Orient Bay-View Sanya

This is one of the ports that we bypassed on the last cruise because of a typhoon. It was the very first time the Holland America cruise line had docked there. As a result, I don't think the town was ready for the 1600 people that hit shore. From the ship briefings, there wasn’t a lot there that interested us or that Cub was physically able to do. (I must add a note here: We received a comment on our blog from a reader we ...

... our guide in Beijing) told us that the people from the farm country have never seen foreigners before & want their picture taken with them to show their friends back home that they met their long lost cousin in the big city. Also foreigners have a big nose & the Chinese find that very attractive, so I guess I have a very attractive big nose & a cousin from the Chinese farm country, .... who knew?

Our 3rd & final stop was directly ...

... for Yalongwan Beach, I wouldn't say it was any more beautiful than Dadonghai Beach. It was more tranquil because it didn't have waves, and the water was like crystal. It also had many more Chinese tourists, many of them wearing the same island-themed shirt and pants ensembles. Patrick, Amanda, and I stood out quite drastically as Westerners on Yalongwan Beach, and we attracted an audience as we swam and did gymnastics in the water ...

Wednesday was another big travel day. Gabe and I checked out of the Outside Inn (after packing some jaffles for the road of course) and hopped in a cab heading back to the Guilin Airport. On our way there, our cab driver got pulled over by the police and couldn't find his ID card or papers or anything. He was very nonchalant about it despite the fact that the officer was very sharp with him, but he did eventually find them and we ended up being on time. As usual ...

Was not overly impressed with Sanya. Sanya is 100% tourist. Mostly Chinese with a lot of Russians. The town is very pretty and the beaches are great. I enjoyed talking with some of the Russians. I guess I did not like the fact that it was one huge tourist trap, not my cup of tea.

... around the city and he pointed out famous hotels and spots of interest. Than we stopped at one I did hear about Deer Turning Head Park. But we only had 15 minutes there and only saw a couple of things. I began to be concerned if this was going to be one of those quickie tours. Next we were told we were going to go on a little "adventure". OK, I thought I was on one already. We headed up some back streets then it was explained to us that ...

'I'm not sure if it's good to have freedom or not... I'm really confused now. If you're too free, you're like the way Hong Kong is now. It's very chaotic. Taiwan is also chaotic... I'm gradually beginning to feel that we Chinese need to be controlled. If we're not being controlled, we'll just do what we want.' -- Jackie Chan to an audience of business leaders on Hainan island.

... dinners, and we'd decided we wanted a last Chinese meal at our last Chinese port. There was a huge restaurant beside the bridge. In we walked. It was like royalty had arrived. We were escorted to the upper level. Sat down and a hoard of about 10 girls surrounded us, half of them asking questions in Chinese. When we'd entered there were dozens of plastic bins full of fish and crabs and shellfish. So I guessed we went down there, chose something and then they cooked it ...

... to watch him launching into a Chinese conversation with someone. He even did a speech at the wedding in Chinese which was amazing skills. Jing speaks perfect English and went her way all week to make sure that we were well fed and never had to arrange anything for ourselves. Steve and Fay: Dave's parents from Oldham. Truly lovely people who fitted right in with all the younger people who were there. Steve and Adam: Dave's brother (and best man ...

Last night was very noisy, with fireworks going off throughout the night, but especially at midnight. There was also a noisy karaoke session on the floor above us, with many singers who definitely shouldn't quit their day-job. I would have slept through it all anyway, but Yoong woke me up at midnight, insisting we go down in the street to see the fireworks. Most of them were of the bang-bang kind so I didn't really see the need. In fact ...