June 7th This morning was one of those not wanting to go anywhere mornings. I would have been quite happy to stay in and vegetate! However, checking the weather told us we had to go in the morning because the rain was arriving in the afternoon. Once we were out our mood changed and we did enjoy ourselves although we kept to a town walk.
Do you remember the caterpillar with the ‘lilac skirts’? We wondered if this was the same one, now under the wall and possibly in the process of metamorphosing.
Today was definitely a day for bugs. I got a bit too close to this one to focus correctly. Its mouth was actually moving as though it was eating something.
Next we found a whole army of something or other, marching in formation up a tree.
Huan managed to spot even more.
Just for a change we walked through the bap market today. The bap stall wasn’t there. In fact many stalls wee not there, they had physically been removed. As most of the entrances to this complex are now blocked except for two having Covid checks I suppose customers have been lost en masse.
We tried many ways to see if there was another entrance / exit open but we failed. That meant time had been wasted and our return along the riverside was cancelled. That did give us this nice photo-opportunity though, two little kittens, but we couldn’t get near to them.
Almost in the same place I took a lot of photos of SWMBO, she took this one of me.
And the photos of Huan? Every single one was out of focus, I know not why. The camera was set to automatic and the kittens came out fine. Never mind, here’s another me!
Not long after this photo was taken, the rain, forecast for three in the afternoon, decided it couldn’t wait any longer. This is what it looked like as we vainly sheltered under a tree.
Needless to say we were soaked to the skin when we reached home. Even worse was that our rooftop water tank was being cleaned today so we couldn’t have hot showers. Towelling dressing gowns came in handy and at least dried us off.
June 8th Murphy’s Law was in effect today, mostly for us for a change. We woke up to rain which eased off after breakfast so we decided to go out. By the time we reached our gate, which is literally two metres from our front door, the rain had returned. Again the forecast was for rain after lunch so we decided to go out anyway with our trusty brollies at the ready. Would you believe it, within minutes the rain stopped and brollies were not needed. We started off by trying to flick seeds over the path into the river!
Bugs were out in force again today, snails in particular. Note that the first one has a passenger and the third one has lost his house.
Spiders crept into the next collage.
All those bugs were found before we crossed to the little island. At the second bridge we had a look at the weather but decided to press on anyway.
Next up are a couple of posers, I found a place for me to pose and then posed Huan in another place. All of today’s photos were taken with our phones but they turned out all right I think.
More bugs were the only subjects we found on our way round, no collage this time though. This butterfly stayed still long enough for one photo.
We weren’t too sure about the next one but eventually we agreed that it must be a cockroach.
What I like about this next photo is that it always, for some reason
or other, reminds me of transcontinental rail journeys in the
The last bug of the day stuck out because it is so dowdy, no colour at all. Perhaps it doesn’t cause skin irritation like its more colourful brethren? I certainly wasn’t going to try touching it.
You may be wondering if the rain came back. It did. Yet again we arrived home soaking wet but at least today we had water for the shower!
June 9th Someone slept in, again, it was me, again, so we went straight out after breakfast with no coffee, and with me forgetting my ‘after breakfast pills’. We had no idea about today’s weather as we hadn’t checked before leaving, it looked reasonable. Over the bridge to somewhere we went and up through the village on their new road.
Approaching the village of罗博特 (LuóBóTè) fame we decided to take the road around the top of the village, a route we hadn’t taken before. You can’t keep keen explorers down you know! At the top we found yet another road to explore.
That took us first, to an old air raid shelter.
At the top we found a farm, complete with its own outdoor gymnasium. Huan was going to pose under the weights until she noticed that the bar had an army of ants marching along it!
There were guard dogs all over the place on this farm, none of which I could get anywhere near. Even these three were beyond the reach of my surprisingly long arms.
After seeing my bovine buddies, who were all in residence today, we turned back and took yet another detour through the village. There are no cow photos because the camera kept wanting to take videos instead of stills. Maybe soon Huan will let me buy a new one! There are pig photos though, by this time the camera was behaving itself. Here are the nervous piglets.
And here, in the next sty, is their just as nervous Mum.
We took this next photo not just to show you the beautiful scenery but to show you that the going is not always easy. This particular little slope was quite steep and slippery to boot, quite nerve wracking for both of us.
By now a couple of the farm ladies had told us about the rain, the sky was beginning to look as though we would not reach home dry, again.
Our luck held for a little while longer, long enough for Huan to get me to take photos of what seem to be her favourite birds, turkeys and then some geese too.
Our last ‘camera’ photo of the day shows the inside of the mansions on the hill where we were looking for a water stop. It seems to have closed.
The camera then went into a plastic bag and the phone was used for the last three photos. This is the road down from the mansions on the hill, you can’t see the rain but it was there!
Heading towards where we knew there was an open shop we came across this barricade, it is to stop traffic around the schools during exam times.
In this case, as we found out around the corner, it was for the high school entrance examinations, known here as中考 (Zhōngkǎo).
So, did we arrive home wet today? Yes we did, although not as wet as yesterday. In fact we quite enjoyed the last couple of kilometres; the rain was light and pleasant.
