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agnesola


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Baby and Baby's around the world travel...

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Yangshuo, Hong kong and some time in Europe!

Yangshuo, China


Hello everybody...

YES! we are back online to write the blogs...

ok, so we left you a long long long time ago (sorry!)... so let me try to expain what happen during that time.

So after visiting Chengdu and the area around it, we went down to the south to visit a "little town" called Yangshuo (only 300 000 people).
The town is really nice, but a little touristy... we went on a bamboo boat tour along the

river were the scenery was absolutely beautiful: hills all around very tall and very steep.
We enjoyed relaxing on the river listenning to some of the boat guys who were singing... and laughing a lot!!

Other ting we visited was a cave called Silver cave. It is full of limestone formations inside and there is loads of colorful spotlights to give it some more effect...
Quite cool actually...


So Yangshuo was our last destination in China before returning to Hong Kong.

Back to Hong Kong, we had the chance to be there at the same time as my dad (Daddy Jacques). So we met him and he treated us with a wonderful hotel night, a great dinner and some time together( the jacuzzi was quite coool!)! It was brilliant and so funny to see each other after such a long time especially at the other end of the planet!


After my dad was gone, we had still a few days in Hong Kong, so we decided to see a bit
of the local culture by going to DISNEYLAND!!!! hihihi... ok it was not really backpacking style but we deserve a bit of stupid fun as well... the day was very fun even though the park is not as great as the one in Paris! And I got to learn how to draw Winnie the Poo!!! Cooooooooooooooool!

We also visited a little fishing town on the Lantau island, where we saw some amazing spiky fishes!!
After walking around for a few hours, we got back to the airport to get our flight... HOME!!


It was our little treat for Ola and me to spend a bit of time in France and Sweden... We

both enjoyed to be home... especially to see all of the family with a peruvian hat!!

After spending time seperataly for Xmas the whole swedish family came to see us in Cognac...
It was great!

And on top of all we got to spend a lot of time with Clelie, my niece who is born just

before the travel... she grows up so quickly... and she is the most beautiful little girl I have ever seen!!! So as you can imagine Ola and me were the most gouzzizii and gagaga Tonton and tata in the world!! But we love it!

Well, that's all now, we are now back travelling in Vietnam... it has been only two days that we are here but we both already love it... next blog will tell you more!

Love you all...

Agnes and Ola

Hello everybody... salut tout le monde…
Oui ! nous voici de retour pour écrire les blogs….
Donc, nous vous avons quittés il y a déjà un bon moment (désolés !)… alors laissez moi vous expliquer ce qui s’est passé durant cette période.
Donc après avoir visité Chengdu et sa region, nous sommes descendus dans le sud pour visiter une « petite ville » du nom de Yangshuo (seulement 300 000 hab.) la ville est vraiment jolie mais un peu touristique… nous avons longé la rivière sur un bateau de bambou d’où le spectacle était absolument superbe : les collines tout autour sont très élevées et très escarpées. Nous avons apprécié ce moment de relaxation sur la rivière, écoutant les bateliers qui chantaient… et qui se marraient pas mal !!
Ce que nous avons visité également, c’est une grotte « Silver cave ». Elle est pleine de formations de calcaire et des spots de couleurs différentes sont du meilleur effet sur ces formations. Vraiment bien…. Yangshuo était notre dernière destination en Chine avant que nous ne retournions à Hong Kong.

De retour à Hong Kong, nous avons eu la chance de nous trouver là en même temps que mon père. Nous l’avons donc rencontré et nuit à l’hôtel, excellent dîner et du temps passé ensemble (le jacuzzi était plutôt sympa !). c’était magique et si drôle de se voir après si longtemps et plus spécialement à l’autre bout de la planète !

Après le départ de mon père, il nous restait quelques jours à passer à Hong Kong… nous avons décidé de voir un peu de la culture locale en allant à DISNEYLAND !!!! hihihi…. Ok ce n’était pas particulièrement un style de routard mais nous méritons bien un peu d’amusement stupide… on s’est amusé même si le parc n’est pas aussi important que le parc à Paris ! et j’ai appris à dessiner Winnie l’Ourson…. Coooooooool !

