Australia

Wednesday 29 February 2012

Hong Kong

This is going to be the last post of the "unnitravels-australia" but hopefully there will be lots of other destinations for unnitravels.blogspot.com :)

So, Hong Kong!

Hong Kong is an extremely interesting, safe and vibrant place to visit. It was also easy to be a tourist by myself here, some other places I wouldn't have probably felt as happy doing stuff alone. But here it just worked.

Hong Kong is a wierd combination of east and west. Looking one way there's a scyscraper made of diamonds (well not exactly, but you get the point)

and by shifting your gaze only 90 degrees there's a little chinese granny pushing a trolly full of food, furniture, her children and grand children and her (most probably dead) parents as well as chickens of course (dead and alive) up a 45 degree hill between buildings that look like they might collapse any moment, under scaffoldings made of bamboo. (fact: they build even the scyscrapers with scaffoldings made out of bamboo, that's something, eh? )

And that's just the way it is. And it functions like a machine. Every bloody thing just works. There is a multipurpose card called the Octopus that you can load money to and then use it as a travelcard or to pay for your shopping, which both are rediculously cheap. Some little things are just so small but clever that you wonder why other places don't do it the same way; There are book-recycling boots on MTR stations, there are little plasticbag-holders on the entrances and exits of metro etc so you can pop your wet umbrella in a bag and don't get everything wet as you hop into the train. GENIOUS!

As well as these amazing functioning thingies, the cityscape was quite something..

So during my 4 days in the city I mostly just chilled and looked around..

sat in the park reading and looking at the aviators

had way too much coffee, but this particular rose latte was probably the best thing I have ever had

went for an amazing 1,5h massage that cost literally nothing and left me drooling for more..

went shopping in some of the coolest shops..

cheapest streetmarkets..

and smelliest food markets

she was so excited being photographed :)

Met a friend who took me for lunch and to the roof of his office for some city-views

Did some T'ai Chi one morning at the Victoria Harbour with this amazing gentleman, he really left a mark on me with the way he moved, controlled his body and mind and the people he was with..

Went for a drink in one of the highest bars in the world, and one of the fanciest places I have ever been.

This building (don't know what) is supposedly very important to the history of Hong Kong. That's what my taxi driver told me and made me take a picture of it, but what the building is or why it's important he didn't wanna tell me and I haven't had the timeto find out yet.

What the Hong Kongers (that's surely not how you say it, right?) definately have got right is taking care of themselves and excercising. Walking through a park you could not look anywhere without seeing people excercising, especially the elderly.

There were proper T'ai Chic classes..

just a granny shaking her limbs about..

some couples learning salsa..

a girl doing yoga..

or a man doing breathing excercises on a bench..

These pictures were all taken in half an hour walk through a park that also had pretty flamingos

That's all folks, thank you so much for taking this adventure with me, I have enjoyed your comments and "likes" a lot, it makes the writing all worth it!

New adventures await, but honestly now I am just extremely happy to go home and hug the brains out of my cats and friends!

Love you and leave you!

Yours truly,

Unni :)

Thursday 23 February 2012

Last of Australia

Oh my how the time flies, these are the last greetings from Down Under
(photo from the Great Ocean Road)

So the last couple of months have been going extremely fast. I was either at the Uni..

or working at the Uni Library, which I did daily all of January..

Weekends and days off it might have just been reading at the beach..

going snorkeling at Shelly beach..

being a tourist visiting the Aquarium..

or watching a Cricket match..

Also tried to play cricket ourselves on the Aussie day

and had a BBQ by the pool with mates, for sure, the traditional Aussie day-celebration.

Oh and then there was Christmas..

had an awesome traditional finnish christmas dinner and sung finnish christmas carols karaoke

The only truly Aussie quest on our celebrations was the 30 degrees heat and the yummy Pavlova

There was the New Year's celebrations..

The views for the fireworks were probably the best in town from North Sydney..

Then there was tour de Melbourne

with a dear old friend after 6 years apart..

and driving the Great Ocean Road, where we bumped in to (not literally thank goodness) these little furballs that managed to look adorable while scratching both their butts and cheeks at the same time..

and these little featherbacks..

Celebrated valentine's day (or friends day as we do in Finland)

Spent a weekend in Hunter Valley with friends tasting wine, celebrating birthdays and saying our goodbyes

..some people seemed to take the goodbyes slghtly easier than others :)

The last week in Australia i spent in the Tropical Queensland; Cairns & the Barrier Reef

the beaches were beautiful there but you had to swim in this lagoon instead because of the deadly box jellyfishes

and they even got saltwater crocodiles there

(this little monster was just cute)

Then I spent a couple of days (most likely the best couple of days during all these months down under) on a boat at the spectacular Great Barrier Reef. Apologies in advance for the picture overload, couldn't help it :)

Some people were just snorkeling

but boy did they miss out..The underwater scenery was incredible

We were surrounded by the endless blue..

.. and some of the most amazing creatures like Hawksbill sea turtles

a group of sleeping (huge!!) Bumphead parrotfish

the Green Sea turtles

the angry little (huge) Triggerfish..

Sea cucumbers

nosy fishes

Clownfishes

Stingrays

I've got a feeling this is not what you usually find inside a Giant Clam..

Some of the best dives were done either early in the morning when some of the fishes were still asleep or sleepy enough, or then after the sun had set.

During the (insane) night dives it was light around the boat and so all the big fishes like the Giant Trevallys and Sharks came to hunt around the boat.. So there we hopped in the middle of the circling sharks in to the dark waters with nothing but our torches and eatchother to comfort.