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"Fall Colors and the Missouri River"
by Bruce H.
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Monday, October 08, 2012
Photograph: Fall Colors And The Missouri River
Went to Indian Cave State Park last week and admired the colors of Autumn. I've tried, unsuccessfully to capture the colors ever since I returned to the midwest (see here, here, and here) but I was always a little too early or a little too late. This time I was just about right.
Saturday, October 06, 2012
Wednesday, October 03, 2012
2012 Asian Adventure - Beijing (Part Two)
Day Fourteen
The last day of the China portion of our trip. It was going to start off with a big one - The Great Wall. A couple days earlier, during our Peking Duck dinner, our guide made a suggestion. Normally the tour would take you to Badaling. Badaling is the most visited portion of the wall and, if you've seen a picture of the wall, it was probably taken there. She suggested that we instead go to a place she called the Badaling Remnant (The ticket of the place referred to it as "The Ancient of the Badaling Great Wall."). Our first reaction was of uncertainty. When we showed pictures to our friends and family back home we wanted them to recognize it. We didn't just want to see a pile of old bricks. We decided to trust our guide when the Wife pointed out that Malinda had not steered us wrong yet.
We left Beijing and along the way we passed Badaling. It was early morning and you could see that the wall was already packed with people and there were several buses parked in the parking lot. Like our guide had suggested, at Badaling all our pictures would be of backs, butts, and umbrellas. Less than ten minutes later our bus left the main highway and drove up a dirt road. The dirt road turned into a well maintained, and fairly new, paved road. We passed through a gate and passed a visitor's center that was still under construction. We left the bus, used the facilities (I saw this sign over one of the urinals), and went the rest of the way on foot.
What we saw next was amazing. It was the Great Wall in all its glory. Not only that but we practically had it all to ourselves. There were maybe a dozen other people there besides us. This portion of the wall was restored by the Japanese and was definitely not a pile of rubble. This is interesting as the Chinese and Japanese notoriously do not get along (As I write this there is tension between the two countries over disputed islands).
The youngest of our group, with me following close behind, went on ahead of the group. It was insane and very cool. The wall is not flat but climbs up and down mountains. I couldn't keep up with KK and he ended up walking a longer section than I did (he was nearly thirty-one years my junior). It was cloudy this morning so a lot of my pictures came out sub-par but in person it lived up to what I'd expected to see. We all thanked our guide as we returned to the bus.
Next stop was a Jade factory where we saw them carving jade and were given a little tour before taking us into their large showroom - yep ... another shopping opportunity. Before we went shopping though we went to a restaurant attached to the factory and had lunch.
After lunch we shopped a bit but the Wife and I ended up buying only magnets ... and ice cream.
Next on our itinerary were the Ming Tombs. After the wall this felt like the power down phase of our China trip. We toured the tombs and the surrounding park and farm land then took a short bus ride to a long tree lined walkway. The walkway was lined with pairs of statues of men, animals, and mythical beasts. The most memorable happening here occurred in a bathroom. I walked in with a member of our group (JE) who was very tall (kept hitting his head on low doorways). Another Chinese tour guide was in there as well. The first urinal was a handicap/child urinal and was low to the ground. JE looked at the low urinal and said it wasn't for him. The Chinese guide than said "That one is for the Japanese. When they go to Europe they need a step stool." Heh.
By the time we were at the end of the long walkway it was starting to drizzle. We got back on the bus and headed back to Beijing with one last shopping stop. This was more at the request of our group. We wanted to stop at the knockoff market to buy some genuine fake stuff. The wife had her sights set on a bag. We found booth that sold what we wanted. The girls asked us to follow her and she proceeded to take us into the stairwell (The place was five stories if I recall). She produced a couple stools and a helper started bring up almost perfect copies of the bag the Wife was interested in. She even used the genuine bag catalog to pick out what she wanted. I have to admit that I was paranoid the entire time we were in that stairwell. I was just waiting for some big thug to come up those stairs and mug us. The Wife got her bag and we went back into the market proper and I was able to calm down a bit.
That night we went out for our goodbye dinner at a Sichuan restaurant. Sichuan food tends to be a bit spicy hot. This meal was toned down a bit but there were a few dishes that set my mouth a flame.
China was almost over. The group, whom had become very close, was on the verge of returning to their real lives ... except us. We still had two weeks to go.
Pictures from day fourteen (07/06/2012) can be found in my 2012-06 China Google Photos album.
Our 2012 Asian Adventure continues ...
The last day of the China portion of our trip. It was going to start off with a big one - The Great Wall. A couple days earlier, during our Peking Duck dinner, our guide made a suggestion. Normally the tour would take you to Badaling. Badaling is the most visited portion of the wall and, if you've seen a picture of the wall, it was probably taken there. She suggested that we instead go to a place she called the Badaling Remnant (The ticket of the place referred to it as "The Ancient of the Badaling Great Wall."). Our first reaction was of uncertainty. When we showed pictures to our friends and family back home we wanted them to recognize it. We didn't just want to see a pile of old bricks. We decided to trust our guide when the Wife pointed out that Malinda had not steered us wrong yet.