Nous avons visité également une petite ville de pêcheurs sur l’île de Lantau où nous avons vu de drôles de « poissons hérissons » !! après un p’tit tour de quelques heures, nous sommes retournés à l’aéroport pour prendre le vol…. MAISON !!! c’était notre petite récompense pour Ola et moi de passer un peu de temps en France et en Suède… nous avons apprécié de nous retrouver à la maison… et spécialement de voir toute la famille affublée du chapeau péruvien ! après avoir passé Noël séparément, toute la famille suédoise est venue nous rejoindre.

C’était super ! et le clou ça a été de passer beaucoup de temps avec Clélie, ma nièce qui est née juste avant le voyage… elle grandit si vite… et c’est la plus jolie petite fille que j’ai jamais vue !!! et comme vous pouvez l’imaginer, Ola et moi étions les plus « gouzzizzii » et « gaga » tonton et tata du monde !!!! mais qu’est ce qu’on aime ça !
Voilà, c’est tout pour l’instant. Nous continuons notre voyage au Vietnam…cela fait 2 jours seulement que nous sommes ici, mais nous sommes déjà enchantés tous les deux… le prochain blog vous en dira plus !
Love you all... on vous aime tous…



permalink written by  agnesola on January 11, 2008 from Yangshuo, China
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Finally the Blog in French thanks to Maman Danielle!!! (m'man t'es une star!)

Hong Kong, Hong Kong


Hello!! Bonjour!!

Juste un petit mot vite fait pour dire que nous sommes a Hong Kong... de retour de nos vacances en France ;)

Tout va bien et nous ecrirons un blog des que possible.

En attendant, Maman Danielle a commence a mettre des traductions francaises de nos blog pour ceux qui preferent la langue de Moliere a Celle de Shakespeare.
Alors amusez vous a les lire et un grand merci a toi maman...

Gros bisous a tous...

Agnes et Ola

Just a little word to say that we are in Hong Kong... back from our hols in France ;)

We are all good and we will start writing blogs again as soon as possible.

In the mean time, Mum Danielle started to put french translations of our blogs for those who prefer French.
So have fun reading it and a big thank you to you Mum...

Big Kisses to you all.

Agnes and Ola




permalink written by  agnesola on January 8, 2008 from Hong Kong, Hong Kong
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jiuzhaigou

Chengdu, China


After Misty Mountains and Giant Buddhas we decided to go north in Sichuan.
Our target was a National Park 10 hours by bus from Chengdu called Jiuzhaigou.

The bus ride was indeed entertaining, we know now that all chinese busdrivers are psychotic madmen. They drive like hell and honk the horn for everything, they honk if they want a car to get out of the way or if there is people on the road (on the side of the road that is) or if...actually, they honk constantly...

Anyway, we arrived in the town of the National Park and who could believe just 10 hours north it would be so freezing cold. We got a room in a hard to find hostel and then went for dinner. We had some of the best food so far in China, A sichuan speciality(unfortunately I dont know what it is called) quite spicy but full of flavour with lots of spices, potato, chicken, tofu, cucumber and loads of stuff....YUMMY!

After sleeping it was hard to get up because we knew it was gonna be cold as hell...
The park is famous for its amazing lakes, it is a bit annoying though that to get around in the park we had to take buses, it is impossible to walk from one lake to another because that is the stupid rules, well, anyway, it was absolutely stunning. The lakes are greenish

but extremly clear and in the lakes it is possible to see old sunken trees and
plants. They also have some very cool waterfalls. There is also old Tibetan like villages, but they have unfortunately (in the name of tourism!) been turned in to shops for crap
souvenirs that are mostly bought by chinese tourists. But we liked the views in the park very much...

We don't have alot of pictures because the download is slow so we will put more when we can

After this it was back to Chengdu and then down south To Guilin where we are now, a 24 hours train ride from Chengdu...in the south. It is nice and warm here...


Puss o kram! Bisous and kisses

Ola And Agnes

VERSION FRANCAISE !!!

