February 3rd Well we started off well; we were both out of bed before half past seven this morning. However, we still didn’t get out of the house before half past nine. Huan blamed me being on the computer and I blamed her being on the phone! A town walk was needed so once again we took one of the #2 buses to the other end of town.
Huan found a duck and I found ancient architecture. It is very easy to see Huan’s duck but you may have to strain your eyes to see the old stairs and house.
Another architectural find for me, our detour was doing us proud.
Of course what I hadn’t seen in the last photo was that it was also a cowshed. The cows were curious enough to stare at us but not enough to come near.
Our little detour was quite interesting although we did have to cut it short. When we got to here the farmer had his irrigation fountain switched on and the time interval was not long enough for us to pass. I only had my sandals on so that was probably just as well.
Here’s a view over the village rooftops instead.
As you know I like to see nature taking things back, how well is it doing here?
How about shopkeepers farming on the doorstep?
I do still like my cars though and this is one of the two Volvos I like. The other one was driven by a gentleman by the name of Simon Templar. I like to think he modeled himself on me!
Things on cars interest me as well these days, especially when they seem to be also taking photos of me, one with an invisible camera!
A lovely couple of views as we neared home, it’s a beautiful day for walking.
More car things for you, both front doors of the same car. It looks very much as if the cats have been put on over something else. I wonder if Huan will let me put frogs all over our car.
Passing by the ‘old people’s school’, where Huan used to go for music lessons, singing lessons and dancing lessons, we took a view looking downwards.
On the wall were some things, drying in the sun. Huan told me that they are radishes.
Not many pooches today but there is a new one in the outdoor market. It is young, very playful and not at all happy about me petting the cat instead of it.
We still managed seven kilometres even though we weren’t trying to. More naps!!
February 4th An easy day today, all we had to do was buy some bread for our dinner this evening. Huan forgot her hat, (I didn’t need mine), and so while she went back upstairs I took photos of our little flower garden.
The guy who does all this used to use a public water tap. It is ‘his’ garden but we all derive pleasure from it. At least most of us do. Someone complained about his water usage, the public tap was removed; even the cleaners have no access now. We used to wash our car there and pay the office a small fee whenever we did so. As for the garden, well he has to hope that the weather helps and he uses water from his apartment. Not much rain in the winter!
We were off to bap market this morning; we knew that we would find bread that Huan liked there. On the way we passed some people enjoying the rays of the sun on their backs. I told them that they should take their tops off! Huan took their photo.
Arriving at our destination we had a walk around their lily pond, which needs a bit of a clean.
Walking along the riverside, bread in hand, Huan tried her hardest to find birds for me.
At one time we were on opposite sides of the road; I could not easily get to where Huan was.
What’s going on here then? Well New Year is coming so we think that the orange trees will be given as gifts. You can also see poinsettias there, maybe we should have one.
Dinner time! What was the bread for?
Here are my ingredients prepared, sans honey and with some small Chinese red beans instead of red lentils. The red beans have been pre-soaked and boiled. I did add a small normal potato to make up for the weight lost by peeling the sweet potatoes.
Follow the recipe and you can’t go wrong. I didn’t add any garnish
at all, it didn’t need it. Here is our table, not such a good photo I’m afraid,
but everything is there. My bowl is nearer the butter dish and I have some kind
of soft bread, it goes very well with soup. Huan’s bowl is the lower one; she
has some bread made with different types of flour. She preferred her bread to
mine. In the middle there is a plate of
February 5th “Parker!” “Yes m’lady.” It was another chauffeur day for me, taking
the Landlady to Sanya this time. She needed to pay the annual maintenance fee.
It turned into a little more than just that. We headed off down the highway and
on arriving in Sanya our first stop was not for the boss, but for me. I checked
in with the bank to find out where my money transfer stands now. The money has
been received back in the
We drove to our area, parked the car, and then Huan took this for some reason.
Off to our apartment we went, to our surprise the walls were pretty clear, no water damage. There was some on the ceiling mind. However, we were only there to hand over the annual fee for maintenance. That done we headed out for lunch, don’t look up!
Dumplings were our choice today with a tea egg each. Here is mine, Huan’s was out of focus!
Driving down the highway had been pretty tiring, too much traffic to relax, so an executive decision was made by Parker. He would drive back through the mountains and we would be tourists on the way home. This was our first stop.
This is a small village with what seems an emphasis on civil air defence, at least judging by the signs. I did like the mural though.
It was a pretty enough place but I was desperately looking for the little boys’ room. I did take some pictures during my search though.