We left Beijing and along the way we passed Badaling. It was early morning and you could see that the wall was already packed with people and there were several buses parked in the parking lot. Like our guide had suggested, at Badaling all our pictures would be of backs, butts, and umbrellas. Less than ten minutes later our bus left the main highway and drove up a dirt road. The dirt road turned into a well maintained, and fairly new, paved road. We passed through a gate and passed a visitor's center that was still under construction. We left the bus, used the facilities (I saw this sign over one of the urinals), and went the rest of the way on foot.
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| The Great Wall of China. |
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| Lots of stairs on the Great Wall. |
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| The Wall all to ourselves - the youngest went the farthest. |
After lunch we shopped a bit but the Wife and I ended up buying only magnets ... and ice cream.
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| Ming Tombs. |
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| Long walkway at the Ming Tombs. |
That night we went out for our goodbye dinner at a Sichuan restaurant. Sichuan food tends to be a bit spicy hot. This meal was toned down a bit but there were a few dishes that set my mouth a flame.
China was almost over. The group, whom had become very close, was on the verge of returning to their real lives ... except us. We still had two weeks to go.
Pictures from day fourteen (07/06/2012) can be found in my 2012-06 China Google Photos album.
Our 2012 Asian Adventure continues ...
Monday, October 01, 2012
Civic Duty ... Check!
Early voting started today and the Wife and I went out and voted.
Now, will you please stop all the negative ads?
Saturday, September 29, 2012
2012 Asian Adventure - Beijing (Part One)
Day Thirteen
We started our busy day with a short bus ride to Tiananmen Square. People of my generation remember this place as the location of trampled dreams of freedom. While the cloud of 1989 hung over this square there wasn't the feeling of being watched as there had been in Lhasa ... or maybe I'd just grown used to it. The square was crowded with people, many visiting the mausoleum of Chairman Mao. Our guide said the mausoleum was not open to tour groups (or was it foreigners?) and, frankly, was not worth the waiting in line. She said cameras weren't allowed in the mausoleum and that you were filed through and weren't given any time to stop and look at the preserved body of Mao ... which she described as looking like a wax figure. It was hard to not hear her skepticism ... I don't think she believes the body in the mausoleum is real.
We walked around the square, the third largest in the world, as our guide pointed out the government buildings and the museums bordering the square. There are a few monuments and large video screens that help break up the square (making it easier to break up crowds perhaps ...). We had our picture taken with the famous Gate of the Heavenly Peace (Tiananmen in Chinese - the south gate of the Forbidden City) and its iconic portrait of Chairman Mao.
Passing under the street in a tunnel we came out in front of the main gate of the Forbidden City. The Forbidden City is huge. To reach the inner sanctum of the emperor you have to pass through five gates. Each layer has its own compliment of meeting halls, banquet rooms, soldier's barracks, etc. The deeper a visitor would enter, the more important they were. We entered the city with the throngs of mostly Chinese tourists.
China is the most populous country in the world. Until now, though, it never really felt that crowded. Beijing, and especially Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City, felt full of people. We reached the second gate and we waited around while our guide picked up our passes. When she returned everyone did a quick head count and we came up one head short. This had never happen in the last twelve days. Early on, I think it was before we cruised the Yangtze, our guide gave everyone a slip of paper written in Chinese and English with her cell number. We were to use it if we got separated. One of the teachers from San Diego had gotten separated ... she used the paper ... it worked. This was the only time when something like this happened the entire trip.
We spent two and a half hours exploring this magnificent place. It just went on and on. For those into movies, "The Last Emperor" was filmed in the Forbidden City. The city includes meeting areas, banquet halls, barracks for soldiers, and lavish homes for the collection of the Emperor's women. While harem is probably more appropriate description, some of the Emperors did seem to collect women just to posses them. This theme, collections of wives, would follow our travels through Nepal, Bhutan, and India.
We exited the city through the gardens and the north entrance and headed for lunch. Thinking we were missing western food (our talk about the burgers in Xi'an may have sparked that idea) our guide took us to an Irish pub. The food was good but, strangely enough, didn't feel very western to me. Not all of our group agreed with having western food. It's one thing to chose it on your own and another to have the tour company do it. Another Chinese meal might have been more appropriate.
After lunch we visited the summer palace located on Kunming Lake (Kunminghu). We weren't there to tour the palace but to take a boat ride. This was fine with me as the Forbidden city would have been tough to top. On the grounds of the palace we got our first close up look at the lotus, a flower with significance in Buddhism. We'd already seen representations of the lotus in stone. It was nice to see it in person.
