One month left?!?!

That's right, many people are flying out of Hong Kong and back to the states around the week of December 14-17, moving on... another batch comes and goes and I stay... so it goes in the outdoor industry leading such a transient lifestyle, ahhhh but that's the draw of it too.

Anyway two weeks of hell just ended, haha, my tribe finished 5th out of 12 today, with a strong 2nd in the tribal chant that took place at West Island School on Hong Kong Island this morning. We would have taken 2nd overall if my kids handn't broken "Daanald" their egg to care for throughout the week. Daan is how you say egg in Cantonese, hehe, only my Chinese kids got that one...

We also have the weekend off AND next Wednesday and Thursday off, so nice! I'm in desperate need of this time off since I definitely need rest to fight off this cold that is hitting me. I feel ok energy wise, but just getting a cough and sinus aches.

After our debrief at the school I went in to Tom Lee Music in Wan Chai and picked up a spare set of guitar strings just in case I have any breakages, you can't just drive 20 minutes to Plattsburgh and take your choice of 15 different kinds at Bob's Music. It's a 5-25 minute wait for the bus, a 25 minute ferry ride, a 25 minute walk/subway/walk to the nearest music store with maybe 3 kinds of acoustic strings and these times are if you hit the transports exactly and don't have to wait.

After picking up strings I made my way back to Tung Chung via the MTR (subway) to meet Katy after she got out of work. After talking for a while she headed home and I went and grabbed some Indian food with my dinner allowance from T.I. and then caught the 7:05 bus back to Pui O and arrived here about 25 minutes later.

Now I don't think i'm going to move from this spot on the futon for a couple days....I might be able to actually do it, I have my laptop and music for entertainment, leftover food scraps scattered around me for sustenance, an old tea bag and some half filled leftover bottles of water for hydration, an air conditioner that I could turn on with my reachin' stick, and hey this futon is sketchy enough that I'm sure a few "accidents" would go unnoticed at least for a few days....

Philippines Pictures!

The Departure

I'm going to be catching the 5:40 bus out of Mui Wo towards the Airport via Tung Chung.
I made up a little plan for this trip, first off....
I will have my SPOT Tracker (http://tinyurl.com/drbones)

Second.....
My very tentative plan goes like this: Tonight I will take a taxi from the airport in Cebu to Missy's house and then stay either there or at Glenda's Monday and Tuesday night, depending on what happens I may go to Bohol and probably stay in Panglao near Tagbilaran City on Wednesday, Thursday, and/or Friday night, This all depends if I'm able to meet up with Irvin's friends in northern Bohol (Danao) or not. Then come back maybe Friday or Saturday and be around Cebu (maybe scuba diving if I can fit it in and give myself enough time to readjust before flying) again until I fly back to Hong Kong next Sunday evening around (7:30pm should be landing here)

Take care everyone!

Day 4 - Sunday, May 3, 2009 - Halong back to Hanoi and on to Hue, Vietnam

Woke up around 7am on the boat, packed up my stuff and woke James and Meghan up to get ready. I thought we needed to get out of the room before breakfast, but it tuned out we didn't. Breakfast was scrambled eggs, toast, cucumber, and coffee. The coffee was quite bad, but Hong Kong has prepared me for even the worst bitter motor oil brews out there.

After breakfast we hung out on the top deck and talked with the others on the boat as the boat putted its way back to the harbor to complete our day. On our way we dropped off 3 people on Cat Ba Island so they could continue on for another night and leave the next day. The docking procedure was a crazy chaotic mess. We watched a lady on another boat that came in too fast fall down a flight of stairs and another woman on the roof almost fall off the front as the boat they were on barreled in to fast to get a good position and rammed the cement pier. There were so many boats in Halong Bay, the tour guide said anywhere from 500-700 boats like the one that we were on. We continued on to the port and had an alright lunch of seafood again. We departed the ship as we crawled and hopped a labyrinth of planks and halls over other boats to make it to the pier. We slugged through crowds of people waiting to depart on their own Halong Bay experience as we were leaving ours.

We met at a van and loaded up on our 3 hour trip back to Hanoi. We lost 2 of the Swedish guys and had to wait around for a while. Finally they showed up and we were off at around 12:30, down the slow and rugged highway. I slept most of the ride, thankfully. We stopped halfway for a break, I bought an ice-cream cone and a Taro/coconut bar for 30,000 VND. Then we loaded up once again and continued our way back to Hanoi.

When we got back, James and Meghan went to find a post office so I stayed back and ordered some food, a dozen spring rolls, sweet and sour pork with rice and a can of soda for 80,000 VND (18,000 VND = 1 USD) The travel company is supposed to come around 6 to bring us to the bus station and our overnight bus to Hue. We bought bug repellent and sunscreen to get ready for Laos.

The spot tracker seems to be a big hit, both James and Meghan have given the link out to their friends and families, it's too bad the computers here don't display google maps very well. Hopefully the overnight bus will be comfortable tonight.