Gulangyu

I had the chance to explore a few places on Gulangyu that I have not explore before. So this is mostly a picture post.

The view of the beach from an outcropping.

The Piano museum is those two buildings.

Sunlight rock in the distance.

Beautiful blooms.

The rockery. A collection of concrete "rocks" stacked creating a maze like slope with stairs and caves. It's pretty cool.

Hiking up sunlight rock.

The view from Sunlight Rock.

The stairs back down one part of Sunlight Rock.

A temple in the park area of Sunlight Rock.

An enormous organ at the Organ Museum.

The beach and the Zheng Chenggong statue. He was a great general for chasing the Dutch out of Taiwan. That the Chinese honor. Go figure.

Gulangyu is a great place to wander and explore. I'll have more pictures from other trips in my coming posts.

My new little friend

After the death  march and mystery lunch we caught taxis (that took forever) and went over to Gulangyu. Our taxi got there first by about 10 minutes. While we waited I noticed this little girl who was playing around and sitting on the steps. She was so cute. But she worried me.

 I couldn't see her family anywhere. She wandered off around the staircase, then came back. Then had some drink and wandered off again. Then her grandma came.

 She called for her, but couldn't find her. I told her that the little girl went around the staircase and she went off to find her. They both came back shortly after and the grandmother gave us 2 wax apples. They are pretty good, but no, I did not eat them. I did not have a way to wash them.

  She was such a little cutie. Her little hair just sticks straight out in every direction. I caught this last photo of her as we left. She was there playing around on Wednesday when I went back.

Her parents must work all day and so grandma takes care of her while collecting plastic bottles for recycling. Many of the old people do this for subsistence. They must get a fair amount for it to be worth it. I now call her "Little Orphan Annie." When I saw her Wednesday afternoon she was sound asleep on her grandma's shoulder. I wish there was something I could do for her. She just breaks my heart!

June 4 Adventure

We went with Shawn, from Lifetime, out to Gulangyu Island. It's always a little different each time. We see or do something new. It's always fun.

It was a very clear day and I got some good pictures of the island from the ferry.

 On the way over.

 To the left is Sunlight Rock - the highest point on the island. When it is not so hot and on a clear day (this fall I suppose) we will climb up and take pictures.

 This cute girl was selling pigs and frogs with ridged backs that when you ran the stick over them made an "oink" or a "ribbit" sound. They are hallowed out in such a way that the echo sounds like animal sounds. They are cool. Shawn wanted one but he wanted it cheaper and so he decided he was going to get one on commission. He stood there for about 10 minutes trying to help her sell them. She did come down on the price.

 He had several people interested, partly because he is a 6'5" white guy making noise. It was funny.

 These lions were atop a stone gate. They were pretty cool.

 This cat was just creepy. We've seen very few cats.

 This is the only antique shop we've seen. Most of it was junk, but part of me wanted to get a frame, a screen or some piece of furniture to take home to do over. That may yet happen.

 We were headed out at low tide - thus the rocks that you can see. 

The sun was on it's way down when we headed back. It was beautiful.

Come back tomorrow to see how our day ended!

I like getting lost...

On small islands that is. On Friday evening I had just left my classmates at a restaurant on Zhoung Shan Lu and decided to walk home, as it was not far and I could see my landmark. Well, I took a wrong turn and after walking for 15 minutes I lost my landmark. So I got in a taxi and asked to be taken to my building. 3 blocks away. What? I'm a dork. I was just behind a building that I should have finished walking around, and I would have seen my building. Silly me. But I did see some fun things and I think I will go exploring again with Daniel in the coming weeks.

The second time we got lost this weekend we did on purpose. We were on Gulangyo and decided that it would be fun to wander a small island and see what it had to offer. We found some fun stuff and I took a lot of pictures. So this is part one of our adventurous weekend.

We had two guests in town this week from Lifetime and so we took them sight seeing. One guy has been a few times, but never had time to sight see. The other has never been to China before. He was like a kid in a candy store. It is fun for us to feel that renewed interest and curiosity again.

We started with a trip over to Gulyangyu where we spent almost 6 hours.

This little guy was just outside the painting shop we like to visit. We will be getting things here in the future.

This is a paper umbrella that was painted and then oiled so that it is preserved and water proof.

This guy was making things out of bamboo. We bought the bird. It doesn't look quite so cool all dried up.

They put glass on top of the wall to prevent people from climbing over them.

These people used blue - a bit more decorative.

This is sugar cain. They run it through a press and juice it.

This is the juice of the sugar cain. The ones on the right that are more gray-green-yellow-ish are the sugar ones. We bought some but it tasted pretty funky. Like saturated sugar water.

This is a very old big tree.

This is the sign for the tree. It's a ficus microcarpa that is 290 years old. There are many al over the island that well over 150 years old.

 This is a statue of a very famous man in Chinese history. His name is Zheng Chengong.

 This is the beach on the way up to see the stone statue.

 I took this from standing as his feet.

 This is back down.

 This is the sign telling people about him.

 We are on the stone walkway that goes around him. I'm trying to include pictures of us so you know we are really seeing and doing!

 This is a bronze statue of his helmet and sword.

On our way back to the ferry and we saw these old ladies playing this game. I tried to ask the old man on the far right what they were playing and he just said no.

It was a fun day. After this we ate noodles and then headed to Zhongshan Lu.

Check back tomorrow.