This is a mall probably in Xiamen....we went to these a lot to find bathrooms.
This is a sushi place in Xiamen. We were staying on Gulanu the island just a ferry ride away from Xiamen. Gulanu specialized in seafood, but seafood like sea cucumber, sea urchants, sea everything and since Ben and I were both a wee bit on the not so happy stomach side we decided to opt for the Japanese food a ferry ride away. (Yeah sushi is still fish, but at least it is less potent). This one was on the second floor accessed by an escalator that only went up. It was a bit tough finding a way back down.
Some crazy plant Ben found.
The parrot show. This was advertised in our guide book as having hourly shows where the parrots danced to disco music. It was all inclusive in the bird aviary so we decided to go. In this picture a lady was donating a dollar and the parrot flew over to accept it.
A big'ole bird that was supposed to roll on this thing. It did it but then it was acting bad so the trainer yelled at it and then clipped it back onto its pole.
Tight rope walking parrot.
Puzzle parrot.
Roller skating Parrot.....
But no disco dancing parrot.
In the aviary the animals were free to roam with out any cages or leashes.
This one got a little too close for comfort. Look at the size of its BEAK!
Some rare birds in a cage.
Look Connie wouldn't you be proud!!!
Some birds to greet you when you first enter.
Ben and the peacock.
You have to make it past these birds as you enter and exit the aviary. All of them parrots! I'd say I was very brave. I do NOT like birds!!!
This is the cable car that takes you from Sun Lit Rock, the highest point on the island of Gulanu to the bird aviary side. It had just rained so the seats were very wet.
Some friends we made while being stuck during the rain. The cable cars by the way didn't seem to have any problem with letting people ride in little metal boxes dangling in the thunderstorm until about maybe 5 minutes into lightning, when they stopped it.....
The rain.
This is the top of Sun Lit Rock and you can see the very nice tall metal pole that really asked to be struck by lightning, Ben and I were up there right before the storm hit and after noticing it was about 2 feet away from us, decided to get the heck out of there.
Ben and I posing next to the metal pole leaning on the metal railings before the storm hit.
The storm approaching.
The storm over the East side of the island.
You can see here the aviary, (the thing under the netting).
This is what is on all of the shores of the main land pretty much, shipping and some kind of mining on the mountain, makes the water real good. Ben and I heard later that just a couple miles away the water had become thick and brown bubbles were forming on the surface! So despite the unbearable hot weather, high humidity, and no wind, we kept away from that water!
This is a shot of the island and across the water is the city of Xiamen.
This is the label of the beverage I poorly chose to drink. "ICE SHOCK"
That shit numbs your throat kind of like that paste the dentist puts on your gums right before he plows in. Ben and I were dying of thirst and this thing just made us feel like puking, literally!
Souvenirs. You can have you picture plastered to a dish of your choice.
This is the rock maze in the Piano Museum and Gardens. It may not look that hard. But there are numerous corridors, paths, and pockets to get trapped in. I think it took Ben and I about a half an hour to get out.
The worst part is from the front it looks easy, like a little meandering path! If you can look closely you'll see caution signs with big exclamation points and lots of people stuck.
The rock garden from the top.
Me smiling unknowingly of what is to come when I enter the maze. (now understand this maze is not shaded and its about 100 degrees out with 70 percent humidity and no breeze...you don't want to be stuck there, who ever designed this was just mean!)
A corner piano in the piano museum. Gulanu Island about 3 miles around, and at one time had the highest number of pianos per home in all of China.
The garden at the Piano Museum.
A walkway under a tree at the gardens.
Ben trying to get some kind of a breeze looking out at the water.
Ben in a little patio area.
Me and Ben and a whole lot a chinese tourists and their umbrellas in the background! It is a serious matter to the Chinese to have pure white skin, they go to great length to attain it, clunky umbrellas that they accidentally poke you in your face with, cream, face whitener, you name it!
A boat off the deck.
This was some kind of arts festival sculpture that was happening on the mainland in Xiamen.
A picture I took of the moon at night that got a little screwed up but I like it.