We left the entrance to the palace grounds and headed down a long covered walkway. The corridor is said to be one of the longest in the world. The walkway takes you through the gardens of the summer palace and provides views of the lake and gardens. The corridor itself is painted with historic scenes and art.
At the end we got on a boat that would take us out on the man-made lake. The excavated dirt was used to build Longevity Hill where some of the palace structures are located. The boat was a relaxing ride. A couple of little girls got their picture taken with several people in our group.
The boat delivered us to Nanhu Island, location of more summer palace temples. We walked back to the mainland over a bridge that offers a nice view of the lake, and all the pleasure boats criss-crossing the lake, before boarding our bus.
Our last stop on this already busy day was a visit with a family in a hutong. A hutong is a neighborhood characterized by narrow alleys made by walled in residences. The area we visited is some of the only privately owned property in China. Our guide described this area of Beijing as some of the most expensive residences in all of China. I found this remarkable as it looked like a slum to most of us, myself included. It was dirty, crowded, and not well maintained. I suspect that the houses behind the walls were another story. Most of these houses were owned by government and military officials. We walked through some narrow streets unpassable by our bus and visited a family. We enjoyed tea and talked about how the house had been passed from generation to generation.
After the visit we took a rickshaw ride around the hutong. This was the least enjoyable part of the tour for me so far. The rickshaw basically took us around in a big circle. If the rickshaw was taking us to a particular place that was unreachable by our bus I would have been fine with it but, since we returned to the starting point without stopping along the way, it felt more like a cheap amusement park ride for the tourists. This was a disappointment. I'd looked forward to the rickshaw ride and it fell flat. We did pass the bell tower that was closed when we went passed. We were not far from the drum tower where an American tourist (father to one of the Olympic coaches) was murdered during the Beijing Olympics. Both towers seem to have been closed since the Olympics.
That night a group of us went back to the restaurant where we'd had Peking Duck the night before and successfully ordered an awesome meal (pictures in the menu helped immensely). The sweet and sour pork was incredible - we ordered three plates of it to the confusion/consternation of the waiters ... and we finished everything we ordered. Ironically the members of our group who had complained about the western food at lunch went to an Indian restaurant for dinner.
Tomorrow was the last day of our China tour and one of the biggest attractions, one of the biggest in the world as a matter of fact - The Great Wall.
Pictures from day thirteen (07/05/2012) can be found in my 2012-06 China Google Photos album.
Our 2012 Asian Adventure continues ...
We started our busy day with a short bus ride to Tiananmen Square. People of my generation remember this place as the location of trampled dreams of freedom. While the cloud of 1989 hung over this square there wasn't the feeling of being watched as there had been in Lhasa ... or maybe I'd just grown used to it. The square was crowded with people, many visiting the mausoleum of Chairman Mao. Our guide said the mausoleum was not open to tour groups (or was it foreigners?) and, frankly, was not worth the waiting in line. She said cameras weren't allowed in the mausoleum and that you were filed through and weren't given any time to stop and look at the preserved body of Mao ... which she described as looking like a wax figure. It was hard to not hear her skepticism ... I don't think she believes the body in the mausoleum is real.
We walked around the square, the third largest in the world, as our guide pointed out the government buildings and the museums bordering the square. There are a few monuments and large video screens that help break up the square (making it easier to break up crowds perhaps ...). We had our picture taken with the famous Gate of the Heavenly Peace (Tiananmen in Chinese - the south gate of the Forbidden City) and its iconic portrait of Chairman Mao.
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| Tiananmen Gate - Gate of Heavenly Peace - South entrance to the Forbidden City. |
China is the most populous country in the world. Until now, though, it never really felt that crowded. Beijing, and especially Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City, felt full of people. We reached the second gate and we waited around while our guide picked up our passes. When she returned everyone did a quick head count and we came up one head short. This had never happen in the last twelve days. Early on, I think it was before we cruised the Yangtze, our guide gave everyone a slip of paper written in Chinese and English with her cell number. We were to use it if we got separated. One of the teachers from San Diego had gotten separated ... she used the paper ... it worked. This was the only time when something like this happened the entire trip.
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| A foo dog in front of an ornate building in the Forbidden City. |
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| The moat surrounding three sides of the Forbidden City. |
After lunch we visited the summer palace located on Kunming Lake (Kunminghu). We weren't there to tour the palace but to take a boat ride. This was fine with me as the Forbidden city would have been tough to top. On the grounds of the palace we got our first close up look at the lotus, a flower with significance in Buddhism. We'd already seen representations of the lotus in stone. It was nice to see it in person.
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| Lotus bloom at the Summer Palace. |
At the end we got on a boat that would take us out on the man-made lake. The excavated dirt was used to build Longevity Hill where some of the palace structures are located. The boat was a relaxing ride. A couple of little girls got their picture taken with several people in our group.
