Broken Chair, Dead Camera, New Camera, Lizards.

August 30^th Well that’s it, the Fuji is now dead as a Dodo, kaput, finis, no use to man nor beast. Yesterday I managed to knock it on to the floor again. This evening I realised it wasn’t really my fault, my new(ish) chair collapsed to one side and that is what caused me to knock the camera off. At least Huan is not so angry with me now!

To ease our troubled minds we escaped to the countryside this morning, fresh air, lovely scenery, no traffic and not a lot of people either. We started off over the bridge to somewhere which appears to be having its pavements re-laid.

Once we were definitely in the country it was time for a panorama, it’s been a while.

On this road, for a change, we decided to show you the irrigation channels.

Crossing the main road and avoiding villages here is another panorama for you.

Eventually of course we had to pass through a village to get back into town but that was not in the middle of the countryside so the people were less wary of me. During times of heightened anxiety about Covid, me being a foreigner can be a little worrying for the village people. We ended up at the other end of the road to somewhere, progress is good but we still don’t know where it will end.

Almost home and two photos of the irrigation canal as we headed to 小岛.

And our last photo comes from the island, one where I managed to get Huan to get (almost) close enough to fill her phone screen with me. I jest of course; I still needed to crop a lot. For those of you muttering that I didn’t crop enough because you can still see me, scroll on!

August 31^st Oh what a beautiful morning, etc. However, this morning was not a walk morning; it was a talk to the chair supplier and hope for a positive outcome. The first thing to be done was to send these three photos.

Whoever was on the other end of our chat had obviously seen this problem before and within a couple of minutes had agreed to send a new gas lift and associated ‘trays’. What the latter is I have no idea. He, or she, said the shipment would be sent today. Now I am wondering if the chair pieces will be having a nice chat to the camera while they both wait for the Covid restrictions on incoming shipments to Hainan to be relaxed.

September 1st “The Lift-Your-Spirits Quote Book” compiled by Allen Klein, ISBN 0-517-16309-8, published in 2001. This month’s quote comes from the chapter “Nature” Look deep, deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better. (Albert Einstein) Bob’s PS –Einstein speaks the truth. Take walks in the countryside, away from people and civilization, not only will you understand everything better, you will also understand yourself better.

Covid restrictions are playing havoc with our walking, last month we only managed 103km.

Last night another of my teeth fell out, I am falling to pieces. Prostate, heart, hair and teeth, there isn’t much else to go wrong. I keep telling Huan that I need to start smoking again! It wasn’t a real tooth that fell out; it was another cap so there are now two on the dining room table. This morning we set off to reconnoitre dentists.

On our way we were accosted by a couple of our neighbours who asked if we had been for a test today. We had heard nothing and told her this. It seems that the rules have changed again and now we must all be tested every three days. If we miss a test our health code will switch from green to yellow. No more stickers are needed.

Off we went to our usual testing place. The change in the procedure coincided with the return of many of the additional medical staff to the mainland. This meant much longer queues; here we are almost at the end of the queue.

Here we are half way to the testing stations looking forward and backwards.

Our route took us in a roundabout way with the Chinese people making their way from one shaded are to the next. That meant we walked alongside a wall with volcanic, possible fake, possibly not, rocks and the odd plants. I took far too many photos.

As is usual with so many, collages had to be made.

I had to include the occasional non-collage too; here is a pooch with hearts on its nose.

Another collage, it is a very interesting wall after all.

Of course in my imagination these tiny plants are enormous trees and I am scaling the cliffs in a forgotten world to explore what may be beyond!

Our last collage includes one from me and two from Huan. I found a lizard in the rocks but couldn’t quite get its head in the photo. Huan found one on a tree but the hedges stopped her getting any closer. Still, you can see the little creatures.

All too soon my daydreams were broken as we were nearing the swab stations. You can see an empty station in the first collage. That is because we are down to two stations from four due to the exodus of our mainland helpers. The second collage was Huan making sure she got me, again.

The whole process this morning took just over one hour so our walking plans went by the wayside again. Instead we decided to visit the bakery and the newly refurbished town Baijiahui. The bakery was a failure, no chocolate cake until later. On our way to the town Baijiahui we passed the one we usually use, and which normally has testing going on outside. Today there was no testing there but there was a big queue across the road.

They were all queuing up to go to the original testing station, the one that was there in the beginning before we all had to be tested so regularly.

The newly refurbished Baijiahui looks a great deal different now; it looks very much like the major supermarkets in Sanya and Haikou. Certainly the fish, meat and vegetable sections are greatly improved. The ‘gifts and durables’ section is much smaller; they have stopped renting the higher floor which was 300 square metres so everything is now on one floor. It still has one major failing which stops us going there for our weekly shop though, that is it has no car park. No doubt we will still pop in occasionally as we did before.