Unfortunately for me, the room in question was locked when we found it and there were no people around to unlock it. With me panicking and rushing about like a headless chicken Huan managed to find a squat loo so I handed her all my belongings and went for it. She took pictures of the restaurant courtyard while she waited.
With not much to see or do, possibly because it was siesta time for the villagers, we decided to move to another place. We didn’t stop taking photos though. Huan had never seen what I am sure my Mum called ‘Billy Dunkers’.
Is this place worth a visit? I would say yes, just try and choose the right time. I may have stayed longer if I could have found a decent coffee, but nothing was open. The scenery is great, very nice walks abound too.
Back to Donald we went. We had left him hanging about with some out of work tourist buggies.
Heading onwards and upwards we found another place that Huan had seen the signs for and that I remembered the entrance that we have passed many times. Do you think that is the secret lair of Bosley and thus Charlie’s Angels? We didn’t spot them I’m afraid.
There is a hotel here and we also found snowbirds. In the grounds were safari animals and Li sculptures. Mind you, we were not sure about the lady due to her clothing.
For our Chinese readers, here’s the map, I didn’t find an English one. There are English signposts to the various parts pf the village though.
There are stone frogs everywhere; the one on the top in the past photo is even holding a pile of gold ingots. Maybe this is where I should live!
In fact this house would be perfect!
There are plenty of walks here too; this is the road around the village.
They even have an open air theatre although I think some cleaning up may be required before the next performance of Shakespeare.
More frogs were found outside the villas, these are fountain frogs.
Also outside the villas are swimming pools, they are even full and maintained.
This pool is more beautiful though, at least in my eyes.
This village even has a small museum detailing the history of the village. For the scrooges amongst you, entrance is free. In fact so far no cash has been spent at all today.
Despite all this wonderful scenery Huan’s day would not be complete without one of these!
On the way in we had spotted some different coloured rice so we had to check further on our way out. I had thought they were the multi-coloured variety that we see in the market. I was wrong as you’ll see a little further down.
Some shapes could be seen including yin and yang.
By now we were feeling the pain! Here is Lady P resting her weary bones.
On our way back to the beginning of the rice paddies we passed another stone circle. There are quite a few in this village; you can see them as you walk around the outside.
I decided I needed a photo of the whole area of rice, Huan decided she needed one of me.
So I guess you want to know about the rice. Here’s all the info you need.
Should you visit this place? Absolutely, we spent three and a half hours here and could have spent longer if we hadn’t been so tired. We may well return and see where some of the lanes from the village lead to. Should you stay the night or more? I certainly could.
On the way home I stopped for a coffee and a fag.
And back in Wuzhishan the weary travellers had a buffet dinner.
Not a lot was done apart from uploading over two hundred photos then sorting and editing them. What you see here is a mere snapshot and this post was actually written on Friday morning.
February 6th My first job today was to share a post on my camera’s FB page to find out if my problems are usual and whether or not I will need a new one soon. This is my camera’s count details, not too high I don’t think but I have already replaced the rear display twice. In addition the on/off switch is now starting to play up.
That done I updated yesterday’s words as mentioned above. In the afternoon we did have a little walk out just to buy some vegetables for the weekend. We took the little island route.
With all the photos I had to upload yesterday I decided to leave the camera at home and only take our phones. No cameras, we both found lizards!
I still haven’t worked out what 1988 stands for but the arch is nice.
Tomorrow is market day so had a walk along the new bit to see how it is coming on. It will be interesting to see what it will look like tomorrow.
Our shopping street will also be closed for New Year stalls from tonight until the 16th. We will take some photos when it is in full swing.
Finally, this is me helping Huan. Why was I helping her when I had already carried our bags all the way from the market? Well, Huan decided that she needed to help a neighbour who has a problem with his leg and of course I could not let her carry heavy things. That is not allowed in my world where I try, and often fail, to be a gentleman! What was in his bag? Fish, he had been fishing in the river. He needs a lot because his children are coming down next week.
February 7th As promised we went first to the bottom end of the market.
Tea Street was maybe even more crowded than it used to be. The little boy in the second photo seems to be as much in awe of the big chicken as we were!
The bottleneck was back but at least the stairs are passable now.
Joining us in fighting through the throng was Shīfù, the man who oversaw our house do-up in 2015. He accelerated on to a stall he and his wife were running. (PS We know that Shīfù means ‘Master’ but we have never called him anything else.) When we found his stall Huan bought some oh his little piggy, she will cook it at New Year. I sent her back to take their photograph.
There you are; a happy couple if I ever saw one. We’ve missed them since they moved into their farm in the mountains; we’ve missed their five sons too! We need to find our way there and take some photos so that you can see the place.