This was taken from Gulanu island looking back at the city of Xiamen across the water.
Some flowers on Gulanu.
A new house being built on Gulanu. Gulanu has a lot of colonial architecture since it was used by a lot of diplomats at one time. There are churches as well on the island.
A poaster I liked.
Ben and I decided to circum navigate the island to try and get any glimpse of a breeze. Instead we came upon a sculpture park with no trees, so out of heat exhaustion, frustration, and boredom, we decided to pose with the sculptures. Note the newly acquired fake Channel bag(only other option was Gucci), we bought to replace our brown backpack which was smelling worse and worse by the day.
Yet another sculpture.
This girl was with several others who were about ten paces in front of ben and I . They were all snickering and looking back at us for about ten minutes. Gulanu was not really a western tourist destination and like most places we went that hadn't seen tourists we got laughed at or stared at and usually it was more out of the other people's embaressment to ask us for a picture or talk to us. As in this case.
The nasty water and if you look in the background you can see the shipping and mining going on. Also the haze in this picture .... its the humidity!
Ohh the bathers! Just below that woman's arm is a boy who was bathing naked and really not so little, when he stands up he is as tall as the woman! A couple yards down from this are a group of girls tossing about algae covered floating stirofoam! Yeah fun fun in the poloution!
Some construction going on on the island. But this gives you the idea of the streets, they are pretty narrow and windy and the houses and buildings sit right on the streets. There are no cars allowed on the island, only an occassional golf cart. (which, considring a good meal is about 20 yuan they have a monopoly on for 700 yuan per day)
Some dried fish in a shop. Practly ever shop ont he island has dried sea products, which makes for an interesting odor, pray to god this place never sees a hurricane and everything rehydrates and comes to life!!!!!!
Dry fish on the street.
This was the more peaceful side of the island that we saw on the first day Ben and I arrived. Ben and I accidentally took the wrong ferry, the one that takes you to the backside of the island and you have to wait an hour for and pay 3 yuan. The other ferry would have docked 20 feet from our hotel, left every ten minutes, and was free. OOPS!!! But this was probably the nicest bit of time we saw the island, since the sun was setting, it was a bit cooler, and no one was really out.
View from the ferry.
On the ferry.
This is right after we arrived in Xiamen by plane. Ben and I were waiting for the bus.
View from the the plane of Guilin.
Some manakins in the airport of Guilin.
This is Yangshou, just south of Guilin.
Fields and mountains on our bus ride.
This is one of the many unofficial buses. They just sort of stop and throw you in and you give them some undetermined amount of money and they take you pretty much where you are going. You basically sit on anything as most of the seats are already occupied.
This is Ben on one such bus after we went kayaking. It took us three hours to get back!!!! The bus would just stop and sit and wait for passengers to load on if it got too empty. It also acted as some sort of post office as people would hand over packages and money and the packages would all get stacked in the middle of the bus until I guess it stopped at the post office, we did not see this happen though. At least the packages and letters had addresses, otherwise it looked real shady to me!
The town we paddled to by kayak.
My kayak and the town.
The town's bridge, it was not built for cars, only pedestrians. At one point in the river there was a little raft that was transporting a sizeable truck to the other side where construction work was going on.
A house boat next to the town.
Our guide floating along. He told us not to paddle the last stretch because a farmer we met on the way told him the current was very fast and he needed to look for a place to get out. Ben and I were a bit puzzled he didn't know where to get out and upon seeing our puzzled expressions our guide noted that no one had ever paddled this stretch of river before. (Note:Ben and I had signed up with a tour company in Yangshou and asked them which stretch of the river was the nicest, they told us this one, put us in a van with a lady who about ten minutes into the trip asked me where we were going. When we got to the right spot miraculously there were two other foreigners and our guide. The two other foreigners had just finished their trip from further up the river and the guide was going to continue with us. This looked promising so off we went. As we neared the end of our trip the guide decied to test several spots to pull off. We ended up getting out behind someone's house boat in a pile of what I hope was mud not shit. He then left the boats and put us on the crazy bus for a three hour return trip.) We did not mind the bus or the mud it was just a little funny that this trip had never been taken before yet was the most beautiful according to the tour company.
