Bangkokery

Once we landed in Bangkok we found our way to the Lub D Hostel at about 4am. It's a really cool hostel, very functional and modern but comfortable too. Much organisation was set in motion the following morning for our onward travels.

Due to the PAD riots on Khao San Rd we didn't venture there the first day,so grabbed a tuktuk and caught a bite to eat elsewhere. I wish I had a photo of the four of us wedged into one tuktuk! It was hilarious! We sampled the nightlife in Bangkok, huge clubs with sooo many people (RCA). (I was slightly disturbed by a baby elephant on show outside the club however).

We also temporarily parted ways with Fitz and Dave here. The early morning goodbyes made it a bit of a blur, hopefully we'll see them in Cambodia for some final quality video-shooting! James and I ventured to the infmaous Khao San Rd now that things seemed to have settled again - (see photo above of policeman wielding a chain though!)

Not much to Khao San - its pretty grimey. If you want instant 'karma' 2008 ie to be turned into a stereotypical tie dyed 'no I bought the jeans with the holes in the knees'/ 'I'm off to 'discover myself in Thailand' vibe - then look no further.

A short stop in Bangkok then - it proved to be enough. Grainne arrived on Saturday afternoon and we imaginatively hit a smelly Irish bar around the corner for grub and a few drinks. James
got stuck into a live S.A v Oz test and we left him distracted to shop along the stalls outside for a while.

Next stop BEACH!

Hongky Kongky

A super dooper fast train brought us from the airport to the underground system allowing us to catch glimpses of the city as we came closer. Our hostel was in a high rise building - no surprises there as everything is highrise. On street level it's all shaded, and rare that you feel the sun on your face, only immense heat.

The first evening we got out and wandered around, eager to see the harbour area and the famous skyline. We soon discovered how vast the underground is, from the street it took almost a mile to actually reach the train, sooo much walking!!! It's also very possible to wander around Hong Kong and not be outside for very long. Lots of air-conditioned pathways leading in and out of buildings and under roads. Eventually we arrived at the ferry crossing point and jumped on a boat to go across to Kowloon. It was dark now so the city sparkled as we crossed the black water.

The view was absolutely magnificent - tremendous -fantastic - spliffing - and so on!We crossed and disembarked to allow ourselves to fully take in the view of the city in all it's glory. There is just something about a city like that at night, it's almost surreal being there.We headed to a few bars later on, celebrated hard the fact we were in Hong Kong!The following day saw a late start as a result.

Some aimless wandering and camera shopping. Just soaking it all up. It's not a city with an abundance of cafes or bars -it's hugely commercial with lots of designer stores and offices. I didn't fancy popping into Chanel in my flipflops so I'll just have to go back. Ladies in tow next time!

James and I got up early the following day and I bought a camera We headed to Kowloon Park with our new toys. We were snap happy there for awhile. Lots of wildlife - flamigo's, colourful fish and turtles. We also went back to the harbour to see the daytime view and get some better pics. Just as impressive during the day.The lads went on their own adventure to a water park nearby and rode a cable car.The downside to our stay was it was too short, a bad call on our part. With our ownwards flight booked we had to get out to Shenzhen for our flight to Bangkok after only two full days in the city. ..We'll be back!

Hangzhou - the Garden City

..was billed to us one of the most beautiful cities in China. This is down to the fact it has many trees, a beautiful lakefront, and you can usually see a few hundred yards in front of you without infra-red goggles on, a rarity given the acidic smog that befouls most of the country. It's a huge tourist destination for Chinese tourists.

We arrived via train which we barely made thanks to Ivan''s wonderful time-keeping! We were met there by Steaven (how he spelt it!) who undoubtedly was our most charismatic and entertaining guide in China. We got hours of entertainment from him (laughing at and not necessarily with him for the most part).

He could aptly be described an effeminate James Brown. He sported jet black combed hair, fish lips, absolutely outrageous sunglasses, and a strut straight out of Vaudiville. One of the first things he did was to show us his cat impression - hilarious(/bizarre?). His main catch phrases were "Woooooooowwwww!", Amaaaaazzzing"and "Janey mack!"

