Manic Monday?

Every day it seems has to have a tag. Bloody Sunday. Black Monday. Ruby Tuesday. Wobbly Wednesday. Mrs. Thursday. And so on…….

Today then is Wind down Monday. Of course in a perfect world it would be Wednesday but alas we managed to unpack in 3 days and ruined the script.

It was on a Friday morning the removal men came to call, they delivered not just one box but brought them one and all. 297 to be precise. All present and correct. The only missing item was the dog. We put her into Dogotel to spare her and us the trauma of her raging against the intruders bearing boxes great and small.

The challenge was moving to a floor area roughly half what we had in England. Much of what he we have is still in plastic crates. We have fitted them together like the wooden puzzles we had as children, hoping that as and when we want something the pile won’t come crashing down when we pull out the crate near the bottom.

The worrying aspect is the fact that we had already disposed of a vast amount of stuff. Yes, stuff is what we have. Piled high. Clothes maketh the man, said Erasmus (later borrowed by Polonius) although of course he said it in Latin. Well in that case we have enough to make an army. And possibly a navy and an air force too. If that is true then shoes clearly maketh the woman. Although I am reasonably sure that the First Sea Lord wouldn’t be seen in Manolo Blahnik, at least not in public. What he gets up to behind the doors of his cabin is his business.

And books. I somewhat misunderestimated, George Bush (43) style. So now they are piled everywhere and I wonder why I have so many. Why on earth do I have a small collection of cookery books? My forte is fresh Waitrose pasta. I don’t think Delia or Nigella would be very impressed. An entire shelf of P G Wodehouse is understandable. So are two floor-to-ceiling bookcases of miscellaneous tomes on birds, moths and photography. Another 2 shelves of New Naturalists. Stacks of business and investing books might be ok. Then there are Dickens and Hardy novels. So what am I to get rid of? Maybe the gardening section could go? I don’t think I shall need Monty Don again. I have already discarded Alan Titchmarsh. Not a moment too soon many would argue. I am unlikely to use the Butterflies of Hertfordshire again. So that would be at least 5 to go. Only another 3995 to go. Roughly.

On the bright side my study or man-cave is almost palatial. I have installed my espresso maker, 2 printers, 2 laptops and a dry cabinet to protect lenses against humidity. Why do I need two laptops? Because the world sees fit to stop me using DVDs from different regions on one laptop. You can actually change region five times and then it locks. So my newer MacBook is for HK DVDs and general work. The old one is the exclusive domain of UK DVDs, currently rerunning Kenneth Clark’s magnificent Civilisation series. I am thinking of sending a copy to the White House.

I remain challenged by how to set up the TVs, which are British bought and need something called a digital decoder. Search me, guv’nor. I have no idea. As there is absolutely nothing worth watching on HK TV this is no hardship for me but Mrs. Ha likes the Korean dramas they show. I think that is why she became addicted to Pointless in Britain. I watch little TV anyway. I prefer 1970s rugby when Wales won everything. I have barely progressed past Steptoe and Son and Ena, Minnie and Martha in the Snug.

At least we have reached a point where we can sit and look at the chaos rather than be overwhelmed by it. Later today we will bail Lulu out of Dogo-jail and she can chase the robot vacuum cleaner round the apartment.

The true sign of having settled in though is the arrival of our first moth. Mrs. Ha suspects this is her late father come to inspect her new home. Unless her father was called Cirrhochrista brizoalis I think this is unlikely. But you never know.

To be continued (maybe).

Hong Kong walking

So we made it.

Hong Kong has made us welcome with uninterrupted perfect weather. Perched in our eyrie we look out over the urban landscape of Hong Kong Island. Centre stage, the rugby posts adorning the geometric splendor of the Bank of China Tower. Not a curve in sight. Below it the HQ of HSBC and the smaller and less eye-catching Standard Chartered Bank tower. The haze is just as bad as when we left in February 2015. The hills of Kowloon are infrequently visible when the net curtains are tugged briefly to one side. Most days though we can watch the Star Ferry chugging its diminishing route between Central and TST. The only birds sounds that float up are the screeches of the Yellow-crested cockatoos. Occasionally a Black Kite will drift past.

To the rear we have the wooded hillsides below The Peak. At night orange lamps show the path winding steeply up Old Peak Road. Atop the ridge some of the world’s most expensive real estate gazes scornfully at the hoi polloi below. That’s us.

I promised myself that I would do some walking if I could find reasonable paths to amble along. To my surprise (and even more so the surprise of my creaking knees and tugging hamstrings) there are several that I find manageable.

To get to the Peak plateau, where the tourists congregate to be disappointed at the invisible view, I have a choice. Chatham Path is a stone stairway that winds up to Barker Road. It is called The Central Green Trail. Just off the main path above May Road is a small, immaculately kept temple. Beyond the path winds through dense jungle on one side and steep slopes to the other, giving the typical panorama of the island. Small cascades suggest there ought to be more wildlife than is visible on my walks. A Pallas’s Squirrel tolerates me briefly then scuttles up the tree trunk and away as hikers approach behind me.

I like this path but to get to the Peak the walk along Barker Road is unappealing. Construction work is everywhere in HK. Build, pause, knock down, rebuild. Creative destruction. Or destructive creation. Barker Road is a classic example. So generally I take the other route up.

At the end of Tregunter Path a narrow hairpin bend loops you onto Old Peak Road. Trees on one side and on the other steep, scrubby slopes. The first few hundred meters are extremely tough on the calf muscles walking up and even harder on the quads walking down. Locals have a couple of solutions. Some try walking in a zig-zag and some walk backwards. The steep section gets the heart rate up. Fix your eyes firmly on the second orange litterbin. This is where the incline starts to lessen and the heart can beat less rapidly.

In the morning the helpers walk the dogs (or vice versa) and the joggers pant up and down, lycra-clad, dripping in perspiration, checking their wrist monitors for heart beat, distance travelled, altitude change and of course the latest stock and property prices. This is after all Hong Kong.

I am constantly checking the environment for my usual birds and bugs. All the way up. It takes me about 25 minutes, including the ritual exchange of greetings with the path sweeper. Sometimes I pause to divert into the men’s toilet. The lights are on all night and it is a good place to check for moths. I suppose it looks a bit odd but it is perfectly innocent.

At the “top” a further choice awaits me. There is a further walk on up to Victoria Peak Garden. This is not extensively used but there have been good birds found up here so its worth an occasional visit.

Or I can walk the roughly 3km around Lugard Road. Flat, easy and the small waterfall offers birds and butterflies if the sun is shining.

Finally I can walk down to Pokfulam Reservoir. This is busy and quite enjoyable but at the end it is either a bus ride back or turn around and walk all the way back up.

So my preferred route now is about half way around Lugard Road and then off to the left. This takes me into Lung Fu Shan country park. According to AFCD, “Lung Fu Shan Country Park was designated in 1998. It is the smallest country park in Hong Kong covering 47 hectares. “

More choices here: A straight walk down Hatton Road to where it approaches HK University. A detour along the LFS Fitness Trail and Pinewood Battery. Or another route down to Pokfulam Reservoir.

I normally do a mix and then follow the path straight back up. Birding is hard here if only because the trail is so popular. Slowly I am starting to get some decent photos and sightings. Pinewood Battery is good for butterflies. The birds need a lot of work and can be very frustrating. The morning light is not especially favourable for photography. I want to write more about Lung Fu Shan but that must wait for another day. I hope you will follow my trips.