Ben and I at a little beach where we took a break.
Water ox.
Our guide.
Ben and the guide.
Me and the guide.
Our guide. He was very nice, he spoke pretty good English and I spoke some Chinese so we chatted the whole way.
Our guide by a houseboat.
Me and our guide.
Water ox by the town swimming across the river.
Ben pulling in to the rest stop and our guide chasing after him to make sure he didn't tip over (this was Ben's second time kayaking)
Ben and some water ox.
Some water ox grazing in the distance.
Ben.
Ben again.
Our guide.
This is back in Yangshou in the Li River. This lady decided to get in the river in high heels and all!
Lady in high heels in the water.
Lady in high heels looking at the water.
A horse and rider across the other shore. You could pay money and ride the horse a couple meters on the beach, the owners would start yelling and chase after the horse and so the horse would gallop for a few meters and then stop and that was the ride.... Kind of how most everything is in China...looks really nice.....isn't in reality.
Lady cleaning clothes in the river.
This is moon rock. It is that little crescent shape cut in the hill.
Some rock climbers on the mountain.
Ben and I after we made it to the top of Moon Rock, very sweaty, very hot. The trail is entirely steps.
The view from the top. Yangshou is famous for its mountain formations.
View from the crescent.
This is a river that Ben and rode by while biking to Moon Rock. Many people take boat rides here...but a bit too many for us!
A boat stuck in the small waterfall.
A more peaceful section of the river.
Biking to Moon Rock.
Ben and I decided to take a boat ride down another section of the river to see the scenery that the area is known for.
The area is on the back of the 20 yuan bill.
As the sun is setting.
The boats.
Ben and I on the beach where our boat stopped.
All the vendors trying to get you to buy rocks.
A lady with cormorants, they used to use cormorants to fish with in the river, but now it is more of a tourist sight.
All the boats that have stopped on the beach and are being attacked by people trying to sell things.
Some people washing clothes and swimming in the river.
Another boat in the river.
The loading dock. Our boat was all European and Australian tourists and then one Chinese family, a grandmother, an older lady and her husband. The lady and the grandmother were trying to explain to me the rock formations, like one looked like a thumbs up and another a woman etc etc etc. They were really nice and helped to make sure we got on the right bus. They were from Xiamen, the town we would be visiting next and gave me some tour pointers.
Some water ox.
A wedding couple in Guilin posing for pictures.
The wedding couple on the walkway. I guess everyone gets married in the south cause there were tons of bridal stores and weddings going on all over.
These were the dished we got in yangshou, a tourist town for westerners, sealed in plastic! This came to be Ben and my favorite restaurant as it served Chinese food! Everywhere else in tried to make western food like pancakes and hamburgers and pizza. (After eating there several times they eventually gave us the regular plates!)
A house in the country.
One of the apartment buildings in the city.
This was at one of our hotels, we weren't sure what nurse shampoo was so we left that one alone!
The country side.
This was taken our last day in Kunming when Ben was not feeling so well.....
Crazy wedding dress in Kunming.
The CRAZIEST wedding dress!
Another pretty good one.
Some firework looking lights at night in one of Kunming's squares.
Me after eating too much food.
Ben after eating too much food, on the roof top restaurant overlooking the park.
Stone carvings on the the road.
More carvings.
This is a view from a climb Ben and I took to Dragon's Gate, a series of temples carved into the cliff by monks a long time ago.
A funny little turtle and snake statue.
Dragon's Gate.
Ben walking down the stairs that are carved into the cliff.
Too many tourists.
The chairlift we took from midpoint to the peak. You can see the lake below and the sand spit that crosses to the other side.
Ben convinced me to go on the chairlift, even though I really do not like heights!
The chairlift.
A bike carrying water.
A temple on the road to Dragon's Gate.
These purple bugs that were all over the paths and yes I am sure they were bugs, they had legs and were moving!!!!
The new highway they built and some housing developments next to it.
