Last Part of France Holiday Pictures - 2005

The Garonne River runs thru Toulouse. Though it looks like a nice sunny day for a stroll at the park, it's actually just above freezing point.


A panoramic view of the buildings across the Garonne.







Of course there were lots of fantastic food in France I had been able to try a lot of the Christmas and winter dishes, but I did not take a lot of photos except for these.


The above is Foie Gras (fattened duck/goose liver) that tastes fabulous. Eaten with some biscuits.


Thinly sliced beef and salmon in the background.


Mouth watering fresh oysters! Hmm you can still smell the sea from these ;)


But all good things must come to an end. However i am lucky to get to board the MAS B747 painted in a beautiful red design. Lots of other travellers were also jostling for position to take a photo of the plane as a background.

Snapshots-20th April 2006

The Invasion

I have to "embargo" some postings till a later date. Till then, here is one of the pictures that I like.

Yuxi, Kunming - 2nd week of April 2006

Welcome to China!

My first trip to China and it's to the Yunnan province. If you have no idea where it is, it's inland towards the west of China, bordering Vietnam. I took an MAS direct flight from Kuala Lumpur and arrived in Kunming about 3.5 hours later. The flight was about 70-80% full with lots of Malaysian & Chinese tourists.

The drive to Yuxi on the new highway takes slightly more than an hour.



A rather decent room. Standard furnishing. The only negative comment must be the rock solid bed! I had the shock of my life when I sat down on the bed after the long journey and almost had a slipped disc! Surprisingly, it didn't affect my sleep or did I feel any ill effects of the bed during my stay there.


While the room does not have cable broadband, it does have WIFI signal provided by the local telco. Unfortunately, there's no way for a roaming line to subscribe to the wifi services, it has to be a local number....another reminder that I am in communist China.

Oh, and yes all the blog services websites has been blocked. The only way around it (if you want to view your own blogs) is to log in thru blogger.com - they block blogspot.com but not if you are in blogger.com in editing mode.

Even the the US diplomatic blunder about the mixup between China and Taiwan's name has been blacked out in the CNN broadcasts.


The view of the rather spartan bathroom. Everything works just fine and there's even hot water, so it isn't that bad.


The very basic mini-bar. Note the absence of any instant coffee. I found out the hard way that people here don't drink coffee, not even in the restaurants. You can have all the tea you want, but not coffee. Thank goodness I have my emergency cache of coffee.




The thing I love most about this place is the wide roads for cars and also pedestrians. They have also made it a habit to have lots of trees and spaces for them to grow beside the road. You can see it from the following pictures taken around Yuxi. You know the place is a driver's paradise when you don't see any traffic lights at major intersections.






Some very nice looking shop houses being built. Oh just look at the trees, and the pedestrian walk.

Philippines - Linden Suites Again - Mid April 2006

I was back in Manila, the Philippines and I was put up at the Linden Suites again. Not that it was a bad thing, but in fact it got an additional star for a big "improvement"!

The kitchen now comes with coffee percolator and a bag of grounded coffee, good for two cups, that was replenished daily!




The suite I have this time has a different layout but has essentially the same furnitures. Another wonderful stay.

Taal Lake, Tagaytay - 26th March 2006

This is at Tagaytay. It's actually a dormant volcano that is filled with water creating a lake with a lot of islands on it. Really enjoyed the view eventhough it was slightly hazy most of the afternoon. In the evening the place starts to get really cool and comfortable.





From the picture below, you can see the fishing village along the edge of the lake.