Après les montagnes embrumées et les bouddhas géants, nous décidons d’aller vers le nord dans le Sichuan. Notre but, c’est un parc national du nom de Jiuzhaigou à 10 heures de bus de Chengdu.
Ce voyage en bus était vraiment spécial… Nous savons maintenant que tous les conducteurs de bus chinois sont des fous psychotiques. Ils conduisent d’une façon infernale, klaxonnent pour tout et n’importe quoi : quand ils veulent qu’une voiture les laisse passer ou s’il y a des gens sur la route (même sur le côté) ou si… enfin, ils klaxonnent sans arrêt…
Enfin ! nous sommes arrivés dans la ville du National Park et qui aurait pu croire que 10 heures plus tard et dans le nord, il ferait si froid. Nous avons trouvé une chambre dans une auberge et sommes allés diner. Là, nous avons mangé la meilleure nourriture de Chine : une spécialité du Sichuan (malheureusement, je ne sais pas comment ça s’appelle) assez épicée mais très savoureuse avec nombre d’épices, des pommes de terre, du poulet, du tofu, du concombre et plein d’autres ingrédients… MMMM !
Après avoir dormi, il nous a été difficile de nous lever parce que nous savions que le temps serait glacial… le parc est réputé pour ses lacs spectaculaires mais l’ennui, c’est que pour en faire le tour, nous devons prendre les bus… c’est impossible de se rendre d’un lac à l’autre en marchant à cause de réglementations stupides, mais c’était absolument stupéfiant. Les lacs sont verdâtres mais extrèmement clairs et on peut y voir les vieux arbres engloutis et les plantes. Il y a aussi des chutes d’eau très froides. Il y a également de vieux villages tibétains qui, en raison du tourisme, ont été transformés en boutiques de souvenirs inutiles qui sont achetés en général par les touristes chinois. Mais nous avons apprécié énormément les paysages dans le parc…
Nous n’avons pas beaucoup de photos étant donné que le chargement est lent et nous en mettrons plus dès que nous le pourrons.
Après cela, retour à Chengdu, puis vers Guilin au sud où nous nous trouvons maintenant, un voyage en train de 24 heures… ici, il fait beau et chaud…

Puss o kram! Bisous and kisses



permalink written by  agnesola on December 6, 2007 from Chengdu, China
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PAAANNDAAS!!

Chengdu, China


Helloo everybody!

After our time in Xi'an, we took a train to go all the way to Sichuan, which is a region situated west of China. We arrived in the capital city of the region called Chengdu.
There we found a lovely, very stylish and charming hostel for us to stay a few nights.

Well, the main thing we have done in Chengdu is to see the town, we went to visit a very nice monastery where we caught a kind of ceremony where old people were turning
around in a room, singing something and repeating it all the time...

Around the monastery is a nice little old town, with a market that we enjoyed seeing.
you can also see a big statue of Mao in the middle of the town, which is nothing beautiful or very artistic...

What we found though, is a very cute area where there is a few shops, but also some

good food stalls and restaurants and bars!! As it was very pretty, we decided to come back to celebrate our 2 years anniversary with Ola in a restaurant... YES!!! ALREADY TWO YEARS!!!
It was a very nice atmosphere, we tried some very spicy snacks called Dragon toes (very
very spicy!!) and had a romantic dinner...!!!

Back home, Ola surprised me with some champagne... romantic boy, as ever...XXX

The other main thing that we did in Chengdu, is to see some Giant Pandas...
And they are absolutely the cutest animals on earth... they are so big, but they really look like big teddy bears that you want to cuddle all the time!


We arrived early in the morning, which is the best time because you can see them eating
(otherwise, during the rest of the day, when they are finished with eating, they mainly sleep!!). We saw quite a few of them, about 10, and we also saw some babies... who are even more cute, and playing around!!! We really loved them... unfortunately we couldn't take pictures of the small ones...

There is also red pandas, who are much smaller and look like a mix of cats, small bears and foxes!! They are also very cute but much less known...

Unfortunately, the giant black and white is close to extinction, as everybody knows, and it is very difficult to breed them, as they have sex very very rarely, and when it happens for the female to give birth, usually to two babies, she can only take care of one baby, so she leaves one dying...
Complicated those cute bears!!

Anyway, we were really happy to see some...

So after 3 days in Chengdu we decided to go and see a mountain, and not just any mountain, but a holy buddhist mountain!

So we arrive after a 2 hour bustrip, our plan was to take a bus up and walk 2 hours to the top, but when we arrive the last bus has already gone, so we have to stay in the village at the bottom for one night. Nothing much to do there so we just walk around in the surrounding forest playing hide and seek in the dark and later on eating and chatting with some other people at the hostel.

So the morning after we catch the bus to almost the top...the walk to the top is only around 2 hours, and along the way there is a few temples and forest to see. It is very misty and mystique. When we get to the top we are amazed to find a giant gold buddha

weighing 660 tons...we expected just some temples and stuff. It is absolutely beautiful

and covered with mist. We intended to sleep on the top in a temple, but none of the t
emples would let us sleep there, so we had to walk down for only 5 minutes and sleep in a hostel. The bad thing about China is that everything that alot of the things that are worth
seeing is so commercialised because so many chinese tourists come, so they build three star hotels and snack/souvenir shops everywhere. Which is a bit sad.

