03/01/2008, Kaitoke
In the evening we went for a guided walk in the temperate rainforest at Kaitoke, which is a small area of primeval forest about 15km from Wellington. The regional council pays for rangers to lead these walks, which were fascinating and very informative. About 40 people were there, including some ten children.
Being temperate, it doesn't have as much wildlife in as a tropical rain forest, but it's still full of birds. This picture tries to show some of the epiphytes that grow high up in the trees, a distinguishing mark of this kind of forest.
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02/01/2008, Wellington
Over the next couple of days, Beryl played energetic tour hostess and showed us lots of the Hutt Valley and Wellington. This is Sarah on the top of Mount Victoria, which gives a stupendous view across Wellington harbour and out across Cook Strait.
It's also got an interesting memorial to the American Admiral Byrd who mounted the first scientific expeditions to the Antarctic, and was important in laying the foundations for the first Antarctic treaty, which established the continent as a place without borders for scientific exploration. It is to Britain's shame that the UK government is now trying to undermine that treaty in order to allow mineral exploitation.
We also spent a load of time in Te Papa, the national museum of NZ, which is fantastic. They currently have a terrific exhibition about whales, with lots of whale song and skeletons and films with many Maori talking about the importance of whales in their mythology and community.
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01/01/2008, Plimmerton Beach
Pip promised Sarah the beach and the sea on New Years Day, and here we are, at Plimmerton beach. We did change into cossies and got wet well above the knee, but didn't quite take the plunge. The pictures aren't very flattering though.
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31/12/2007, Wellington, Oriental Bay
We arrived, finally, in Wellington at 7pm, after a comedy of errors at the Auckland International which was well understaffed for the holidays. Our cheerfulness was helped by free bubbles from Air New Zealand on the internal flight south.
Beryl met us at Wellington airport, and this is her having a drink (of water!) at the Fisherman's Table restaurant in Oriental Bay. We had planned the fireworks in the city centre but Sarah kept falling asleep so we went home.
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30/12/2007, Sik Sik Yuen Wong Tai Sin Temple
The main temple is full of colour and incense, the rustle and swish of prayer and the clatter of rattling lucky sticks. Everything is very informal; there are no robed hierophants directing how people pray, no-one enforcing a particular format or theology. Worshippers buy incense and other small items such as paper parcels, oranges or apples. The incense is lit at one of the numerous burners. Many people walk round the court yard several times, waving the sticks. Others stand, kneel or prostrate themselves in front of the temple, praying earnestly. Many acquire a box of the chim, bamboo sticks tightly packed; they shake the box until one falls out, revealing a number. The box is free; the interpretation by one of the many diviners requires a fee.
There are many containers in front of the temple. A small notice suggests that you put at least three incense sticks in each of these, to seek success in whatever endeavours you feel might benefit. Sarah bought a pack of incense and stuck them in.
The many, many busy worshippers completely ignore everyone else, whether westerner or Chinese, whether taking pictures, peering inside the temple or simply leaning against a pillar watching the show. It's a very open, democratic place.
After an hour or so in the temple, it was time to go. We made our way back to the airport. A good thing we were early, as our luggage was overweight and we hastily repacked. This isn't uncommon as people leave the land of cheap shopping. Our hand luggage got rather heavier, but we squeaked in with only a small amount over to pay.
Time to get south of the equator.
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30/12/2007, Sik Sik Yuen Wong Tai Sin Temple
The Sik Sik Yuen Wong Tai temple is a large complex, largely built early in the 1970's, for Taoist workshop. It is dedicated to Wong Tai Sin who looks after success in business and avoiding ill-health.
There are several different parts to the temple. The picture shows the garden of the nine walled dragons. On seeing the sign, we expected a garden with a wall around it, containing nine statues of dragons (or maybe a lot of tarragon). Instead, there's a garden, with a wall in it, decorated by nine ornate dragons, each one different from the rest.
We also visited the Garden of Good Wishes. A series of small temples wind around ponds connected by waterfalls (sadly turned off and being drained for cleaning during our visit). The ponds are full of fish and small grey tortoises.
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30/12/2007, Happy Foot massage parlour
A foot massage is heaven. We advise anyone going to Hong Kong to get one. Or why wait: go to your nearest Chinese health centre today! We had saved this for our last few hours, and wished we had one every day.
On the advice of the Lonely Planet guide, we went to the Happy Foot parlour in Wellington Street. That was a good tip. (Though we would love to know who to choose a good parlour in Hong Kong; how could we tell which were the good ones near our hotel, for instance?)
