Friday, 28 February 2014
This entry is part of "France: From Paris to the Riviera" series...
We kicked off our honeymoon in the romance capital of the world (Paris), spent a few days in the relaxing Provence countryside... the last portion of our honeymoon was by the Mediterranean Sea: Côte d'Azur aka the French Riviera.
Wednesday, 26 February 2014
This entry is part of "France: From Paris to the Riviera" series...
We kicked off our honeymoon in the romance capital of the world (Paris), spent a few days in the relaxing Provence countryside... the last portion of our honeymoon was by the Mediterranean Sea: Côte d'Azur aka the French Riviera.
Due to the amount of pictures/words this entry is posted in 2 parts
Friday, 20 December 2013
This entry is part of "France: From Paris to the Riviera" series...
We kicked off our honeymoon in the romance capital of the world (Paris), we then traveled to the middle of France and found ourselves immersed in a completely different atmosphere...
Friday, 6 December 2013
This entry is part of "France: From Paris to the Riviera" series...
Paris has long been considered the romance capital of the world... so what better place to kick off our honeymoon?
Due to the amount of pictures/words this entry is posted in 2 parts
Friday, 4 October 2013
This entry is part of "France: From Paris to the Riviera" series...
Paris has long been considered the romance capital of the world... so what better place to kick off our honeymoon?
Due to the amount of pictures/words this entry is posted in 2 parts
Thursday, 26 September 2013
Introduction:
Two years after getting married my wife and I finally found time to go on a proper honeymoon! The decision to choose France as our honeymoon destination came naturally as France offered everything we would appreciate in an adventure: Legendary cuisine, excellent variety of photographic opportunities, and of course being the romance capital of the world (I know it’s a cliché, but why not go for the gold?).
On our 16-day adventure we wanted to spend at least a week in Paris since this was our first time visiting France, and spend the rest of our time “sampling” different parts of France at a relatively leisure pace (we wanted to smell the roses too!). Cote d’Azur (French Riviera) emerged as an ideal second destination because it combined relaxation with an excellent public transport system. Upon departure our itinerary looked like this: Paris (7 days) -> Avignon area (2.5 days) -> Nice (5 days) -> return to Paris for our flight home (we did not have a daily itinerary because getting lost had led to many amazing surprises throughout our travels in the past). Unlike our trip to China, my wife's semi-fluent French turned out to be an extremely important asset.
AND… For the first time ever instead of staying at hotels we rented private apartments for both Paris and Nice… as for Provence… we opted to let fate decide our fortunes.
Sunday, 1 September 2013
1 day whirlwind visit in August
I have always considered Seattle as Vancouver's twin because these two cities are so close geographically from each other (~2 hours by car excluding the border wait). In typical northwest fashion Seattleites are polite, laid-back, and generally fit (who can blame them? Northwest's natural beauty = outdoor activities).
I have been to/through Seattle many times before but I have never "toured" around the city (like many Vancouverites, Seattle's existence was purely for cross-border shopping... until now). With the entire northwest enjoying a history-setting fantastic summer, and the Toronto Blue Jays coming to Seattle... Seattle here I come!
Monday, 5 August 2013
Adventures of two bananas in the Capital
Last time I visited Beijing
I was 4 years old and I ran off in Tiananmen Square
looking for bullet holes (which led to homemade personal locating devices
attached to me for the reminder of the trip... aka little bells around my wrist).
Oh yeah, I also "spoke" Chinese back then.
From my recollection Beijing
was a sterile and oppressive city (possibly because my parents and I visited
not too long after the infamous Tiananmen Square
incident). My memories of Beijing
consisted of endless bicycle traffic with occasional motorbikes (cars and buses
were few and far between); ice-sledding/tobogganing on a frozen lake (courtesy
of nice Beijing locals); climbing the Badaling great wall in tears but got a
“Great Wall conqueror” certificate; and my first encounter with snow.
Fast forward 20ish years my Chinese language skills remained atrocious
(shameful would be another word that would describe my Mandarin), and this time
I took my wife with me to hike the Great Wall of China. My wife, a third-generation Chinese-Canadian
who is fluent in English and French, turned out to be less useful in
communicating with the locals than I had hoped.
So during our 5-day trip to the Capital we were essentially two bananas
traveling in Beijing
where everybody expected us to converse in Chinese – which led to some
memorable experiences. (banana: yellow
outside, white inside)
Saturday, 6 July 2013
Woke up to a beautiful clear morning with cloudless blue sky (BOO YA no smog!). The first order of business: Go to McD’s and grab our lunches for the day - $2 CAD breakfast meals (we got 2 each haha). We are not big fans of fast-food especially when traveling abroad, but with minimal choices we had to buy from the world famous golden arches. Combining McD’s with some light snacks/drinks, we were ready for the Great Wall of China! Our driver met us at the hotel lobby and off we went to Jinshanling!
