>7 Marathons (In Bits and Pieces) and Hissing Sid.

April 25^th Rip van Winkle struggled again this morning and so didn’t get out for a walk until after lunch. The first photo was just to show you that the lanterns I mentioned last week really are red in colour and not orange.

Next up, as I was crossing the river they were piping concrete into the new walls so these two pictures show that being done, and show what the ‘parking bays’ along the temporary roads are for. We still have no timeline for completion but rest assured; we’ll keep you informed.

Remember the juicy locust on the tree, well today on some other trees, I found some moults. (This time it is a noun and not a verb.) Being moults, they were all obviously empty.

Today’s route was all over the place to get a few kilometres in while at the same time keeping a wary eye on the sky. Someone else was keeping an eye on the sky too. I remember when all we had was a bit of wood with twine wrapped around it leading up, if you were lucky, to a kite made of wood and paper. Nowadays it’s all mod cons.

In town I stopped to chat to a couple of rabbits in a cage when I realised I was being watched. Something very fishy was going on!

Arriving home it was time to heat up today’s dinner, Yemeni Kebda, which I had cooked before going out. Ours was a little ‘wetter’ than what you see in the picture, but that was deliberate. Like many people, Huan is not keen on ‘dry’ liver so I had marinated our pork liver in alcoholic vinegar and Soya sauce for a while before cooking. We had it with corn bread; it would also go well with rice or mashed potatoes, maybe even noodles.

April 26^th The old man was still not finding it easy this morning but he did manage to get out before lunch leaving Huan busy with her studying. The weather was still a little worrying, look at the rain forests doing their thing over the mountains.

Wildlife first, although I’m not so sure most people would see it as such. I think what we have here is a dung beetle but it also seems to be having problems making any balls to manoeuvre. This could be because it is trying to make them with dog poop.

Soon somebody else spotted me from just up the verge. The one on the right had been rearing up to pull branches down but wouldn’t do it again while I was watching.

Still trying to get a few kilometres in I was taking odd detours everywhere, one of them behind the unfinished hotel in the place with no property title books. The first photo shows a lift shaft, now with no exterior wall, the second is the service road.

Around the top people had taken over the grounds for private farming, who can blame them. As for me, getting out was nowhere near as easy as getting in had been, especially as I was in shorts and sandals. It must be a couple of years or more since Huan and I last walked here, must remember to now stay away.

Back on the road I looked back and spotted a little bird with a problem. It was stuck behind a window between two floors. I suppose the technical term is a curtain wall but I don’t really know. The bird was stuck behind the light coloured square pane in this photo. (You can’t see it here because I took this photo later.)

Of course I had to go in to the villa and have a look. I entered the room above the floor, and while I waited for my eyes to adjust I realised I was being watched again. This time it was a very quiet cat, at least until I said “oh hello pussy cat’ when it shot past me and out of the door. I could see the bird below so I headed down a floor and into another room. It soon became obvious that there was no way I was ever going to get it out from below so back up I went. The poor little birdie was not feeling too happy at all.

I found a plastic pipe, thin enough and short enough, which I shoved down the hole. I could get the bird to hop on but it wouldn’t stay on when I drew the pipe out again. Just as I was beginning to lose hope and think I would have to leave it, I spotted an old Chinese style broom. With that I was able to scoop the little creature to one side and then, using the pipe to gently hold it against the brush, lift it out through the small space between floor and window. Within a second or two it had spotted light coming in through the door and rapidly flew off. Let’s hope it doesn’t find its way back in again!

Time had flown while I was there so I had to head for home where I found the student still hard at it. Today’s struggles were trucks and buses, points and fines.

After lunch it was time to face the fear again! Last week, when we got home from the dentist, another previous repair, not done by him, had fallen out of my mouth. It had left a rather large hole and some nerve ending pain. Off we went, along the river bank where Huan stopped and said, “Look, your yellow friend!” Well my little yellow friend also had company, an even smaller little green friend, who seemed to be looking at me.

And here we are at the dentists’ where there is even a lovely tea table to seduce you into their chairs. All too soon I was seated in the chair.

Before long, and after some infliction of pain, the dentist said I would need to have an X-ray. We went off to another room.