We had free time after arrival which was great. The hotel again was fantastic. We strolled down to the lake front after an appalling meal. It's really hit and miss with food here! On the lakefront a group of Chinese tourists were out in force with their cameras watching a fountain and lights show.

On our first morning Steaven brought us to Huagang park where we had a boat ride on the West lake. Nice views and gentle floating passed the next hour. From there it was onto the Six Harmonies Pagoda! Naturally we were ecstatic about the prospect of another pagoda! (hum the theme tune to the melody of My Sherona - go on!). On the hilltop Steaven tried to impress us with a completely obscured view of the river - woooow, amaaaaziing! We climbed the pagoda to take in the view of the surrounds, and made our way back to the hotel.

J, Dave and I headed out to sample the nightlife - something Dave is itching to do on arrival in every new place. Meanwhile Fitz had some down time. After a few screwrivers in a dice bar and a beer tower in a jazz bar we hit a local club which had a dancefloor made of sponge which bounced as you dance! Ingenious. It's times like that when the local chippie on the way home is hugely missed, heehee - the following early morning rise was difficult all round needless to say!

Hangzhou is famous for its' Longjin tea so we headed off to a nearby tea plantation to sample it! We sat around steaming our eyeballs over the tea and drinking copious amounts in a quest to cure our livers of all evil! Having bought enough to keep us going for a few months (adding a few kilos to the bags in the process) we went on our merry way feeling a lot better.

We had a fairly funky lunch thereafter in a private room with a view over the tea plantation in a colonial style building. It was wonderful until the food arrived! A whole chicken (giblets/full head, feet etc - the works) some nuclear fish with green beady eyes, soup of questionable (nigh alien) content. Our stomachs are fairly hardened at this stage, and we're not afraid to try new foods - but this was just poxy. Poor 'oul Steaven's seemingly insatiable enthusiasm even waned when he saw that most of it remained untouched upon departure.

Kenny Egan was due to fight in his Gold Medal bout against the Chinese fella - Xiaoping Zhang (Dave and James got a photo with him in Beijing!) so we headed to the solitary Irish bar in Hangzhou - the imaginatively titled Shamrock. Only one Irishman working in the place - he said he had come across only 6 of us in his 6 months of living there. We had an early night in anticipation of the flight to Hong Kong the following morning.

Shanghai

After disembarking we made our way to the nearby city of Yichang, where with time to kill our guide did what guides do best and brought us to silk workshop/ factory to spend some dough! Not to be missed apparently! And of course me being a compulsive/impulsive shopper I ended up dropping a rake of cash on a hand made silk tapestry of Van Gogh's 'Sunflowers'! Typical!

We arrived into Shanghai that evening was spectacular. There is nothing like arriving into a big city like that when it's getting dark and all the buildings are lit up. Ivan our local guide met us and sped us into our next abode. A beautiful hotel with a great location. The ride into the city was great with all of us craning our necks out the window to catch the views of the city as the skyscrapers whizzed past. It's one of those cities that has roads going over roads and another over that again. Sooo big and busy!

The following morning we headed off by car to Suzhou. It's a nearby "village" Ivan informed us (over one million people live there). Its a commuter town for Shanghai. A lot of manufacturing has been moved out there to retain Shanghai as the financial services center of the country. As a result the better air quality in Shanghai is very noticeable. Suzhou didn't have a whole lot to offer than a canal ride. It's a city that used to use these canals for trading and transport now they're more of a tourist attraction. The "Lingering Garden" was closed (I'm not making these names up - I swear!) so we headed to the next best one - "Master of Nets Garden.

Later that day James, Dave and I walked to the waterfront (the Bund) to see the skyline across the river. It was spectacular! The architecture of the different skyscrapers is so different to any other city in the world I've visited. The TV tower, an intergalactic space agey monster of a building is the most colourful and the most interesting. The grand Hyatt hotel (still unopened) towers over everything in the city and is incredible.