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| Summer Palace of Longevity Hill. |
Our last stop on this already busy day was a visit with a family in a hutong. A hutong is a neighborhood characterized by narrow alleys made by walled in residences. The area we visited is some of the only privately owned property in China. Our guide described this area of Beijing as some of the most expensive residences in all of China. I found this remarkable as it looked like a slum to most of us, myself included. It was dirty, crowded, and not well maintained. I suspect that the houses behind the walls were another story. Most of these houses were owned by government and military officials. We walked through some narrow streets unpassable by our bus and visited a family. We enjoyed tea and talked about how the house had been passed from generation to generation.
After the visit we took a rickshaw ride around the hutong. This was the least enjoyable part of the tour for me so far. The rickshaw basically took us around in a big circle. If the rickshaw was taking us to a particular place that was unreachable by our bus I would have been fine with it but, since we returned to the starting point without stopping along the way, it felt more like a cheap amusement park ride for the tourists. This was a disappointment. I'd looked forward to the rickshaw ride and it fell flat. We did pass the bell tower that was closed when we went passed. We were not far from the drum tower where an American tourist (father to one of the Olympic coaches) was murdered during the Beijing Olympics. Both towers seem to have been closed since the Olympics.
That night a group of us went back to the restaurant where we'd had Peking Duck the night before and successfully ordered an awesome meal (pictures in the menu helped immensely). The sweet and sour pork was incredible - we ordered three plates of it to the confusion/consternation of the waiters ... and we finished everything we ordered. Ironically the members of our group who had complained about the western food at lunch went to an Indian restaurant for dinner.
Tomorrow was the last day of our China tour and one of the biggest attractions, one of the biggest in the world as a matter of fact - The Great Wall.
Pictures from day thirteen (07/05/2012) can be found in my 2012-06 China Google Photos album.
Our 2012 Asian Adventure continues ...
Thursday, September 27, 2012
Photograph: Amongst The Corn
The corn is almost gone ... brought in almost a month ahead of normal ... but I managed to take this picture one morning on one of my walks before the corn was gone. A Morning Glory I believe.
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| "Amongst the Corn" by Bruce H. |
Tuesday, September 25, 2012
Book: Iain M. Banks' "Surface Detail"
I needed a book to read as I flew fourteen plus hour to Shanghai and another fourteen plus on the way back from Delhi to Newark, not to mention all the flights in China, Nepal, Bhutan, and India. I settled on one more Iain M. Bank Culture book. "Surface Detail
" is the latest culture book to be published though another one will be out soon.The book explores virtual worlds, specifically virtual afterlives. In the advanced world of the Culture, people can live indefinitely and, when they are tired of living they can upload their conscious into virtual worlds of their choosing. Theses virtual worlds have become virtual Heavens. But what is Heaven without Hell?
Non-Culture worlds, believing that you can not have rewards without punishment have created virtual Hells to punish their criminals for all eternity.
Not everyone agrees the Hells should exist and, to prevent a war, created a new virtual world where the two parties could fight a virtual war. If the side backed by the Culture wins, the Hells will be turned off. If not, the Hells will go on existing to torment their victims. Unfortunately the anti-Hell side ... is loosing the virtual war.
The book follows several different people, some in the real world, some in the virtual Hells, and some fighting the virtual war. Their lives converge as the anti-Hell faction plans to bring the war out of the virtual and into the real world.
The book was very good. It really made you think. If you could live forever, would you? Would you get bored? Would you voluntarily choose real, irreversible death? When does everlasting life become never ending Hell? And most important of all, how can you tell if the world around you is real or just some incredibly sophisticated virtual world?
The book served its purpose: it entertained me on over twenty-eight hours of flights around the world. I completed the 627 page book early in the morning at the Newark airport. There are nine (soon to be ten) culture books. When I started the series I wasn't that impressed but I stuck to it and frankly, Banks' style and his Culture have grown on me. I'm looking forward to the tenth book.
Highly recommended.
Sunday, September 23, 2012
2012 Asian Adventure - Clay And Duck.
Day 11
For the first time since the Yangtze cruise we actually got out of a city. Our first stop of the day was a big one: The Terracotta Army.
The terracotta army, life-size, detailed soldiers, archers, and chariots made from terracotta, was built as a memorial (like the pyramids of Egypt) to the founder of the Qin dynasty (Qin is pronounced Chin and is where China got its western name), the first imperial dynasty of China. The soldiers, located in underground vaults, were built to protect and serve the emperor in the afterlife. The construction of the mausoleum and terracotta army took almost forty years to build and almost 700,000 workers. There are an estimated 8,000 life sized figures in the complex. Not long after the fall of the dynasty, a later dynastic leader sent mobs to break into the vaults and destroy and burn everything they could find. After their destruction, they were lost to the world until 1974, over 2,100 years.