After studying the resulting image, which I don’t think you want to see, the dentist told Huan that I had a lot of teeth that were not original! By the time he has finished I will have even more because today’s visit is the first of four I had planned. A little more drilling and filling and I was OK to go home, going back in about two weeks to have the filling removed and a cap fitted.

April 27^th Huan decided that she would join me today, after lunch, and that we would have another bus and walk day. I guess it must be nearing the end of the month and time to make sure not too much credit is left on the OAP bus card. We took the bus to just past Nansheng so that we could walk back through the old army camp. We found a new, and smaller, Nansheng, built for tourists. It’s a long time since we walked this road but we don’t remember this.

Pointy Mountain was quite prevalent in this afternoon’s walk; I lost count of how many times we saw it, and even how many photos we took of it. Dead snakes were also around, but not too many, and thankfully, no live ones. The old army place is vast and for some time we weren’t sure of our bearings. Some places we recognised, others we didn’t, and we couldn’t seem to find the avenue of heroes. We did eventually work out where we were and we managed to find the avenue. However, the heroes had been removed, we’re not sure where to.

If you are interested in knowing more about the heroes, you can find all the details in my post of November 2017. All seven heroes are there, along with their relevant plaques. However, you may need help with those as they are all in Chinese.

Just a few minutes later we came across a herd of cows, the first one made a beeline for me. I was allowed to touch and talk but then, it is not obvious from the photo, he did not want me to go to his right towards the rest of the herd. You can see them waiting behind.

Behind them we spotted the farmer and one cow tagging along with her resting her hand on its back. When she let go, for whatever reason, the cow started going around in small circles. We asked why, and she told us it had previously been hit by a car so now it could only walk with her.

This is a long walk, if we didn’t take the bus it would be twenty eight kilometres, you can see that in the 2017 post. I’m not sure if my heart is ready for things like that again. Taking the bus helps and it is a good feeling walking through the old army base.

It is very peaceful most of the time, although some villages and farms do have some noisy hounds. I could hear this one but couldn’t see him across the pond. It’s funny, if he hadn’t barked we would not have seen the pig, which we have never seen before.

For the Minister of All of course, no walk would be complete if she didn’t find something for me to be given orders to point the camera at. At least this was a photo I could take!

A few more Pointy Mountain photos were taken and then Huan decided we should take a picture of the bird scaring ribbons in the fields. She said it looked as though the village, and the farmers, were having a party. I managed to find a spot that included good old ‘Pointy’. Note also that there is a human scarecrow in this photo too, relaxing under an umbrella.

Coming into the next village, from the reverse direction to normal, I realised that although we knew the river on the right of the bridge, as you look at it, very well, we did not know the left hand side as much. Creating the small panorama I managed to sneak Madam in too.

Coming into the village after we found a fruit tree, Huan wanted know what sort so asked a passing local guy. He said they were wild lychees, very good, no chemicals added. Unfortunately for us they were nowhere near ripe. I got ready with the camera and was then told I was not pointing the right way, I should have included the insect.

Sometimes, walking into the small villages, the pooches are laid out in the road without a care in the world, until we come along that is. They then decide they should have a little barking session to let the big people know that there are strangers around!

Pretty soon we were at the bus stop the Wuzhishan side of Nansheng, having walked over ten kilometres to get there. With the beginning and the end today we had a grand total of twelve, more than enough for one day. For a change, on the bus, we tried a camera selfie.

Once home all I had to do was warm up dinner, which I had cooked this morning. Like many British people, I assume, I have a few different recipes for sausage casserole. Today’s is one that I had not tried before. As it says, it is easy. However, there is a discrepancy between the summary and the method as far as cooking time goes. I suggest you prod, poke and taste and modify the times to suit yourself. Despite us not having access to any good old British bangers we both enjoyed it very much.

April 28^th The O.C. (Officer Commanding) put me on escort duty today and I was tasked with ensuring the ladies got to their practice safely. We hadn’t been out of the house more than a few minutes before Huan found a lizard. This one allowed me to get fairly close. Just look at the size of its back legs and of its claws, visible in the middle left of the photo.

The next two photos were taken for the ‘where did I go quiz” when I reached home. Huan’s sense of location is sometimes hopeless; a lot of prompting was needed.