The following day we politely informed Ivan that we didn't really fancy visiting the Embroidery Institute outlined on the itinerary. I think perhaps he was as relieved as we were! So we headed over to Chinatown (yes in Shanghai- the original Shanghai) where we had a wander. It contains the highest grossing Starbucks in China - get your head around that?!

A Jade Buddha temple was on the itinerary also. Of course it was - surely a day can't go by in China where we don't see a buddha temple! This buddha is extra special - it's made of jade (green sacred stone). All Chinese people where jade whether it's a bracelet or ear-rings or necklace, they are very superstitious about it's importance, particularly if it's your Chinese New Year. During that year it's considered you will have bad luck and so must wear jade to protect you and bring you good luck!

We tried some tea whilst at the temple, and bought some that will solve all our problems!

Ivan deposited us at a market that afternoon where we haggled our way to a few bargains. After making our way across the river to the old Hyatt we went to the top for a free view of the city by night. The hotel has a atrium from about half way up the building so when on the top floor (88th) it's possible to look down through a glass roof to approximately the 50th floor where we could make out a grand piano and bar. Very cool but dizzying!

We wined and dined that side of the Bund before heading back across to have a drink or two before hitting the hay. More rapid tourism coming our way, we need all the sleep we can get!

Next stop Hangzhou!

Cruising down the Yangtze!

Ahh, its tough. It really is. Getting whizzed around in air conditioned people-carriers pretending we're the Corr's on a world tour (Dave is definitely Andrea, the primadonna!). Chongqing, our guide nonchalantly spouted, is THE biggest city in the world, with a population of 33 million.
Gasps and gurgles from the back seats. "Surely not,..surely Mumbai, ..Mexico City, Shanghai..no?!"

I'm not quite sure what she was basing said statistic on..but sure feck it, we all settled that the place was at least bigger than Mullingar.

We boarded the 'Victoria Katerina' at about 7pm after a slap up and beer fuelled 'hot pot'. All teak and shining gold interiors, our good ship VK welcomed us to the sound of a scratchy brass band perched on the dock that squawked its approval at each new group of heaving tourists as they waddled towards her gangplank.

Having settled into our adjacent cabins on the top deck we spent the evening on the upper deck watching the murky river float by as we left the city. The lights and lasers of Chongqing receding into the distance, and I fell into a happy sleep looking forward to the next few days (after watching the news on CNN on our widescreen in the cabin - ahh the luxury haha!)

Over breakfast the next morning (our seats were pre-assigned) we met an Australian couple, and a lovely South African family who were to be our culinary accomplices for the remainder of the journey. We had earlier (7am.. uggggh) been dutifully informed by the matronly German voice beaming through the speakers in our cabin that 'Ze stop today laaydeez and gentlemen is ze City of Ghosts. Pleeze remember to bring comfortable valking shoes, your pacemakers and your cameras'. We hoped that our pacemakers would be supplied en route to the gangerplanker.

Two oul English fella's made my day that morning on the ascent from the boat up to the foothill of 'Ze City of Ghosts'. About ten steps up - bare chested, cigar toting, and 'ever so ever so' one says to the other "By jove I think I'm about to reach my limit".

I look around and cock my eyebrow. His buddy wheezes back "Me too, by jove".

Ten more steps.

Number one looks down, beaten, exasperated, and stops in his tracks. "Ok I've reached my limit. Thats it". Deadpan. Silence. ...Then they both break their shits laughing and continue on up the hill. Grumpy old men. Legends.