In 1974 a group of farmers were digging a well when they pulled up several terracotta body parts. The villagers thought the parts were cursed and the farmers who found them were forced to leave their village. Several years later some of the discoveries were sent to a professor who recognized the significance of the find and the Chinese government began excavation. In the 2,000s, during a visit to China, ex-President Clinton asked to meet the farmer who discovered the soldiers. The Chinese were frazzled as they did not know where they were. They eventually found one of the farmers and, after teaching him how to write some basic words (he was illiterate) was introduced to the President. President Clinton asked for his autograph and the farmer, not knowing how to write his name, simply drew three circles (representing past, present, and future - a very Buddhist idea). Soon after this, the organization that was excavating the site hired the farmer, Mr. Yang. He now has a desk at the gift store where he autographs books and photographs.
We toured the museum and three excavated pits. The soldiers, now all in pieces, are slowly being excavated and reconstructed. It is interesting to see the jumbled pieces and the complete soldiers side by side. I learn shortly before leaving on this trip that the original soldiers were all painted. Unfortunately the paint crumbled to dust when the pieces were exposed to air. They are doing a great job restoring the soldiers but still have a long way to go.
While we were walking around Chinese high school students were cornering members of our group to ask them survey questions about the facilities, how they could be improved, what we didn't like, and stuff like that. I managed to avoid them but the Wife was hit up a couple times though one student did give her a post card as a gift for answering her questions.
After lunch we stopped at a tea house where we were given a tea tasting and a demonstration of the "Tea Culture" (sometimes referred to as the Chinese Tea Ceremony). I opted for a cup of hot chocolate instead (I usually don't like hot chocolate but that cup tasted rich and delicious). The ceremony for making the tea is very elaborate. I sat back and watched as other in our group tasted different teas.
After the tea room we headed back to the gift shop for one final walk through. The most common souvenir is a set of miniature terracotta soldiers. As we walked around the excavation hawkers would jump out of the bushes (literally at times) trying to sell you cheap sets. It turns out there is a factory nearby that manufactures replicas for the museum gift shop using clay from the same area as the terracotta soldiers. The hawkers are selling the factory rejects. One thing we noticed is that most of these cheap sets smelled like dung. We joked it was yak dung.
We decided to spend a little extra and buy a set in the museum gift shop. After we'd bought the set a member of our group asked if we'd had them signed by the farmer. When we said no he said don't be one of those people who appear on Antiques Roadshow and discover your set is worth $500 but if they had been signed they would be $10,000!!! We went over, payed the small signing fee, and got the base of each figure signed by Mr. Yang. The Wife then proceeded to carry the terracotta soldiers in her carry on through the rest of China, Nepal, Bhutan, and India - we got some strange looks from the x-ray machine operators.
After the terracotta army we went to the obligatory stop at a shop - this one being a furniture store. The furniture was very beautiful and very over priced and nothing was bought. This China trip had more shopping than any of our other General Tour's trips. In Peru we had only a one hour stop at a market. In Jordan we had a one hour stop at a store where handicapped women made crafts to sell. In China I lost count of the number of hours we spent stopping at "official" shopping stops. I guess this is one way to keep tour costs down - get outside sponsors.
On the way back to the hotel we stopped at the wall that surrounds old Xi'an. It's pretty impressive but we knew we would soon see the great wall and the Xi'an wall was good but not that great. We did see a ceremonial changing of the guard with soldiers in period armor and uniforms.
Back to the hotel and up the elevator passed the nonexistent fourth floor - the number '4' is unlucky in China. Interesting how a secular society is so full of superstition. That night we had another burger which I augmented with a trio of chocolate (mousse, macaroon, and ice cream).
Day 12
Day seven started with flight number seven. We flew into Beijing and slowly made our way through some terrible traffic to our hotel. It was the fourth of July and we joked with our guide that we wanted american flags, hot dogs, and fireworks to shoot off in Tienanmen Square the next day (Actually we really didn't know which day was the fourth - the date line really screwed with us). Malinda just looked at us and ignored our requests. I was never sure if Malinda really understood our American sense of humor.
When we were out of the bus, Malinda would hold up a stuffed panda on a stick for us to follow. In Xi'an we kidnapped the panda and left her a ransom note. Malinda read the note and totally ignored it. For a while we thought she might think we were making fun of her but she claimed to understand our humor. I still wonder if she really did.
After a rest at the hotel - and some underwear laundering for me - we went to see the Chinese acrobats. I didn't really take any pictures (it was too dark to really get any good pictures) but take my word for it, it was amazing. So was the ice cream bar I had there.
From the acrobat show we went to a restaurant across from our hotel where we had our welcome to China meal. "Wha?!?" you say? Normally this China trip starts in Beijing and ends in Shanghai. For the first time they reversed the order of the tour. So, instead of a welcome dinner on our first stop in China, we were having a welcome dinner in our last stop of the China tour. The meal was one of the best Chinese meals I've had with the highlight being Peking Duck.
