Yangshou River Cruise

Today we went on an amazing boat ride down a river surrounded by these mountains. We had a boat to ourselves which was pretty spectacular - our bargaining skills are clearly growing.

5 days in Yangshou Paradise

Yangshou, its really stunning here. It's surrounded by huge karsts (massive abrupt mountains). We've been taking it easy here, soaking up the views, taking walks and eating.

Shantou and Guiyu

After HK, we went to a terrible town on our way to a more terrible (but interesting) town. We decided to take a wee side trip to Guiyu, a village which I did a lot of research on at university. It's filled with e-waste, and the town itself has become very toxic. We went there with high hopes, all of which were fulfilled. We got some great photos, walked around the city and even got interviews with people who "recycle" e-waste!. Lucky for us we found an awesome guide who is as interested in the problem as we are. Our guide also had family who ran underwear factories, so we were able to visit two factories and see their conditions. We were invited in for tea at all places we went to, including a temple/orphanage. The day was a great experience, and hopefully one i can use later.

Hong Kong

After Beijing, and on NY's eve, we flew down to Hong Kong. That night we went out for a lovely dinner with friends, a movie, and a huge mid-night flower market. Over the 5 days that we spent there, we went to a few of the lovely islands, some of which are very developed and others that are not. HK has a huge amount of diversity. Chinese NY was a great time to be there, it meant that all the temples were filled with incense and people and all of them had really great atmosphere. We went up "The Peak" on "The Tram", and had great views. Went to a fun party, a not-so-fun parade (lame), a great museum, lots of long walks, ate loads of yum food. Unfortunately also waited in a line for 2 hours, Tim got food poisoning and I got an allergic reaction and puffed up like a red itchy balloon. HK had it all.

Beijing!

hmmm, well in keeping with extremely sporadic blog entries ...

We finished our jobs in Korea, took another very short job for a couple of weeks - and got the hell out of there. It was sad to finish up and leave our students and friends ... but we're pretty happy to be traveling.

So, first we went to Beijing. It was really quite cold. -25! So, while we did sightseeing, we kept being outside to a minimum - it was just too cold, and I (Leah) turned into the biggest whinging bitch to face China (now that I'm warmer, I am of course back to being lovely and kind :)

In Beijing, we went to all the must sees we could bare - the Forbidden city and Tiananmen square (where we tried to stage a protest but no one cared). The Summer palace - which despite its name, is really beautiful in winter, even when your freezing your ass off. We went to a great Lama temple, one of the best temples we've seen - great architecture and really well looked after.

And, of course, we went to the Great Wall. It was great (ha ha) because it was a few days before Chinese New Year and it was deserted! We thought we would be rubbing elbows along the whole wall - but there was hardly a soul. It was a really beautiful and awe-inspiring place