Usually getting out of this place is fairly easy; there is a large open gate at the other end. Today, said gate was closed and I had to get myself around the pillar and over the fence. I forgot the before photo, this one is the after, just after a truck turned up to open the gate!

My route took me past 仁帝山 Rén dì shān 康养基地 kāng yǎng jīdì - Rendi Mountain Health Care Base where they have some ‘bas-reliefs’ on the exterior walls. I think someone has been cheating me when we have watched traditional bamboo dancing!

This was a lucky shot; the little bird landed for a few seconds, seemed to look around and tweet and then quickly took off again. Luck was with me, even if distance wasn’t.

Apart from a couple more photos of the road that was it from me. Of course, when Huan came home she also came with yet more posed photos of the gang, teacher is front and centre.

For the rest of the day, and the night, I uploaded the landfill walk from last week. If you want to see it you can find it here - https://youtu.be/l_WEV51bRBc

April 29^th The Queen graciously agreed to accompany on a market stroll today, as long as she could go to the bank first. I took photos of fish while she counted her money.

The local authorities have been busy down at the bap market end of the street and also outside the town market. That means a lot of people have moved to park themselves in front of the tea-shop. They now stretch even towards our end of the town.

Is it animal, vegetable or mineral? Despite looking suspiciously like a foot from an ape-like cryptid such as Bigfoot, it is in fact vegetable. It is in Chinese, 山药shānyào, or for you and I just a plain old yam, albeit a rather big one! You can see the lady trader’s foot on the right hand side of the photo, which should give you an idea of the scale. It is definitely a BIG foot!

Passing through the bap market and past the freezer shop that had no oxtails I spotted a couple of new friends. Their young owner is only here on occasional weekends, she boards in a school that we passed by on our walk through the army base this week. It must be a good school as her English was nigh on perfect. One little friend escaped through the feeding hatch!

And I was a lucky boy yet again with a little birdie, this one on a bin.

We decided that we had walked enough for one day, just as well because it rained after dinner.

April 30^th Today I fancied a typical Sunday morning and I had found something new to watch on the PC, a British series called “The Capture”. My plan was to still go out for the last day of the month, reaching for that magic total. All ready to go and Huan piped up that she was coming with me, a pleasant surprise, no complaints from me. We started off going through Luobote village where Huan found a student enjoying the three day holidays while practicing his family trade in the woodworking shop. She took too many photos of course!

While she was doing that I was creating a little panorama just outside.

In the past we were able to go through this village, through the fields and towards the medicine factory. That way has been blocked for a while but we thought we would still explore and see if there was a way through.

There was still no way through but we did find a way back to get back to the road.

Just after that we, or should I say I, stumbled across a snake. With Huan behind me telling me to take a video, and to get a bit nearer, I dutifully obeyed. Here is a screen shot of the snake, maybe 80-90cm in length. Shortly afterwards we met a local who told us it was ‘not very’ poisonous!

The road we had been aiming for had been dug up to create a new one but soon enough we were back where we belonged, in the countryside. There was also a new road for Huan.

For probably the first time this year, we found some dragonflies. I had been wondering where they had all got to, blaming climate change etc. Today’s were all this colour.

Wild pineapples were up next, we don’t know why they are red though.

Next is another panorama taken while I was trying to explain to Huan where we were. Don’t look too closely at the sky and the foliage on the right, I retouched it to remove a little bit of electrical cabling, and I am still only using Picasa.

Four little rascals came next, scurrying down the tree as fast as they could when they say Huan pointing her phone at them. I managed a snap or two; here is one of them. I guess they don’t look too guilty here and none of them are actually up the tree.

No more pictures for today, I think we’ve had enough. There is a portion of a screen shot though, just to show that I have walked over seven marathons this month. Didn’t I do well?

May 1st Are we back to normality, with no photos for a Monday? We could be, at least for this week. Having made sure that we, or at least I, walked every day last month to reach the magic 300 number, it is now time to relax a bit. If long walks occur, fine, if they don’t, also fine.

All we did today was shopping, with learning for Huan and binge watching for me. Who knows what tomorrow brings, all we know is that the road is sometimes long, with mountains in our way, but we’ll keep on climbing those steps! Sorry… Blame that poetic licence again. One thing you can be sure of is that we will be back next week, see you then.