Many of our meals were included with our tour. In China these meals included tea or coffee ... or any hot water based drink. Sodas and ice water were not free and had to be paid for separately. We all understood paying for soda but we were a bit confused about the water. During our meal someone at our table had an idea: we ordered hot water on the rock. The waiters talked it over a bit and decided that hot water on ice would be included with the meal for no extra charge. Bizarre.
On the way back to the hotel a few of us visited the Wal-Mart next door from the hotel. It didn't have quite the same feel as the one at home. I didn't buy anything.
Later that night there was a knock on the door. When we opened it there was a roll of toilet paper with, I kid you not, sausages on forks stuck in the roll making it look like an exploding fireworks. Nothing like wienies and toilet paper to celebrate the fourth of July! Our friends from San Diego were awesome and quite creative with what they found at the Wal-Mart.
The last twelve days had been really full and we still had two more full days left in Beijing.
Pictures from days eleven and twelve (07/03 - 07/04/2012) can be found in my 2012-06 China Google Photos album.
Our 2012 Asian Adventure continues ...
For the first time since the Yangtze cruise we actually got out of a city. Our first stop of the day was a big one: The Terracotta Army.
The terracotta army, life-size, detailed soldiers, archers, and chariots made from terracotta, was built as a memorial (like the pyramids of Egypt) to the founder of the Qin dynasty (Qin is pronounced Chin and is where China got its western name), the first imperial dynasty of China. The soldiers, located in underground vaults, were built to protect and serve the emperor in the afterlife. The construction of the mausoleum and terracotta army took almost forty years to build and almost 700,000 workers. There are an estimated 8,000 life sized figures in the complex. Not long after the fall of the dynasty, a later dynastic leader sent mobs to break into the vaults and destroy and burn everything they could find. After their destruction, they were lost to the world until 1974, over 2,100 years.
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| The Terracotta Soldiers |
We toured the museum and three excavated pits. The soldiers, now all in pieces, are slowly being excavated and reconstructed. It is interesting to see the jumbled pieces and the complete soldiers side by side. I learn shortly before leaving on this trip that the original soldiers were all painted. Unfortunately the paint crumbled to dust when the pieces were exposed to air. They are doing a great job restoring the soldiers but still have a long way to go.
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| Pit One - The largest of the excavations open to the public. |
After lunch we stopped at a tea house where we were given a tea tasting and a demonstration of the "Tea Culture" (sometimes referred to as the Chinese Tea Ceremony). I opted for a cup of hot chocolate instead (I usually don't like hot chocolate but that cup tasted rich and delicious). The ceremony for making the tea is very elaborate. I sat back and watched as other in our group tasted different teas.
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| Different types of tea. |
We decided to spend a little extra and buy a set in the museum gift shop. After we'd bought the set a member of our group asked if we'd had them signed by the farmer. When we said no he said don't be one of those people who appear on Antiques Roadshow and discover your set is worth $500 but if they had been signed they would be $10,000!!! We went over, payed the small signing fee, and got the base of each figure signed by Mr. Yang. The Wife then proceeded to carry the terracotta soldiers in her carry on through the rest of China, Nepal, Bhutan, and India - we got some strange looks from the x-ray machine operators.
After the terracotta army we went to the obligatory stop at a shop - this one being a furniture store. The furniture was very beautiful and very over priced and nothing was bought. This China trip had more shopping than any of our other General Tour's trips. In Peru we had only a one hour stop at a market. In Jordan we had a one hour stop at a store where handicapped women made crafts to sell. In China I lost count of the number of hours we spent stopping at "official" shopping stops. I guess this is one way to keep tour costs down - get outside sponsors.
On the way back to the hotel we stopped at the wall that surrounds old Xi'an. It's pretty impressive but we knew we would soon see the great wall and the Xi'an wall was good but not that great. We did see a ceremonial changing of the guard with soldiers in period armor and uniforms.
Back to the hotel and up the elevator passed the nonexistent fourth floor - the number '4' is unlucky in China. Interesting how a secular society is so full of superstition. That night we had another burger which I augmented with a trio of chocolate (mousse, macaroon, and ice cream).
Day 12
Day seven started with flight number seven. We flew into Beijing and slowly made our way through some terrible traffic to our hotel. It was the fourth of July and we joked with our guide that we wanted american flags, hot dogs, and fireworks to shoot off in Tienanmen Square the next day (Actually we really didn't know which day was the fourth - the date line really screwed with us). Malinda just looked at us and ignored our requests. I was never sure if Malinda really understood our American sense of humor.
When we were out of the bus, Malinda would hold up a stuffed panda on a stick for us to follow. In Xi'an we kidnapped the panda and left her a ransom note. Malinda read the note and totally ignored it. For a while we thought she might think we were making fun of her but she claimed to understand our humor. I still wonder if she really did.
