Leaving on a jet plane

I love that song..... anyway.

I am in HK airport at the moment with an hour or so to kill before I board for Beijing. Only have one day of work there and hoping to get out to the Wall for a look at that on Saturday, before I bum a flight back for Honkers to turn around and fly back up to Tokyo. Its a bit of a long winded operation, but Cathay do not fly PEK-NAR so I have no choice.

Anyway, back to Honkers. I loved it. I am sure the noise would drive me mad after a while, but as a stopover for a few nights you couldn't ask for anything more in a city. There are a few things that I noticed that tripped me up a few times, the biggest of these was escalators. Yes, I know, not very tricky devices. However, unlike in Australia, all the escalator you need is always on the right, as opposed to the left in Australia. They also stay to the right when walking. I find this odd because when driving, they stay on the left. Anyway I took a few near spills while trying to get on the wrong escalator.

Also a note for those who were interested, they were not hawks in the city but a very stunning Black Kite. Not the one with the string attached.

I did manage to get a new camera and have some pics below and also on my flickr site. I only got it last night so the pics are a bit ordinary while I learn how to drive it. I got the Lumix TZ3. Great camera been eyeing it for a while at home.

I am not sure if I have mentioned yet but I do have a travelling companion for the trip..... yes, you guessed it.... miniNICK is with me. He quite enjoyed his punt across the harbour on the Star ferry and also his wanderings around the back lanes. For those of you that know him, you will know that he loves experiencing all pasrt of a culture.

More news once we hit Beijing where the weather is now only forecast for -5 which is a lot better than the -8 it was going to be.

Bai-Bai