Anyway, we slept there and went up early to see the sunrise, well, that was the plan. It was too misty to see the sun at all so we started walking down instead. Here we face another problem, instead of a natural trail all the way down, there is cement steps. Which is very hard on the legs and knees. Our plan was to walk all the way down, but we only walk for 5 hours and then catch the bus down, our legs hurt too much, this also means that we missed what was supposed to be the most beautiful part of the mountain. We are still happy though and go on to our next destination the same day!

The next thing to see is a city called Leshan and their Giant Buddha, it is carved out of a

mountain and is the largest buddha in the world apparently. It is Very huge, the ears alone are around 7 meters i think. We are very tired though and walk around for a while and take pictures from the top and bottom and then we leave for Chengdu to rest
out weary bodies...

We were very happy to get away to see some trees and nature though...our next stop is a national park 10 hours from here...

Puss puss kram kram, bisous and kisses!

Agnes and Olala

Helloo everybody! Bonjour tout le monde !
Après notre passage à Xi’an, nous avons pris un train pour nous rendre dans le Sichuan qui est une région située à l’ouest de la Chine. Nous arrivons dans la capitale régionale appelée Chengdu. Nous avons trouvé une auberge très agréable et d’un style ravissant où nous passerons quelques nuits.
Notre activité principale à Chengdu a été de visiter la ville et un monastère très agréable où nous avons assisté à un genre de cérémonie où des personnes âgées tournaient dans une pièce en chantant de façon répétitive… autour du monastère, il y a une jolie petite ville ancienne avec un marché que nous avons aimé parcourir. On peut voir également une énorme statue de Mao au milieu de la ville pas vraiment belle ni très artistique…
Ce que nous avons découvert également, c’est un endroit où se trouvaient quelques commerces ainsi que quelques bonnes adresses de terrasses, restaurants et bars !! comme c’était très joli, nous avons décidé d’y revenir pour célébrer le 2ème anniversaire de notre rencontre avec Ola… OUI !!! DEJA DEUX ANS !!!
C’était une atmosphère très chaleureuse et nous avons goûté quelques mets appelés les « doigts de Dragon » (très très épicé) et nous avons fait un diner romantique…. !!
De retour, Ola m’a fait la surprise avec du champagne…. Quel garçon romantique, comme toujours …
Ce que nous avons fait d’important aussi à Chengdu, c’est d’avoir vu les pandas géants… et ce sont les animaux les plus adorables du monde… ils sont si gros mais ressemblent à de gros nounours que vous avez envie de câliner tout le temps !!!
Nous sommes arrivés tôt le matin, ce qui est le meilleur moment car on peut les voir manger (sinon, le reste du temps, dès qu’ils ont fini de manger, ils dorment !!) Nous en avons vu beaucoup (une dizaine) et également quelques bébés… qui sont évidemment encore plus adorables et qui jouent !! on les a adorés…. Malheureusement, nous n’avons pas pu prendre de photos des petits…
Il y a aussi des pandas rouges qui sont beaucoup plus petits et ressemblent à des croisements entre des chats, des petits ours et des renards !!! ils sont également très mignons mais sont moins connus…
Malheureusement, le géant noir et blanc est en voie d’extinction, comme chacun le sait, et il est très difficile de les faire se reproduire car ils s’accouplent très très rarement, et lorsqu’une femelle donne naissance, à 2 bébés en moyenne, elle ne prend soin que d’un bébé et laisse l’autre mourir… ils sont compliqués ces gentils nounours !! de toutes façons, nous avons été très heureux d’en voir quelques-uns…
Puis, après 3 jours à Chengdu, nous avons décidé d’aller voir une montagne, pas n’importe quelle montagne mais une montagne boudhiste sacrée !
Nous arrivons après 2 heures de bus et notre projet était de prendre un autre bus et de marcher environ 2 heures pour atteindre le sommet mais quand nous sommes arrivés, le dernier bus venait juste de partir et nous avons dû rester en bas dans le village pour une nuit. Rien de plus à faire et nous avons joué à cache cache dans la forêt et dans la nuit puis nous sommes allés manger et bavarder avec quelques autre personnes de l’auberge.