For RMB $900 we hired our driver Joe for the entire day. Having a fantastic guide/driver really made our great wall experience that much more immersive. The drive to Jinshanling was approximately 2.5 hours from where we stayed (close to the Forbidden City). Of course my wife slept through the entire car ride (there and back), but I was conversing with Joe the entire time in English and some broken Chinese about topics that would’ve put her to sleep anyways haha (like politics). In fact I was pleasantly surprised at Joe’s willingness to speak his mind about more “sensitive” subjects like government and politics. From our conversation I learned a few fun facts about Beijing and China:
This new alternate entrance (East gate entrance?) to Jinshanling Great Wall was similar to a lot of new architectures in China. Although the property itself looked amazing, it did not blend in with the surrounding landscape and thereby it stuck out like a sore thumb. We realized that we made a correct call to visit Jinshanling instead of the more “famous” sections like Badaling or Mutianyu because we were the only visitors at the entrance. After paying the entrance fee of ~$50 RMB per person, we embarked on a 30 minute hike uphill on a well maintained trail until we reached our starting point.
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Our hike started at Dongwuyanlou (or Dongwuyan tower/East Five Eyes Tower/東五眼樓) and we could only proceed in one direction westward towards the Jinshanling main entrance because the path towards Simatai was off limits. This section of the great wall is considered as the "wild wall" because this section has not been touched since its conception from the Ming Dynasty era (AD 1570). We walked casually westward as we were in no rush, sometimes stopping at the watch towers (or what was left of it) for refreshments and sometimes even doubled back to savor the astonishing views. (Jinshanling has the highest density of watch towers as well as various strategic wall improvements that are unique to this stretch of the Great Wall).
The first third of the hike was definitely more challenging as loose bricks, crumbling walls, wobbly steps, and numerous potholes welcomed us at every turn. We hiked this section rather cautiously but the hike itself was easily manageable and we didn’t feel at any point in danger. We had the Great Wall all to ourselves as we did not encounter another soul for the first 1.5 hour. Our driver said most visitors who visit Jinshanling are foreigners as most Asians (except Japanese tourists) usually stick with Badaling or Mutianyu. In fact throughout our entire hike we saw two other couples, one local elder, and four local kids playing tag. Looking back at my Great Wall experiences I would rather experience 30 minutes of Jinshanling than hours at Badaling. There is something truly special about experiencing the Great Wall at its original state with minimal disturbances from other visitors, over commercialization, and traffic. (Did you know the Badaling section is basically a complete rebuilt on ancient foundations?)
(Aside: I visited Badaling when I was a kid before China was open to the western world and domestic Chinese citizens were too poor to travel… and Badaling was already packed then! Badaling wasn’t as commercially developed then and the “washroom” had crawlies everywhere – I imagine its hygiene status should be improved now. Anyways I digress…)
As we proceeded westward the wind felt gentler and our hike felt less rugged as well. We encountered an abruptly repaved section half way into our journey, but just as abruptly the renovation ceased 200 meters down the path.. WTF? By the time we reached the Big Jinshan Tower our journey through the wild great wall was over and we were walking on “solid stones” once again. This stretch of Jinshanling was renovated in the 1980-1990s and it was beautifully renovated (non-intrusive). There were even cable cars to traffic less physically-able visitors to/from the great wall! It was closed when we visited during the winter months, and in fact the entire main entrance seemed deserted when we hiked through the little Jinshanling resort village (aka main entrance). Joe was waiting for us at the parking lot as promised and our hike through Jinshanling was about 4.5 hours all together (with numerous photo/snack breaks in between… so probably 3 hours with no interruptions).
UPDATE: July 17, 2013 - Additional Photos Added! click here!
Have you been to Jinshanling? Or are you intrigued by the wild wall? If you enjoyed this post, or have any questions about the trip. Let me know in the comments below! Happy travels!
Saturday, 11 May 2013
Introduction
I don't even remember why I wanted to go to Iceland in the first place (I wanted to go even before I picked up photography). To be honest, I think this destination popped in my head simply because I wanted to go somewhere where few people have been, and I wanted to be different. Fast forward 10 years, I finally went ahead and googled this random rock in the middle of the Atlantic. For the longest time the only thing I've heard about Iceland was that it was expensive (and indeed it was), but once I saw pictures of this place I knew I was going to go there for sure.
I had intended to visit Iceland on my own since my wife wasn't all that interested (plus she couldn't take time off from work). Being in my mid-twenties I didn't need anyone to go anywhere with me, I don't know how but I ended up treating my mom to this trip (in a way to thank her, and something different for her as well)... I am glad I did.
Like any amateur photographer/poor traveler with plenty of time on their hands, I spent tons of time doing 3 things: 1) I went on Flickr to see if there are any cool ideas, 2) Tripadvisor to ask for advice regarding my trip plans, and 3) try to save some money with car rental/accommodations.