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Hong Kong, China – September 1999
Wrapped in a concrete forest, Hong Kong is not known to be a place
for viewing wild animals. In actuality, Hong Kong is home to the Chinese White Dolphins, one of the most adorable animals in the world.
Until the Hong Kong government selected the Chinese White Dolphins as the mascot for the
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Urumqi, China – September 1999
During the long winter, Urumqi is covered with snow and the frozen frost on the tree branches turns the city silver. But Urumqi is at it’s most attractive in the summer, when the trees are green, water gurgles in the streams, flowers bloom and mountains are lush green.
Heavenly Lake
Lege
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Disco Ball
Dalian is a coastal city, surrounded on all sides by water, thanks to the Yellow and the Bohai Sea. Its location on the Liaodong Peninsula provides several miles of beachfront to walk along. The mountains are high, and the air is relatively cleaner.
In the city, there remain memories of Rus
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Xanadu (1 of 5)
Who hasn’t heard of Kublai Khan (and his rather more fierce granddad, Genghis)? Even in English classes, Coleridge’s poem is inescapable.
So, here I am in Peking, and I know that Xanadu, the actual Xanadu, is not far away. It was Kublai’s summer palace and is just a few
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Xanadu (2 of 5)
Sunday starts with a delay over depositing the Green Toad (my backpack) in the baggage room, so a city bus to the railway station would risk missing my 8:50 train. The assistants normally lurking around the gates are absent but a small taxi delivers some Chinese so he gets an immediate refil
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Xanadu (3 of 5)
One of the office women conducts me next door to a hotel, and in the office a mob of curious locals gathers, including an English teacher (possibly sent for) who is more comfortable with written English. He writes that I must first go to Lanqui, two hours away by bus, and thence a further te
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Xanadu (4 of 5)
It is however, no ordinary embankment, but the remains of the walls and towers that girdled round twice five miles… Yes… this is the place. I go out into the bitter wind, and besides the track are stone pillars on which I recognize both Mongolian, and the ideograms for Shangdu. S
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Xanadu (5 of 5)
As yesterday, I emerge into the dawn gloom at about six twenty, with activity in the streets and buses in motion. Indeed, one is leaving even as I cross the street, but when I mention Peking, the driver motions me to the terminal building. Within, the ticket office ladies nominate a bus to s
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Xanandu Poem – Kublai Khan
In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure-dome decree:
Where Alph, the sacred river ran
Through caverns measureless to man
Down to a sunless sea.
So twice five miles of fertile ground
With walls and towers were girdled round:
And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills,
Where blossomed
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Arriving in Hong Kong (3 of 5)
For those who’ve never had the thrill of landing at the old airport in Hong Kong, ‘Kai Tak’ was better than any amusement park ride. You enter Hong Kong airspace from the west, fly over the outer lying islands, then make a steep right bank to land in downtown Kowloon. Let
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Arriving in Hong Kong (4 of 5)
The following day I phoned my parents in England. I had a small amount of cash in a bank account and needed it. I went to a booth on Nathan Road and after getting through to England heard the message, “This number is no longer in service.” My God! I thought, breaking out in a cold
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Arriving in Hong Kong (5 of 5)
One afternoon I bumped into the guy who had directed me to my guest house, the English guy Dave. He told me he was representing a Chinese tailor’s shop and would stand on the busy street trying to lure customers into the shop. I told him my situation and he suggested I should work for t
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Lijiang: A Special Place in China
Deep in the far north-west of China's Yunnan Province lies an ancient town whose history began long before the Mongol invasion led by Kublai Khan (Yuan Dynasty 1271-1368)."The inclusion of southern China in 1279 made the Mongol Empire the largest the world has ever seen" (Lonel
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Arriving in Hong Kong (1 of 5)
I had just finished a year’s travel in Australia with my two best friends from the States. One guy decided to stay in Oz with his new girlfriend, while the other, a mild mannered guy named Mark chose to spend a couple of months travelling through Indonesia with me.
After this time, Mark
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Arriving in Hong Kong (2 of 5)
I knew there was an area called Khao San Road in the west of the city that was a haven for backpackers. I boarded a bus outside the airport and rode it downtown. When in the center of town I noticed we were stopped at a large intersection. I took this opportunity to jump off the bus and went
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Going Against the Flow (1 of 4)
Shanghai to Wuhan up the Yangzi River
The Yangzi River is one of the world’s great rivers. Sourced high in the Himalayan mountains and Tibetan Plateau of central Asia and flowing to the Pacific coast, it is steeped with a human history dating as far back as the very origins of Chinese s
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Going Against the Flow (2 of 4)
In comparison, Third Class was a series of dorm-like cabins that accommodated up to twelve passengers, while Fourth Class was similar but in dorms that held up to twenty people. Lastly there was Fifth Class – deck space only.
Walking through the main foyer area of the ferry, scenes at
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Going Against the Flow (3 of 4)
Suspension bridge near Nanjing
The next morning dawned sunny and clear and I arose by 6:30am. With two cameras in hand (SLR and handy-cam video), I did not want to miss a moment of this great journey. I arrived on deck just as a huge, half-completed suspension bridge wa
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Going Against the Flow (4 of 4)
The third and final day on the river indeed dawned overcast and drizzly. I was once again up and about at 6:30am and despite the gray and sunless morning the scenery was the most spectacular of the passage. Whisks of low cloud surrounded the peaks of nearby hill tops, flowing like misty water
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Off the Track – China Style
We all pride ourselves on being independent travelers to some degree. You have done the wall, the palace and maybe the warriors. You have traveled the big cities and done most of it without the help of a tour guide, maybe you don’t even own a Lonely Planet Guide and you may even know t
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