this week... Soooo yea...........................
I know I worked a lot... I presented on Wednesday...
But that is about it...

Wednesday, February 15, 2012

Mai Po Nature Reserve

 On Sunday, we went to the Mai Po Nature Reserve and went on a bird watching tour. This was arranged for us by the marketing coordinator of the Mai Po Nature Reserve who we interviewed for our project. He believed that they were conducting ecotourism on the reserve and he wanted us to experience it. We took one of their few English-guided tours and got into the reserve for free. The reserve is way up North so it took awhile to get there.

















This is Amy, licking sugar cane paper...