After a rest at the hotel - and some underwear laundering for me - we went to see the Chinese acrobats. I didn't really take any pictures (it was too dark to really get any good pictures) but take my word for it, it was amazing. So was the ice cream bar I had there.
From the acrobat show we went to a restaurant across from our hotel where we had our welcome to China meal. "Wha?!?" you say? Normally this China trip starts in Beijing and ends in Shanghai. For the first time they reversed the order of the tour. So, instead of a welcome dinner on our first stop in China, we were having a welcome dinner in our last stop of the China tour. The meal was one of the best Chinese meals I've had with the highlight being Peking Duck.
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| Beijing after dark. |
On the way back to the hotel a few of us visited the Wal-Mart next door from the hotel. It didn't have quite the same feel as the one at home. I didn't buy anything.
Later that night there was a knock on the door. When we opened it there was a roll of toilet paper with, I kid you not, sausages on forks stuck in the roll making it look like an exploding fireworks. Nothing like wienies and toilet paper to celebrate the fourth of July! Our friends from San Diego were awesome and quite creative with what they found at the Wal-Mart.
The last twelve days had been really full and we still had two more full days left in Beijing.
Pictures from days eleven and twelve (07/03 - 07/04/2012) can be found in my 2012-06 China Google Photos album.
Our 2012 Asian Adventure continues ...
Friday, September 21, 2012
Regimen Restart And Health Update
I posted, when I suspended my exercise regime for our Asian Adventure, that I would not use this as an excuse to stop for good. I was good to my word as I did restart my regimen when I returned.
- I restarted my physical therapy exercises (twice a week) and my abs work (thrice a week).
- After a pause of over a month I played it safe and restarted the walking at five miles and am building back up to the thirteen - fifteen mile range that is my goal.
- I started biking twice a week. I started really slow. My first ride was only three miles or about twenty minutes on the bike. I've then upped it three miles every two weeks and am now doing nine - ten miles. I was concerned how my knee would take the biking but it has handled it wonderfully and I now consider my knee to be 99.9% healed.
The day I went to the doctor I woke up with a sharp pain in my right heal. I'd experience this before on the Camino but I'd thought it had been related to my twisted pelvis. Since the pelvis issue had been corrected by my physical therapy I was at a loss. At the doctors I asked about the shoulder and the heal. A few questions and a little manipulation of the two parts of my body and he had a diagnosis. The shoulder was rotator cuff tendinitis. The heal was heel spur/plantar fascitis.
So I went home with oral steroids and anti-inflammatory meds. They would hopefully treat both issues. He also suggested icing my heel/foot after walking (which I am doing) and gave me nine exercises to strengthen the shoulder that I have to do twice a day - yeah ... more exercises ... not sure I'm happy but if it's necessary ... and it's only for the next ten days or so. That's the good news I took away from this by the way - the doctor only gave me meds for ten days expecting this to be enough to correct my conditions. I hope his assessment is correct and I'm back to "normal" in ten days. If not, I'm back to the doctor I would imagine.
I'm sure you all are getting tired of me complaining about my aches and pains on Homer's Travels. I think I'm starting to sound like a broken and whiny record. I think I'll shelve the health and exercise labels for a while. You're welcome.
One nice side affect of taking these meds is I have had no allergy issues. When my allergies bother me my nose holes shrink and clog up, especially at night when I'm trying to sleep. Since I started taking the meds I've had no problems. I kind of dread when I'm out of pills.
I'm starting to get tire of all this. As soon as I fix one problem (twisted pelvis, knee, back pain) other problems pop up (rotator cuff, plantar fascitis). I know I'm not getting younger but for once I would like to get all my issues dealt with without something else getting injured, irritated, or cranky.I'm sure you all are getting tired of me complaining about my aches and pains on Homer's Travels. I think I'm starting to sound like a broken and whiny record. I think I'll shelve the health and exercise labels for a while. You're welcome.
Tuesday, September 18, 2012
Back ... To The Pack
Less than a year from now (Sept-Oct 2013) I will be heading out on my second Camino de Santiago so it's time to start getting ready. Along with the exercise regimen that I've restarted, and I will post about soon, I need to update some of my gear.
Besides shoes and socks, the most important piece of gear is probably the backpack. The pack I used last time was a GoLite Lite-Speed. The pack served me well but a couple things have happened that are prompting me to buy a new pack. The first was a failure of the belt buckle. The buckle is a standard, two prong affair. About a day or two before I arrived in Santiago the buckle decided to stop buckling. The lower of the two prongs had, over 30-some days warped (bent inward) to the point that it would no longer latch. I ended up tying the loose belt ends over the bucket to help secure the pack - not an optimum solution but it got me and my pack to Fisterra.