Look right next to the foot of the lady in the red coat, she has a live chicken just sitting there with her on the BUS!
Me hiking.
The road to the park of Dragon Gate.
A kid with a sculpture.
Lime juice! Really SOUR!
This is at a garden in Kunming, it has a little lake and you can pay money and get sealed inside one of these balls and tossed out on the water and kind of spin around.
At a sushi restaurant. Despite what it looks like Ben was not feeling good and only at the miso soup I ate EVERYTHING ELSE! I was hungry!!!!!
A KTV, basically a Karaoke bar...we think....
Crazy ice cream fruit things that just take like artificial fruit.
In the garden in Kunming.
A little rock hill in the Garden.
A wierd sculpture.
Another sculpture.
This was in the theme part of the gardens and you could rent tandem bicycles.
The theme park part, this King Kong was activated as a car rolled by the track above, it would swing its rock.
Someone on the ride. The little boy got a toy gun and would shoot at the animals and apparently they would sort of "die" if he hit some kind of target and the animal would shut off.
More of the garden...
A sign in the garden.
A pagoda.
Some flowers.
A bridge.
The bonsai part of the park.
This was near the enterance.
An archway made of red flags.
The entrance to the park.
This is what the street lights looked like in some parts of Kunming, a bird that held a light.
A bilboard that ben liked.
The hot hot hot dinner we ate! It was really good and didn't burn until about 3 minutes after you ate it! It was cilantro, lime, goji berries, and a bit of garlic or scallion I think, and you put that over noodles and top it off with some kind of dried meat.
Ben eating it.
A street in Kunming. Kunming was one of my favorite cities we saw!
A water store.
A park in Kinming.
More of the park over looking the water.
Some dogs in the park.
A street in Kunming. The whole city was very green, had lots of parks, was easy to walk, had interesting streets and architecture and good food.
A strange looking advertisement on the street.
The center of Kunming. The city is known for its flowers and this entire thing is made from flowers, there are several of these around the city!
Another street in Kunming.
A store front.
This is a mall probably in Xiamen....we went to these a lot to find bathrooms.
This is a sushi place in Xiamen. We were staying on Gulanu the island just a ferry ride away from Xiamen. Gulanu specialized in seafood, but seafood like sea cucumber, sea urchants, sea everything and since Ben and I were both a wee bit on the not so happy stomach side we decided to opt for the Japanese food a ferry ride away. (Yeah sushi is still fish, but at least it is less potent). This one was on the second floor accessed by an escalator that only went up. It was a bit tough finding a way back down.
Some crazy plant Ben found.
The parrot show. This was advertised in our guide book as having hourly shows where the parrots danced to disco music. It was all inclusive in the bird aviary so we decided to go. In this picture a lady was donating a dollar and the parrot flew over to accept it.
A big'ole bird that was supposed to roll on this thing. It did it but then it was acting bad so the trainer yelled at it and then clipped it back onto its pole.
Tight rope walking parrot.
Puzzle parrot.
Roller skating Parrot.....
But no disco dancing parrot.
In the aviary the animals were free to roam with out any cages or leashes.
This one got a little too close for comfort. Look at the size of its BEAK!
Some rare birds in a cage.
Look Connie wouldn't you be proud!!!
Some birds to greet you when you first enter.
Ben and the peacock.
You have to make it past these birds as you enter and exit the aviary. All of them parrots! I'd say I was very brave. I do NOT like birds!!!
This is the cable car that takes you from Sun Lit Rock, the highest point on the island of Gulanu to the bird aviary side. It had just rained so the seats were very wet.
Some friends we made while being stuck during the rain. The cable cars by the way didn't seem to have any problem with letting people ride in little metal boxes dangling in the thunderstorm until about maybe 5 minutes into lightning, when they stopped it.....
The rain.
This is the top of Sun Lit Rock and you can see the very nice tall metal pole that really asked to be struck by lightning, Ben and I were up there right before the storm hit and after noticing it was about 2 feet away from us, decided to get the heck out of there.