Camera and chair parts progress report, we have a shipment number for the chair parts, both camera and bits of chair are still stuck on the mainland.

September 2^nd Today was a dental failure day! We set off to the dentist that we had checked out yesterday only to find out that he wasn’t there. After half an hour of waiting and being told by the local cleaners that sometimes he doesn’t open up we decided to try somewhere else.

Huan likes the ‘old man’ dentist with a small surgery with door open to the street. I thought we should try the new one, large glass windows, air-conditioned, individual surgeries etc. It started off well but the longer I was there in the chair, before the work even stated, the worse it became. I had taken a couple of thousand out thinking a thousand for each tooth should be fine. The dentist was going on about one and a half thousand per tooth and I would need three to replace one meaning four in total so six thousand! By now, with Huan doing her best to translate (Bless her cottons socks) I was feeling very frustrated and not comfortable at all. I made an executive decision and said we were leaving! I guess that after the weekend I will be visiting the ‘old man’ dentist, I just hope he doesn’t drain my wallet too.

At the end of the day we checked camera progress and lo and behold, it has begun moving. The courier company has a good reputation and is always fast so a day or two should see it here.

September 3^rd Saturday beckoned and we heeded the call, despite having no confidence at all in the riverside market being open. It wasn’t.

On our way home we passed another stickered car, I suppose it was a nice day.

After lunch the camera arrived, with Panasonic tape around a wine box!

And here is everything unboxed but still unassembled. Huan was in a hurry but I insisted on reading at least some of the instructions first. As always they were only in Chinese but these days life is better, you can download manuals for almost anything in almost any language.

Eventually, after charging the battery, setting the language and the time, it was time to take a couple of shots out of the window.

The results don’t look too bad although I much prefer Fuji colours. Beggars can’t be choosers though can they? Neither of these images have been post processed in any way, even Picasa can make them look better so I suppose I shouldn’t worry.

Finally, a selfie from me and one that Huan didn’t know I was going to take of her.

September 4^th Percy’s test day today, yes the Panasonic now has a name, “Percy”. His first job was to record another test for us, our 17^th, no more stickers though. Today was much faster; we are back up to four testing stations again.

Today’s route was to take us past the three legged dog stop and round the riverside to try and find Huan’s favourite animals, lizards. Having said that I am not at all sure if turkeys, chickens and birds in general don’t come higher up the list. Passing the new, as yet to open hotel, we found that it had been taken over as a quarantine site.

The going became a bit rough and we had to leave the path and go onto the road.

Unfortunately our three legged friend appears to have disappeared. In fact today there were no humans at the public conveniences at all, it was all locked up. Soon we found our first creature, a little butterfly, and Percy did quite well.

He didn’t seem to do so well at landscapes, but I have a suspicion that may have more to do with the filter I used today. I’ll try again with the old Fuji filter and see what happens.

Huan did find some lizards, here is #1, from below and from the side.

Next we have one going down and then going back up.

She found only one more lizard, looks like it could be related to the previous one despite being over ten minutes later and a few trees further on.

Well, Huan was in her element today, especially when we got home. She knew this was a squirrel (or a chipmunk) but she didn’t think I would get a decent snap of it. The slight additional zoom of the Panasonic helped I suppose.

I did try experimenting with Percy but a lot more reading is needed before I have any idea what I’m doing. For you, dear reader, here is yet another of those ubiquitous electric cars. “Why?” I hear you ask. Well, this week I learned that this particular model will soon have a convertible available, only two seats, with a range of 280km. It’s almost good enough for us!

Here’s one that Huan thinks is good, I think it’s just about OK. Any further cropping results in a horrendous photo but at least you can see the bird here.

Let’s finish with a selfie again, both of us, looking at Percy’s fully articulating screen. Once we remembered to look at the lens and not at ourselves it was fine!

September 5th Monday and no photographs today. We only went shopping and then after lunch ordered additional accessories for the camera. We needed a waterproof bag, screen protectors, an additional charger and a couple of additional batteries. We also ordered the ‘vlog’ mini tripod which will allow us to shoot photos and videos at arm’s length if we so wish.

Another week comes to an end, but luckily for us so does the epic chronicle of the continuously changing camera along with its orders, cancellations, non-deliveries and of course finally, an actual delivery. It’s too early to say what it’s like but it has to be better than our phones and is definitely better than the now dead Fuji. Even if I thought it was not up to the standards I want I very much doubt if I would be brave enough to ask Huan to change it yet again! Give us your opinion on yesterday’s piccies, I will try and get better, I promise.

From the odd couple in Hainan to all you other odd folk out there, stay happy, stay safe and take care. As always, we will return in a week, TTFN!