'Ze City', which in fact sits on top of where the city of Fengdu once was before it was swamped by the rising river, is some sort of great place of veneration for the local Buddhists. Its altogether Ying and Yang, Devils and Heaven, caf and de-caf, black and white, Johnny Cash and Daniel O'Donnell old boy. The whole works thrown into one big religious hotch potch of sweaty tourist heaven. I found myself being dared to lift a 10 stone piece of metal and rub it around a groove in the ground at one stage by our guide. If I completed the task I would apparently instantaneously win the lotto, and turn into the perfect cross of Morrisey, Elvis, Eric Cantona and Paul O'Connell. Instead I crumpled under the pressure and stood by humiliated as a 4 foot 2 monk appeared from behind a statue of Rod Stewart and completed the trick in a flash.

Buddha you bastard.

We took the cable car back down the hill and scrambled back to the 'real world' of our floating buffet lunch and conversation about South African gold mines.

That was to be our only stop of the day, so I hit the gym for an hour or two in an attempt to break my all time daily sweat record. I got damn close.

After lunch we messed about on the top deck taking in the fantastic scenery. We also attended a Q & A session with the chief tourist looker afterter and quizzed him on all things China, from press restrictions to those sticky questions about where exactly the 1.3m people displaced by the Three Gorges Dam project actually all ended up (were there grannies still submerged down there shaking defiant water clogged fists at the Politburo kind of thing). He dutifully informed us that of course there werent you silly Westerners, and of course all asbestos plants and sewage works and glue factories were properly sanitized before the mighty Yangtze rose and devoured them all.

In all seriousness its just and incredible project and we felt so lucky to be able to see that stretch of the river before it rises the remaining 75 metres odd and the project is brought to completion in late 2008.

We had a few pre-Captain's Dinner beers on our balcony with Martin from Arizona, who turned out to be one of the soundest fellas we've met on the trip so far. Who says Yanks don't do irony? Not us anyway! I donned my white linen suit, sparked a Monte Cristo, and swanned into the dining room like I bleedin' owned the place. Had a few G & T's (wondered aloud to the captain as to who the feck was driving the boat and what in God's name were we paying him for?) and generally behaved like a late 19th century colonial. All in a days work.

Day two's itinerary came booming through the foggy haze of the night before at some ungodly hour the following morning. Off our vessel we waddled onto a smaller boat for a trip into the Lesser Gorges (there are three in total, culminating in the 'least gorge' of course.) Again the views were stunning. We passed by a hanging coffin - there are a series of these death defying burial sites carved into the side of the gorge faces - and some wild monkeys en route. At one point we spotted a girl standing up to her ankles at the base of what seemed like an impossibly steep section of gorge wall. Our guide informed us that she was waiting for a water bus, and that she had probably walked about 3 hours from her home to get there. Without doubt the strangest bus stop I've ever come across.

Barely visible on sections of the walls you can still see a narrow pathway that served as a trading artery for centuries. It cuts it's way along at such ridiculous angles, and is so high up in points (or at least it was until the flooding started) that I just couldn't imagine even walking along it, never mind carrying a load!

To get into the smallest of the three lesser gorges we hopped onto an even smaller boat (Sampan) and whizzed upstream for about 45 minutes past boats of singing Chinese ladies. I struggle to describe just how amazing the views were here so I will try to post a few photos soon.

On arrival back to our floating air conditioned box, we were informed that the 'Captain's Farewell Dinner' was to commence at 7. By jaysus did captain like to make a deal of himself! Sarah decided to attend a fashion show with a few of her new girly friends, so the lads and I had a few bevvies and contemplated another day of hardcore tourism. We docked just beside the culmination of the great project - the dam itself. I took the opportunity to tell my funniest joke (what did the fish say when it swam into the wall? - you guessed it) to resounding silence.

Day three - our last on the boat - we took a bus for the 45 minute journey to the dam itself and the visitors centre there. Had a good look around in the blistering heat before hopping back on the bus and heading for Yichang where we were scheduled to catch a flight to Shanghai.


All in all the three days were breath-taking. The early rises (6am) near killed us at points but we quickly learned all tourism needs to be done before midday heat. The heat was really oppressive. Also extremely humid. The brown colour of the mighty Yangzte, the lush green scenery surrounding it and in the gorges and the blue skies will be forever etched in my memory. It was truly phenomenal.