20 May 14
It’s become a thing for me, to plan for an outdoorsy activity when we travel anywhere. It sucks to hike (or even try to enjoy nature) in Singapore because of the humidity, heat and mozzies. While this hike we did in Hong Kong nearly killed us and our relationship (just kidding!), I was really happy we completed it after we completed it.
I borrowed this book and decided on Jardine’s Lookout trail because of the promising views. It didn’t disappoint! The Victoria Peak trail would probably be awesome too but Ben & I have been up to the Peak before. I’ll share at the end of the post how to get to the starting point.
Hiking up to the starting point!
This is Ben, totally regretting letting me plan our trip
I keep calm (and clam) and carry on, till the view spoke for itself
Mid-way!
On the top of Mount Butler
The descend is long. Like, really long, till you see signs of life and promise of drinking water.
So we took many, many breaks
How to get there:
– Get to Exchange Square. It is a bus interchange. Located between Central & Hong Kong station.
– Get on Bus 6 or 66. I took Bus 6.
– The journey takes you through Wanchai & Causeway Bay. Once the bus leaves the busy city streets and climbs uphill, enjoy the view for a bit before getting ready to alight.
– Alight at the stop near the cricket club, next to a petrol kiosk. The bus journey took about 25 – 30 minutes at an off-peak hour.
– Buy water from the petrol kiosk, last chance to and you’ll need it. There isn’t a lot of shade to rest under on the trail. Not until you descend from Mount Butler.
– There’s a staircase from the petrol kiosk which will take you up to a street road, Tai Tam Reservoir Road. From there, start walking upwards till you see this wooden archway.
Alternatively, you can skip this by taking a cab. The wooden archway is just shy of the entrance to Parkview, a residential complex.
I found this post to be very informative; I have no idea how far or how long we walked for or what we were even looking at (I’m bad at geography, estimation and simple math calculations). So thank you internet people for sharing!
| Tags: 50mm/F1.8, hong kong, hong kong trail, nikon FM10
6 May 14
I took 6 photos in Beijing. I whined a little about the bad haze condition on Instagram which was why we left within 36 hours of arriving. I had grand plans! Of climbing the Great Wall, of touching and seeing cherry blossoms for the first time in my life, of stuffing my face with good dumplings, of visiting 798 Art District and Cao Chang Di (my translation: field of grass) to get a bit closer to Ai Wei Wei’s legacy.
We did none of the above, got nowhere close in fact. The haze made everything harder to do – breathing, seeing, walking, navigating, getting lost, asking for directions. Even with our N95 masks, I couldn’t handle the haze and succumbed to a migraine by late afternoon. Me thinks everyone who lives in Beijing is superhuman. Even their dogs are superdogs. They love their doggies there, it’s so sweet! Fun fact: The only two times I’ve seen this dog IRL was in Shanghai and again in Beijing.
Back to the 6 photos, I took these while roaming the streets of Sanlitun. On hindsight, we should have gone somewhere else for the only day we had in the city. In fact my instincts failed me horribly the entire time in Beijing because the places I picked for lunch and dinner were disappointing too.
The photos make me sound like I’m crazy right? What haze? Everyone’s out and about, sitting outdoors with their friends. Superhumans, I told you. And also, pictures lie. I follow FLOTUS on Instagram and she was visiting Beijing a few weeks before us. She was doing tai chi in a park! I even told my family, if Michelle Obama’s allowed to go to Beijing, the haze can’t be that bad. My friend gave it back to me good though, she said Beijing probably cleared the haze for MObama :\ Possible, possible.
I’m not sure if we’re coming back for you, Beijing. I still check the haze index on random days, for fun, hoping there’s one day I can tell Ben, “oh my god I think it’s getting better, let’s go back!”.
| Tags: 50mm/F1.8, beijing, china, nikon FM10
7 Mar 14
I know everyone feels like this from time to time, when there’s too many things to keep up with. When that time comes around for me, the first thing I neglect is this blog. #guilty
Now allow me to flood your screen with one last wave of photos from Istanbul!
While riding the nostalgic tram on Istiklal Caddesi
A street vendor peddling bubble blowing machines
Sitting down with a coffee and looking up
Evening time at the Galata bridge
Around Taksim Square
Exploring the side alleys along Istiklal Caddesi
This is what the nostalgic tram looks like from the outside
Here’s Ben with a flight of colourful stairs right before we said goodbye to this lovely city
| Tags: 50mm/F1.8, istanbul, nikon FM10, turkey
21 Feb 14
On our last day in Istanbul, we took a taxi out to Rumeli Hisari. It is right next to the Bosphorus and because we were greeted with amazing sunshine and perfect 18-degree weather, we had a really good time there.
We made our way there to eat at Kale Cafe (photo on the left). Made popular and known to me from an episode of No Reservations! We ordered the usual Turkish breakfast spread and it didn’t disappoint!
After breakfast, we took a slow walk toward the Ottoman Fortress of Rumeli Hisari.
The view was beautiful although some points were scary to hike up to. Looking at these photos now, I’m getting excited about our trip to Beijing in April. I booked us a hike to the Great Wall, like an 8km hike. Ha! I’m just thinking about getting nice pictures and not thinking so much about the distance…
| Tags: 400 film, 50mm/F1.8, istanbul, nikon FM10, turkey
27 Jan 14
Dreaming about island life. Thinking back to our day spent in Heybeliada in Princes’ Islands.
We ate at Heyamola and of course I ordered some menemen – which is scrambled eggs. It quickly became one of my favourite foods.
After lunch we walked around the island.
Then it was time to head back to the city via ferry.
On a techie note: We purchased sim cards for our iPhones at the airport, to have 3G on the go. On the 7th day, our 3G got cut off even though we paid for our entire 11-days stay. Turns out, the country requires you to pay taxes for using their service. The service staff at Vodafone didn’t breathe a word about this at the airport, so imagine us – cold grumpy and lost without Google Maps and Instagram – first world problems. So there’s a tip from me to you! We didn’t pay taxes because it was a Friday and it was past 5pm. The tax office was already closed and would be closed over the weekend too. I think we left Istanbul on Monday so we decided, screw it, no internet no biggie. (it WAS a BIGGIE).
| Tags: 50mm/F1.8, istanbul, nikon FM10, turkey
