I enjoy a fine winter holiday journey to "Vietnam" Nothing really went according to plan - most significantly I did not actually make it to Vietnam - somehow the prospect of boarding a 20-hour, overnight bus packed with locals spitting and snoring and shouting on mobile phones was just too daunting for me.
Instead I landed in some obscure Chinese city -- Xiamen -- where it seems that few westerners visit - who besides me would travel to China for European colonial atmosphere? The attraction for running - a car-free island! This island, Xiamen's historical area of Gulangyu, has become somewhat Disneyified - but I did not have a problem with that - it all still seemed authentic enough, and and the paths through the hills and along the waterfront were perfect for hours of running/sightseeing. A Xiamen bonus - even better running was to be found in the center of the town - after dark even. I went on a night run through Xiamen's version of NYC's Central Park - an endless network of wide trails alongside a series of lakes that reflected the city's colorful, neon-lit skyscrapers. For some third-tier Chinese city it was spectacular. No doubt this is the running mecca of Xiamen. Not that I ever actually saw any other runners, and I may very well have been the first person to ever run on these paths. I am sure however if I came back in 10 years the trails will be packed with Xiamenites doing long runs and interval workouts.
Next I journey to another car-free island and training destination - Hong Kong's Lamma Island.
My training suffers a bit -- even my wimpy, compromised travel journey is fatiguing. From Xiamen I do end up on a sleeper bus - however it is a 7-hour ride departing at 1:00 in the afternoon, and I am not sleepy, and I am assigned to a horrible middle bunk. I plead with a young man in the back rear window seat to trade with me and I am ready to offer him 50 RMB for the exchange, but once he understands my request he smiles and quickly moves before I can offer him cash. People pay thousands of dollars extra to lie flat on airplane flights but on this trip I want to prop myself up and look out at the rolling Chinese countryside. I overnight in Shenzhen in a lovely, spacious 1-bedroom suite. Based on the strange decor and all the odd accouterments stocked in the bathroom I presume the hotel caters to HK businessmen and their Chinese mistresses. Accommodations on Lamma Island are less luxurious, but no less interesting. The key to the apartment where we were to stay does not materialize and by around 11pm with all the hotels on the island full and the last ferry having left we start to grow concerned. We strike up a conversation with a local artist woman who takes pity on us and allows us to stay with her and her 5 children in a fantastic waterfront home where she is squatting as she tries to convert the place into a "cultural center". Granted the house has no running water, no lights, no covering on the windows... But the candles, the sound of the ocean, the artwork and the crumbling building create an amazing atmosphere.
My training suffers a bit -- even my wimpy, compromised travel journey is fatiguing. From Xiamen I do end up on a sleeper bus - however it is a 7-hour ride departing at 1:00 in the afternoon, and I am not sleepy, and I am assigned to a horrible middle bunk. I plead with a young man in the back rear window seat to trade with me and I am ready to offer him 50 RMB for the exchange, but once he understands my request he smiles and quickly moves before I can offer him cash. People pay thousands of dollars extra to lie flat on airplane flights but on this trip I want to prop myself up and look out at the rolling Chinese countryside. I overnight in Shenzhen in a lovely, spacious 1-bedroom suite. Based on the strange decor and all the odd accouterments stocked in the bathroom I presume the hotel caters to HK businessmen and their Chinese mistresses. Accommodations on Lamma Island are less luxurious, but no less interesting. The key to the apartment where we were to stay does not materialize and by around 11pm with all the hotels on the island full and the last ferry having left we start to grow concerned. We strike up a conversation with a local artist woman who takes pity on us and allows us to stay with her and her 5 children in a fantastic waterfront home where she is squatting as she tries to convert the place into a "cultural center". Granted the house has no running water, no lights, no covering on the windows... But the candles, the sound of the ocean, the artwork and the crumbling building create an amazing atmosphere.
I participate in Hong Kong's annual Boxing Day Run. Great weather, great organization, great course. Unfortunately the Boxing Day Run is only 4k, and I only start to wake up at about the 3k mark. Well, really I only wake up after the event when we go to The Flying Pan for American breakfast accompanied by bottomless cups of coffee. There is much to be said for the beer and pasta we enjoy after every event in Japan, but when it is still only noon I strongly prefer the breakfast food I grew up with - and the coffee.
Later I journey to the city of Yangshuo, formerly a great backpacker destination, which apparently is now hopelessly overtouristed and passe. But again I don't find this terribly troubling. I manage to get on a mountain bike and it does not take long to escape the hordes of (overwhelmingly Chinese) tourists. At the end of 70-kilometers of cycling through quiet rice fields and karst mountains and remote villages I am pleased to return to all the tourist infrastructure - particularly the lovely coffee shops.
Thats an inspiring travel report! Will travel to HK-CHina more often in 08 so maybe our path will actually cross in one of the King of the Hills series
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