Ben and I posing next to the metal pole leaning on the metal railings before the storm hit.
The storm approaching.
The storm over the East side of the island.
You can see here the aviary, (the thing under the netting).
This is what is on all of the shores of the main land pretty much, shipping and some kind of mining on the mountain, makes the water real good. Ben and I heard later that just a couple miles away the water had become thick and brown bubbles were forming on the surface! So despite the unbearable hot weather, high humidity, and no wind, we kept away from that water!
This is a shot of the island and across the water is the city of Xiamen.
This is the label of the beverage I poorly chose to drink. "ICE SHOCK"
That shit numbs your throat kind of like that paste the dentist puts on your gums right before he plows in. Ben and I were dying of thirst and this thing just made us feel like puking, literally!
Souvenirs. You can have you picture plastered to a dish of your choice.
This is the rock maze in the Piano Museum and Gardens. It may not look that hard. But there are numerous corridors, paths, and pockets to get trapped in. I think it took Ben and I about a half an hour to get out.
The worst part is from the front it looks easy, like a little meandering path! If you can look closely you'll see caution signs with big exclamation points and lots of people stuck.
The rock garden from the top.
Me smiling unknowingly of what is to come when I enter the maze. (now understand this maze is not shaded and its about 100 degrees out with 70 percent humidity and no breeze...you don't want to be stuck there, who ever designed this was just mean!)
A corner piano in the piano museum. Gulanu Island about 3 miles around, and at one time had the highest number of pianos per home in all of China.
The garden at the Piano Museum.
A walkway under a tree at the gardens.
Ben trying to get some kind of a breeze looking out at the water.
Ben in a little patio area.
Me and Ben and a whole lot a chinese tourists and their umbrellas in the background! It is a serious matter to the Chinese to have pure white skin, they go to great length to attain it, clunky umbrellas that they accidentally poke you in your face with, cream, face whitener, you name it!
A boat off the deck.
This was some kind of arts festival sculpture that was happening on the mainland in Xiamen.
A picture I took of the moon at night that got a little screwed up but I like it.
This was taken from Gulanu island looking back at the city of Xiamen across the water.
Some flowers on Gulanu.
A new house being built on Gulanu. Gulanu has a lot of colonial architecture since it was used by a lot of diplomats at one time. There are churches as well on the island.
A poaster I liked.
Ben and I decided to circum navigate the island to try and get any glimpse of a breeze. Instead we came upon a sculpture park with no trees, so out of heat exhaustion, frustration, and boredom, we decided to pose with the sculptures. Note the newly acquired fake Channel bag(only other option was Gucci), we bought to replace our brown backpack which was smelling worse and worse by the day.
Yet another sculpture.
This girl was with several others who were about ten paces in front of ben and I . They were all snickering and looking back at us for about ten minutes. Gulanu was not really a western tourist destination and like most places we went that hadn't seen tourists we got laughed at or stared at and usually it was more out of the other people's embaressment to ask us for a picture or talk to us. As in this case.
The nasty water and if you look in the background you can see the shipping and mining going on. Also the haze in this picture .... its the humidity!
Ohh the bathers! Just below that woman's arm is a boy who was bathing naked and really not so little, when he stands up he is as tall as the woman! A couple yards down from this are a group of girls tossing about algae covered floating stirofoam! Yeah fun fun in the poloution!
Some construction going on on the island. But this gives you the idea of the streets, they are pretty narrow and windy and the houses and buildings sit right on the streets. There are no cars allowed on the island, only an occassional golf cart. (which, considring a good meal is about 20 yuan they have a monopoly on for 700 yuan per day)
Some dried fish in a shop. Practly ever shop ont he island has dried sea products, which makes for an interesting odor, pray to god this place never sees a hurricane and everything rehydrates and comes to life!!!!!!
Dry fish on the street.
This was the more peaceful side of the island that we saw on the first day Ben and I arrived. Ben and I accidentally took the wrong ferry, the one that takes you to the backside of the island and you have to wait an hour for and pay 3 yuan. The other ferry would have docked 20 feet from our hotel, left every ten minutes, and was free. OOPS!!! But this was probably the nicest bit of time we saw the island, since the sun was setting, it was a bit cooler, and no one was really out.