I did try to get a photograph of Huan returning to where I was waiting but none of the resulting snaps were very flattering so I was ordered not to use them. Instead here are two more pictures of crowds, one near the riverside buildings and one beyond.
I do wonder sometimes when we will decide that battling through the crowds is not worth it any more. Shopping trolleys that people pull are what will probably eventually decide it for us, unless of course we start using them too.
Here we stopped to see the puppies and I told the children than I was a big child too.
Back home Huan was too busy for a nap so I didn’t have one either. Later on I got on with my duties in the kitchen again.
Because I didn’t follow the recipe exactly there are no photos I’m afraid. The only thing I changed was step three. Because of our kitchen foibles I put the duck legs on a bed of thickly sliced onion and a whole halved carrot. I then added two whole garlic cloves and two whole potatoes. For the last fifteen minutes I added some cauliflower. Making it photogenic either in the pan or on the plate would not work. We enjoyed it but I would suggest that you do as they say and only put duck legs in the roasting pan!
February 8th “Lazy Sunday afternoon, I’ve got no mind to worry, close my eyes and drift away” And that is exactly what we did this afternoon. For a change we were also lazy in the morning. There was some maintenance require in the bathroom though.
I also prepared dinner in the morning and Huan had a bath after our nap in the afternoon. Isn’t life wonderful when you’re having fun? This was dinner prior to dishing it up. We had it on a bed of noodles so it wasn’t very photogenic.
It was of course chilli con Bob again but with a difference. There were some left over onions and cauliflower from yesterday so they were finely chopped and added to the minced beef. A little soy sauce was added and then the pièce de résistance, the left over orange flavoured juice from the duck. First I fried a little garlic with some sliced sweet Chinese sausage and then added the marinated beef and some paprika. Once brown enough a diced carrot and some sliced mushrooms were added and it was left to simmer. The final touch was the addition of a tin of kidney beans. All I had to do at dinner time was cook the noodles. We both enjoyed it very much; the addition of the juice from the duck gave it that something extra. PS I added parmesan to mine.
For the rest of the evening we stayed in 100% lazy mode.
February 9th Shopping day is here again so it must be time to sing a song. “Happy days are here again! The skies above are clear again, Let us sing a song of cheer again, Happy days are here again!” Wouldn’t it be nice if that feeling was true worldwide? For us two over here we do feel that way most of the time, despite the bumps in the road. As an example, we still have no new windows, the shop has closed for the New Year and the owner has gone to visit family on the mainland. Still, at least we have windows, the eighth floor is open to the elements, someone measured their windows incorrectly!
Anyway, back to humdrum details of our days. Our car was parked across the road so we went different ways to get to it. I took the rubbish out and Huan went to buy the lottery tickets. One of the traditions of New Year is a major spring clean and this is not just of houses but also places of business. We are doing no cleaning because much mess will be made when they knock our old windows out. Down at the gate though, cleaning for the restaurant was in progress.
Meanwhile Huan found that Donald had been collecting leaves.
Having had such a lazy day yesterday and with neither of us having to cook today, (yesterday’s leftovers are today’s dinner), we decided a little walk would be in order. First a car for you.
And then another one, some old time drivers may recognise another driver and I don’t mean the old guy holding the camera.
New Year is slowly becoming more noticeable, we’ll get more for you next week.
And finally two big dogs, two Doberman Pinschers in fact, one of which you have seen before. The big one with the pointy ears is new to the garden and we can’t get him to come anywhere near us. He is absolutely terrified, not of us but of the other on who is a she! The owners are hoping that they will get together and make babies but anytime the young man gets anywhere near the young lady she gets very angry with him and tried to bite him. The owners are hoping that time will mellow the female.
Of course I had to search for Magnum P.I. and show Huan Higgins with the two dogs in that show, she was impressed. I thought OK; let’s see about Magnum’s shorts, she was not so impressed! I guess I will have to stick with my old man shorts for now.
I’ll finish on what could be a bit of good news. The bank called today, my lump sum has appeared again, this time with my correct name! Of course there is still a problem; the bank now needs to know where the money came from and why the sum is not quite the same as they have seen in my letters from the pension company. Trying to explain that the value continues to change until such time as I actually get the money was not so easy. Is it only us poor people who have these problems? How do rich people move millions around between countries? I bet they don’t have the same troubles that we do; it’s been almost a year now!
Enough grumbling, time to sign off and try and get this posted before midnight. Stay well, stay happy, and don’t watch too many negative feeds on your social media feeds! TTFN.
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