This is a rare picture; a nearly empty tube. Hong Kong seemed to be gearing up for the frenzy of New Years Eve. Pip took this picture pulling out of the first stop on Kwun Tong line, on our way to our final tourist visit. You can see that the trains are all interconnected and very long indeed. So, despite the crowds, you do not feel squashed into intimacy as you so often do in London or Paris.
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30/12/2007, Many Hong Kong streets
In Hong Kong, they use bamboo for scaffolding. A pile such as this on the street suggests something about to be built, or demolished. It is tied together with plastic, as far as we could tell, but in the old days it would have been tough fronds. The bamboo is tough and effective, and much more environmentally-friendly than metal poles.
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29/12/2007, Kowloon Park
Kowloon Park has a sculpture walk and garden, filled with a surprising mix of abstract work. By the time we got there, night was falling. This 'Seed' caught our attention, its surfaces covered in intricate whorls and the whole thing a complex three-dimensional study of space and light.
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29/12/2007, Kowloon Park
It will come as no surprise that there is dreadful smog in Hong Kong. On a bad day, your throat is itchy and your lungs objecting after an hour or so on the streets. Many outdoor workers (cleaners, police, stall vendors) wear smog masks.
Our feet hurt, our chests were crying for relief. We retreated to the calm fountains and paths of Kowloon Park. It was busy but not unbearably so, with many benches on which to sit and watch the play of water. Where we sat, the trees were full of birds. They sang and chirped in a frantic dance, as busy as the swirling crowds we had left behind.
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29/12/2007, Causeway Bay
On the Saturday, our last full day in Hong Kong, we got up in good time to take the ferry across to Hong Kong Island. This is called one of the world's 50 great trips by the National Geographic (or so the ferry says on its publicity). It is a huge amount of fun for HKD2.
It's even less if you get an Octopus card, which we had acquired when we arrived. This is the equivalent to London's oyster card, giving substantially cheaper public transport. It works on almost everything, including the trams and the ferries.
A detour via the City Hall took in the extremely smug 'Maritime Focus' exhibition. A radar plot of activity across the Pearl River Delta (for which HK is the principal deep-sea port), speeded up, makes for impressive viewing. You'd need a very sharp lookout navigating in these crowded waters.
We had ordered some business cards from a small stall in Man Wah street, near the western end of Des Voeux Street Central. They were ready for collection, and now when Pip is asked for details of her jewellery, she can hand over a natty card. Also, at long last, we have proper 'boat cards' for Roaring Girl. Lots of other cruisers have them and we've needed them many times.
And of course, we had to visit the marina. This is situated under the world trade centre, a relatively short sky-scraper on the waterfront of the shopping area at Causeway Bay, east of the central district. It's quite hard to find from the tram stop and we wandered around a maze of overpasses and underpasses, glimpsing masts in the gaps of buildings, for quite some time.
It's a small marina, and doesn't appear to have many pontoons. Vessels are moored bows to a big mooring buoy, from which two lines are then taken aft to each quarter. This is a new system to us, and would make for interesting mooring the first time. There is a typhoon barrage protecting the marina, but one would have to be very sure the mooring were up to the impact of hurricane force winds.
There's a busy ship yard and a reasonable chandlery. Security was quite evident; we were challenged on the gate but they let us in to visit the shop. We don't look terribly threatening of course, and in general we thought it looked fairly safe. There are several sampans which are obviously being lived on. Also quite a few of these wonderful old-style coasting and fishing vessels. We had seen several in the harbour and they are still regular working boats.
By the marina is the Noonday Gun. According to the plaque, this was originally part of the substantial armoury of Jardine Matheson. This company was one of the first western trading concerns in China, and become a powerful hong or business. The senior management were important taipans. JM armed its clippers for protection against piracy, storing its arsenal at East Point, which overlooked both Causeway Bay and the principal clipper anchorage. A gun was fired to honour the return or arrival of JM taipans into Hong Kong.
One day, one such taipan overtook a newly arrived Navy officer who was becalmed on his way into port. The officer heard the private signal, and was outraged. He ordered that JM should ensure a gun was fired at noon every day, as a time signal for the colony. The tradition survives to this day.
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29/12/2007, The Hong Kong underground
Hong Kong is very, very crowded. It is difficult for one photo to convey the constant crush, the way in which you are always weaving in the street, on the escalators, through the shops. This is a ordinary underground platform in the centre of the city, not in rush hour.
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