View from the ferry.
On the ferry.
This is right after we arrived in Xiamen by plane. Ben and I were waiting for the bus.
View from the the plane of Guilin.
Some manakins in the airport of Guilin.
This is Yangshou, just south of Guilin.
Fields and mountains on our bus ride.
This is one of the many unofficial buses. They just sort of stop and throw you in and you give them some undetermined amount of money and they take you pretty much where you are going. You basically sit on anything as most of the seats are already occupied.
This is Ben on one such bus after we went kayaking. It took us three hours to get back!!!! The bus would just stop and sit and wait for passengers to load on if it got too empty. It also acted as some sort of post office as people would hand over packages and money and the packages would all get stacked in the middle of the bus until I guess it stopped at the post office, we did not see this happen though. At least the packages and letters had addresses, otherwise it looked real shady to me!
The town we paddled to by kayak.
My kayak and the town.
The town's bridge, it was not built for cars, only pedestrians. At one point in the river there was a little raft that was transporting a sizeable truck to the other side where construction work was going on.
A house boat next to the town.
Our guide floating along. He told us not to paddle the last stretch because a farmer we met on the way told him the current was very fast and he needed to look for a place to get out. Ben and I were a bit puzzled he didn't know where to get out and upon seeing our puzzled expressions our guide noted that no one had ever paddled this stretch of river before. (Note:Ben and I had signed up with a tour company in Yangshou and asked them which stretch of the river was the nicest, they told us this one, put us in a van with a lady who about ten minutes into the trip asked me where we were going. When we got to the right spot miraculously there were two other foreigners and our guide. The two other foreigners had just finished their trip from further up the river and the guide was going to continue with us. This looked promising so off we went. As we neared the end of our trip the guide decied to test several spots to pull off. We ended up getting out behind someone's house boat in a pile of what I hope was mud not shit. He then left the boats and put us on the crazy bus for a three hour return trip.) We did not mind the bus or the mud it was just a little funny that this trip had never been taken before yet was the most beautiful according to the tour company.
Ben and I at a little beach where we took a break.
Water ox.
Our guide.
Ben and the guide.
Me and the guide.
Our guide. He was very nice, he spoke pretty good English and I spoke some Chinese so we chatted the whole way.
Our guide by a houseboat.
Me and our guide.
Water ox by the town swimming across the river.
Ben pulling in to the rest stop and our guide chasing after him to make sure he didn't tip over (this was Ben's second time kayaking)
Ben and some water ox.
Some water ox grazing in the distance.
Ben.
Ben again.
Our guide.
This is back in Yangshou in the Li River. This lady decided to get in the river in high heels and all!
Lady in high heels in the water.
Lady in high heels looking at the water.
A horse and rider across the other shore. You could pay money and ride the horse a couple meters on the beach, the owners would start yelling and chase after the horse and so the horse would gallop for a few meters and then stop and that was the ride.... Kind of how most everything is in China...looks really nice.....isn't in reality.
Lady cleaning clothes in the river.
This is moon rock. It is that little crescent shape cut in the hill.
Some rock climbers on the mountain.
Ben and I after we made it to the top of Moon Rock, very sweaty, very hot. The trail is entirely steps.
The view from the top. Yangshou is famous for its mountain formations.
View from the crescent.
This is a river that Ben and rode by while biking to Moon Rock. Many people take boat rides here...but a bit too many for us!
A boat stuck in the small waterfall.
A more peaceful section of the river.
Biking to Moon Rock.
Ben and I decided to take a boat ride down another section of the river to see the scenery that the area is known for.
The area is on the back of the 20 yuan bill.
As the sun is setting.
The boats.
Ben and I on the beach where our boat stopped.
All the vendors trying to get you to buy rocks.
A lady with cormorants, they used to use cormorants to fish with in the river, but now it is more of a tourist sight.
All the boats that have stopped on the beach and are being attacked by people trying to sell things.
