Lamma Island Outing! 南丫島

I woke groggily, stumbled as quietly around as I could without waking up my roommate, grabbed my toiletries and opened my door while rubbing my half closed eyes.

Sunshine poured in from the window across from our room. The view of the mountains from the balcony was clear, in HD and beautiful. Instantly I felt awake, and thought myself crazy that I wanted a few more moments in bed. Besides, we were going on an adventure today - to Lamma Island!

Lamma Island is the third largest island in Hong Kong, behind Hong Kong Island and Lantau Island. It is located southwest of HK island, and a 20 minute ferry ride from there. The island boasts great seafood, relaxing atmosphere and beautiful beaches! According to Wikipedia, the name 'Lamma' was given because of the shape of the island - it resembles a fork of a tree. In Chinese, Lamma Island is called 南丫. The first character 南 means south and the second character 丫...is not really a character in Chinese. However, it is still used and is pronounced as 'ah'. Lamma Island can also be translated to 'Southern Peninsula'.

Cheung Chau Bun Festival! 長洲包山節

The legendary Cheung Chau Bun Festival is a special day full of dancing lions, street food that allure tourists and locals alike...and buns. Lots of lots of buns. Buns all shapes and sizes, made from many materials (although you wouldn't want to eat the plastic ones really).

Thailand - Part 6: Koh Samed

Free breakfast.

That was one of the first things in my mind when I woke up the next morning. It was a groggy morning as we did end up having a few drinks in our hotel room the night prior, but we readily got up and prepared ourselves for the day's activities.

The free breakfast was indeed awesome. They served a wide range of items that we usually wouldn't eat for breakfast such as stir-fried veggies, coconut curry soup and pasta - but of course I didn't care. The 5 of us filled up our plates and took a seat on one of the tables of the patio to enjoy the sunshine.

Mmm, buffet breakfast.

Nan Lian Garden

Nan Lian Garden is a beautiful little green getaway in the middle of the city, close to the Diamond Hill MTR station. I found it as I was researching online for a nice outdoorsy adventure to give Melody a break from her midterms. For anyone with quick access to the MTR, Diamond Hill is each to reach and it is quite easy to find the garden with the standard directions posted at the MTR exits. The garden is open to the public and has a general area where you can walk unrestricted into the evening hours. Along the paths, there are these special exhibit areas that you have to pay to access and they have less frequent opening hours. I believe these paid areas have either reduced fare or free entrance on Wednesday, but we never found our way back to try this out.

 Entrance area of Nan Lian Garden

 Chinese people have a thing for building gates

 Little trees are also popular here

This garden trip was where I first learned to use bokeh with my Canon point-and-shoot

Nan Lian Garden is a gently meandering series of walkways that have small ponds, trees and pagodas scattered aesthetically about. All around the garden are the towering skyscrapers and the immovable mountains. On our visit, it was populated mainly with older folks who were strolling about, or sitting by the larger pond, watching the giant Koi swim peacefully about. Throughout the park, small birds sing and call to each other, helping to remove the drone of the city traffic.

Map of Nan Lian Garden

 The views are like something from a post card, but more urban, due to the skyscrapers

 Some of these buildings house information guides about the ancient wood construction techniques

Eventually, the sun began to set in the garden. Due to how it is deeply entrenched against the highways and skyscrapers, we were quickly being left in a small garden pit of darkness. Climbing up to higher ground, we noticed that there was a walkway across a highway that was actually a crossing to the Chi Lin Nunnery that we had visited on the first city tour that we were taken on. With a few more pictures, we concluded our adventures and went in search of dinner!

 Sunset in the garden

 Chi Lin Nunnery Courtyard

This is one of my favourite HK pictures: The contrast of these ancient temples and the tower mountains and skyscrapers is a peculiar urban beauty to me

Japanese Curry Beef udon 

 Soup noodle dinner set thing

Melody bought a Snoopy shirt at Uniqlo