The rest of the pack is in pretty good shape and I would just replace the buckle if it weren't for the second issue I had: the pack is heavy. Heavy is a relative term of course but when you are carrying all your possessions over five hundred miles every ounce becomes important. That is why I have started shopping for a lighter pack.
I narrowed my choices down to two: the Gossamer Gear Gorilla 2012 and the GoLite Jam 35L. Both packs weigh in around 1 lb 11 oz (765 g). My Lite-Speed is 3 lb 5 oz (1,500 g) so either pack would be about half the weight and save me roughly 1 lb 10 oz (735 g). That's a huge savings over five hundred miles.
When I compared these two packs I looked at several criteria:
Besides shoes and socks, the most important piece of gear is probably the backpack. The pack I used last time was a GoLite Lite-Speed. The pack served me well but a couple things have happened that are prompting me to buy a new pack. The first was a failure of the belt buckle. The buckle is a standard, two prong affair. About a day or two before I arrived in Santiago the buckle decided to stop buckling. The lower of the two prongs had, over 30-some days warped (bent inward) to the point that it would no longer latch. I ended up tying the loose belt ends over the bucket to help secure the pack - not an optimum solution but it got me and my pack to Fisterra.
The rest of the pack is in pretty good shape and I would just replace the buckle if it weren't for the second issue I had: the pack is heavy. Heavy is a relative term of course but when you are carrying all your possessions over five hundred miles every ounce becomes important. That is why I have started shopping for a lighter pack.
I narrowed my choices down to two: the Gossamer Gear Gorilla 2012 and the GoLite Jam 35L. Both packs weigh in around 1 lb 11 oz (765 g). My Lite-Speed is 3 lb 5 oz (1,500 g) so either pack would be about half the weight and save me roughly 1 lb 10 oz (735 g). That's a huge savings over five hundred miles.
When I compared these two packs I looked at several criteria:
- Price. The Gorilla is $225. The Jam is $99 (Reduced from $200 due to a change from retail stores to direct to customer selling by GoLite).
- Size. The Gorilla is 39 liters. The Jam is 35 liter. I was concerned that 35 l would be too small but, after looking at my 35 l dry sack that I used last time, I realized that it was almost always less that two thirds full. Either size should be plenty.
- Belt. Last Camino as I walked my waist line shrank. Near the end I couldn't quite get my belt tight enough. This is important as a properly adjusted pack lets the weight of the pack rest on the belt/waist. If the belt doesn't fit properly then more weight will be improperly carried by the shoulders. Gassamer Gear uses detachable belts thus you can order a large pack (my torso is a large) with a medium belt (my waist is a medium/regular). GoLite confirmed to me in an email their belts do not detach so if you buy a large pack for a large torso you get a large belt. The smallest size for the large belt is 33 inches - my current pant size. If my waste shrinks I may have issues similar to what I had last Camino.
In the end I thought belt length and comfort were more important than price so I purchased the Gossamer Gear Gorilla 2012. Delivery was lightning quick (five days). I was amazed with how small the box was and how light it felt. I opened it up, put it together (attached the belt and back foam padding), put it on, and realized right away that I had to return it. Don't get me wrong, I love the pack. I like how it's configured. I like the fit of the belt. The pack had a lot of potential but there was, for me, a fatal flaw: the arm straps.
When I put the pack on the straps rubbed either side of my neck. To make it worse, the seams of the arm straps ran along the inside of the straps so, as I moved, the rough seam rubbed back and forth on my neck. I had visions of bloody scratches on both sides of my neck or worse, decapitation. The issue was how the straps attached to the top of the pack. The straps leave straight out from the top (See Figure 1). My Lite-Speed straps are attached at an angle which takes the straps away from the neck (See Figure 2).
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| Figure 1 Attachment of arm straps on top of Gossamer Gear Gorilla 2012. |
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| Figure 2 Attachment of arm straps on top of GoLite Lite-Speed. |
In addition, GoLite covers the arm strap seam with a bead that provides a smooth surface along the side of the neck. Figure 3 is the Gossamer Gear arm strap and Figure 4 is the GoLite Lite-Speed arm strap.
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| Figure 3 Gossamer Gear Gorilla 2012 arm strap seam. |
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| Figure 4 GoLite Lite-Speed arm strap seam. |
I did try the Gorilla on with an eleven pound load and I compared the feel with the Lite-Speed. With a load the Gorilla felt better as the weight forced the arm straps out a little bit but you could still feel the seam digging in a bit even through the collar of my shirt. The lite-speed felt fine just like it did the entire length of the Camino.
So I sent the Gossamer Gear pack back yesterday. They have a thirty day money back guarantee so all I'm out is shipping. I'm hoping that the GoLite Jam arm straps are the same as the Lite-Speeds. Unfortunately I won't know until November as the Jam is out of stock until them.
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