June 10th Rain stopped play this morning so we stayed put. Huan practiced a lot of music, I prepared tomorrow’s duck legs. I also reminded myself how good Barbra Streisand was by watching Funny Girl, not sure I ever saw it first time around.
We did get out after lunch, keeping a careful eye on the sky. Check out this riverside farm and see how much disappeared with the rain over the last week or so.
As you may notice, the couple are still planting, in this case peanuts!
Along the riverside we went, not looking for anything in particular, but still keeping a very watchful eye on the sky. All down the near side, to the last bridge, we saw nothing. Huan managed to spot a lizard on the far side, I tried to get a decent photo but we only had our phones today. At least you can see it.
Just for fun I took a snap of the path almost at ground level, Huan liked it, so here it is.
Just to show you how much rain there has been, here are two different views of the path down by the river. In neither place would we have been able to walk.
The last one for today shows why red ants are much worse than black ants and why you should avoid them like the plague. If you don’t, that might be you they carry off! This one had been going the other way until he saw the camera and did a rapid u-turn. As I took the camera away he did another u-turn and went back to the other direction.
Did we avoid the rain today? Well, it did try now and then so we ended up a little damp but nowhere near as wet as the last couple of outings made us.
June 11th Market day, and raining, so we set off with our umbrellas. That didn’t last long, just outside the main gate Huan spotted her old hulusi teacher rushing home carrying his grandson so she gave him her umbrella. Now, I don’t know about you, but sharing foldable umbrellas never works for me. If I have Huan on my right my left side gets soaked, and if she is on my left then my right side gets soaked. I gave up and just walked in the rain! The rain did ease off a little as we neared the market, I spotted a little cat and had my photo taken surreptitiously while petting it, not by Huan but by one of the traders nearby.
Did we buy anything this week? Yes we did, but don’t ask me why. Huan can sometimes, nay, nearly always, be very gullible and sales people can very easily get her to believe in what they are selling. In this case it was some kind of dry bread, almost biscuit like in texture. I do know we will not be buying it again.
Our next stop was the ‘ear’ lady. Huan had to have her ears looked at again to check if the perforation is closing. To me it didn’t look much different so there’s no photo. We’ll see how she goes on week by week.
It seems like I am not the only ‘alien’ in Wuzhishan, I bumped into Frank today. For some reason he refused to speak to me, I guess he wanted to stay incognito!
And here is someone who doesn’t look too pleased with Huan taking his (or her) photo at all!
Another day, more rain, and Bob arriving home dripping wet again. Yes, the rain returned!
June 12th The morning disappeared, not because of the weather but because the old man didn’t get out of bed until after nine o’clock! The computer told us that “In the past 30 years it rained 26 out of 30 times on this day.” Throwing caution to the winds we went out after lunch anyway, and being brave, we didn’t have an umbrella between us. On our way down the main road we spotted some bovine buddies. Because of where they were I didn’t try to touch them at all, I didn’t fancy being responsible for any wrecked cars.
Some worried noises were starting to come from Huan’s direction, she thought that she had something like a dung beetle on her hat. I was pleased to show her that it wasn’t, although it was also quite a pretty coloured thing.
We were going through some of the back alleys and such like today where we found two canine companions who I had no chance of getting near at all. One also seemed a little poorly.
He also liked to bark a lot!
The camera seemed to be playing up a lot today, half pressure on the shutter switch was not focusing as it normally should. Quite a lot of my snaps had to be deleted when we got home. At least we managed a couple of decent fauna pictures.
Walking back along the tea shop side of the river we noticed that the level was very low again today. I decided to show you what used to be, a long time before we ever arrived here, a beautiful water feature, a fountain shooting quite high in the air. In fact there used to be two of them, we know because we have seen pictures of them on hoardings. I wonder if there are any plans to resurrect them at some time in the future.
Almost home when this view caught my eye, beautiful isn’t it?
And lastly for today, our friend is back, albeit sans lilac skirts. Perhaps it’s not our friend but another of its compatriots; I guess we will never know.
Did we get wet again today? I am glad to say that we didn’t, in fact as I sit here at half past eight in the evening the rain still hasn’t showed its face. Days like this I enjoy!
June 13th Change of plan today, we were supposed
to visit the hospital for my latest round of blood tests and all sorts of other
tests. Huan sent a WeChat message to Dr. Mă yesterday evening and he told us
that this week his day is Wednesday. While she was telling me this I was
thinking how much easier it is for us to get doctors’ appointments than it is
for my friends and family in the
We visited the market after we’d done the supermarket bit; here I am scanning my phone for a health code, to be allowed in.
Today the number of ladies calling “I love you!” had increased considerably. I told them that they didn’t love me; they loved Huan and her wallet, especially as she was buying fish from them! Unlike Huan, I didn’t think to take a photo of her, maybe next week.
Despite the weather being so much better today we still didn’t do
anything else, apart from the weekly shop. We had a nap after lunch instead! I
finished my
Have a nice week, Bob. But June 9 is not the high school entrance examination,中考. It is the "college entrance examination",高考, similar to the act or sat in the United States. -from Zack
ReplyDeleteSorry, we thought the Gaokao was finished and just read the sign over the school gate.
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