cheung chau has a lot of flies

a couple of days into hong kong, and a little tired of sasa's and shopping, we decided to check out an outlying island and took the ferry out to cheung chau. we got off the ferry and it was sticky hot, as usual. i was hoping that since it was more coastal, it would mean that it was less humid, but go fig it was even more sticky and hot. it was really wonderful, let me tell you.

(pictures taken from ipod, that's why so tiny)

we started walking along the very touristy street, looking for something fun to do. we saw some vague signs for a temple, so we ventured out there, briefly looked at the burning incense, and moved on. we walked along the coast, admiring the pretty scenery. i noticed a lot of people biking along the trail, which looked super fun. friend, being fairly cautious and suspicious about biking activities, decided to ask what looked like a local man whether the trail would continue to be flat and glorious, and good conditions for biking. he said "oh, it gets hard after awhile. hard for people not used to it." so we said "oh cool, dodged a bullet" and continued on our two footed way along the what seemed to be an endless stretch of flat land.

we walked for another fifteen minutes, stopping at a beach where i decided to walk on a algae covered rock, slipped, and promptly fell on my toosh while also scraping my leg on the rock.

we walked some more where i noticed that flies really liked eating the blood on my leg. that was really cool.

we saw these women in city wear merrily riding bikes and exclaiming in cantonese "it is SO nice to bike her, so EASY!" and so we then decided to forget the local man's advice and walk back so that we could rent bikes. we rented bikes for $5 USD each for three hours, not bad!

five minutes out of the rental place, the chain broke on friend's bike. here he is waiting to get the bike fixed.

so we rode merrily along, having a great time, cheering our good fortune. then the road ended. and i was stationary and the flies were still trying to eat my blood. i started slapping at my leg to get rid of them and sweat was running down all over my body. friend's shag haircut was looking decidedly damp. we tried to lock up our bikes to go up a steep trail, but we just ended up getting bike grease all over our hands and legs. we decided to ride back and explore the beach and the surrounding town.

helicopter landing pad.

frozen fruit on a stick. really, really good. i plan to make these for the next potluck i attend.

a street alley where we found AMAZING mango desserts. friend has fotos of them on the other camera, but basically they had this dessert cheung fun where the filling was MANGO with a MANGO paste around it and the wrapper was sweet. i braved my mango allergies to try it. they were out of their famous cake type things, but they also made a very nice cantaloupe freeze.

in sum, cheung chau was hot, sticky, and kind of touristy but it was fun to bike and the beaches really are lovely. they also make nice desserts. don't fall on the beach because the flies will eat your blood.

love,

allison