Some people washing clothes and swimming in the river.
Another boat in the river.
The loading dock. Our boat was all European and Australian tourists and then one Chinese family, a grandmother, an older lady and her husband. The lady and the grandmother were trying to explain to me the rock formations, like one looked like a thumbs up and another a woman etc etc etc. They were really nice and helped to make sure we got on the right bus. They were from Xiamen, the town we would be visiting next and gave me some tour pointers.
Some water ox.
A wedding couple in Guilin posing for pictures.
The wedding couple on the walkway. I guess everyone gets married in the south cause there were tons of bridal stores and weddings going on all over.
These were the dished we got in yangshou, a tourist town for westerners, sealed in plastic! This came to be Ben and my favorite restaurant as it served Chinese food! Everywhere else in tried to make western food like pancakes and hamburgers and pizza. (After eating there several times they eventually gave us the regular plates!)
A house in the country.
One of the apartment buildings in the city.
This was at one of our hotels, we weren't sure what nurse shampoo was so we left that one alone!
The country side.
This was taken our last day in Kunming when Ben was not feeling so well.....
Crazy wedding dress in Kunming.
The CRAZIEST wedding dress!
Another pretty good one.
Some firework looking lights at night in one of Kunming's squares.
Me after eating too much food.
Ben after eating too much food, on the roof top restaurant overlooking the park.
Stone carvings on the the road.
More carvings.
This is a view from a climb Ben and I took to Dragon's Gate, a series of temples carved into the cliff by monks a long time ago.
A funny little turtle and snake statue.
Dragon's Gate.
Ben walking down the stairs that are carved into the cliff.
Too many tourists.
The chairlift we took from midpoint to the peak. You can see the lake below and the sand spit that crosses to the other side.
Ben convinced me to go on the chairlift, even though I really do not like heights!
The chairlift.
A bike carrying water.
A temple on the road to Dragon's Gate.
These purple bugs that were all over the paths and yes I am sure they were bugs, they had legs and were moving!!!!
The new highway they built and some housing developments next to it.
Look right next to the foot of the lady in the red coat, she has a live chicken just sitting there with her on the BUS!
Me hiking.
The road to the park of Dragon Gate.
A kid with a sculpture.
Lime juice! Really SOUR!
This is at a garden in Kunming, it has a little lake and you can pay money and get sealed inside one of these balls and tossed out on the water and kind of spin around.
At a sushi restaurant. Despite what it looks like Ben was not feeling good and only at the miso soup I ate EVERYTHING ELSE! I was hungry!!!!!
A KTV, basically a Karaoke bar...we think....
Crazy ice cream fruit things that just take like artificial fruit.
In the garden in Kunming.
A little rock hill in the Garden.
A wierd sculpture.
Another sculpture.
This was in the theme part of the gardens and you could rent tandem bicycles.
The theme park part, this King Kong was activated as a car rolled by the track above, it would swing its rock.
Someone on the ride. The little boy got a toy gun and would shoot at the animals and apparently they would sort of "die" if he hit some kind of target and the animal would shut off.
More of the garden...
A sign in the garden.
A pagoda.
Some flowers.
A bridge.
The bonsai part of the park.
This was near the enterance.
An archway made of red flags.
The entrance to the park.
This is what the street lights looked like in some parts of Kunming, a bird that held a light.
A bilboard that ben liked.
The hot hot hot dinner we ate! It was really good and didn't burn until about 3 minutes after you ate it! It was cilantro, lime, goji berries, and a bit of garlic or scallion I think, and you put that over noodles and top it off with some kind of dried meat.
Ben eating it.
A street in Kunming. Kunming was one of my favorite cities we saw!
A water store.
A park in Kinming.
More of the park over looking the water.
Some dogs in the park.
A street in Kunming. The whole city was very green, had lots of parks, was easy to walk, had interesting streets and architecture and good food.
A strange looking advertisement on the street.
The center of Kunming. The city is known for its flowers and this entire thing is made from flowers, there are several of these around the city!
Another street in Kunming.
A store front.