Le lendemain matin, nous prenions le bus qui nous menait presqu’en haut… il faut seulement 2 heures de marche pour arriver au sommet et tout le long du chemin, nous sommes à travers forêt et succession de temples. C’est très brumeux et mystique. Au sommet, nous découvrons un bouddha géant en or et qui pèse 660 tonnes… nous nous attendions à voir quelques temples. C’est absolument magnifique et couvert par la brume. Nous voulions dormir dans un temple mais cela était impossible et il nous a fallu descendre pendant 5 minutes environ pour trouver une auberge où dormir. Ce qui est désagréable en Chine, c’est qu’il y a aussi le pire du fait de la commercialisation et qu’il y a énormément de touristes chinois. Des hôtels 3 étoiles ont donc été construits un peu partout ainsi que des boutiques de souvenirs et de restauration rapide, ce qui est un peu décevant.
Néanmoins, nous avons dormi là et nous sommes levés de bonne heure pour voir le lever du soleil, enfin c’était notre projet. Mais c’était trop brumeux pour voir le soleil et nous nous sommes mis en marche pour redescendre dans la vallée. C’est là que nous avons dû faire face à un autre problème. Au lieu d’un chemin qui descende en pente douce, ce sont des marches en ciment, ce qui est très dur pour les jambes et les genoux. Au départ, nous voulions descendre en marchant mais après 5 heures de marche, nous avons repris le bus car nous avions trop mal aux jambes. Nous avons donc raté ce qui était la partie la plus belle de la montagne. Mais nous sommes contents tout de même et pensons déjà à notre prochaine destination.
La prochaine chose à voir est une ville appelée Leshan et le bouddha géant extrait d’une montagne et qui est apparemment le plus important du monde. Il est vraiment énorme, les oreilles à elles seules doivent mesurer env. 7 mètres. Nous sommes très fatigués et nous nous baladons pendant un moment et nous prenons des photos du sommet et d’en bas, puis nous partons pour Chengdu pour détendre nos pauvres corps….
Nous sommes très heureux d’avoir pu contempler la nature et quelques arbres… notre prochaine étape est un parc national à 10 heures d’ici…
Puss puss kram kram, bisous and kisses!



permalink written by  agnesola on November 29, 2007 from Chengdu, China
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Warriors!

Xi'an, China


Hello Again dear readers...

We are now in a town called Xi'an, about 17 hours by train from Shanghai.
We thought that since we were going out of Shanghai more in to the middle of China we might come to s small town, but no. In Xi'an there is around 7 million people, the same as in london. But I guess in a country with 1.3 BILLION people, it is hard to find little towns with only a few thousand inhabitants...

Anyway, except for so much people it is quite a nice town, pretty polluted but it has some nice things. There is a rather a lot of muslims living here, there is even a muslim quarter

and a big mosque. Walking around in that area is very nice with markets and food stalls and shops everywhere.

In Xi'an there is a big contrast with old and new, The centre of the town is surrounded by

an ancient city wall, it is 14 km all around in a rectangular shape and you can bike around it which we did today on our last day here. it is nice because you see the center from up above. It also has alot of old buildings, towers and temples, but also alot of new shopping malls and stuff like that, it is all mixed up.

Agnes has been sick since we got here so we ended up staying longer than we thought, so the first few days we did not do very much, but on the third day she felt better so we went to see the Terracotta warriors. It lies around 50 minutes from Xi'an and these

warriors were discovered in 197 and are more than 2000 years old. So far they have discovered around 8000 warriors, and they think there might be more.

There is 3 different "pits" to see the warriors in, but pit nr 2 was closed so there was only 2 open, plus an exhibit with stuff from pit nr 2. The first pit we saw was small but the

second one is huge, it is like an airport hangar, with rows of warriors and horses. It is so impressive to see and apparently when they were made they were painted in bright colors and they all had real weapons, but alot of these have disappeared because of theft a loooooong time ago.

The warriors purpose was to help rule another empire with emperor Qin Shi Huangdi in the afterlife. The terracotta warriors were placed in the pits in precise military formation according to rank and duty.

On our last day, except for riding on the wall, we walked around in a park alongside the wall, and you see people doing tai chi, playing chinese chess and gathering in groups playing and singing, it is very nice to see people coming together and doing things.

Now we are waiting for our train to go to Chengdu, which lies 16 hours away by train, in the state of Sechuan, so we are looking forward to the food expecially, and hopefully to see some nature.

Kiss kiss, bisous and puss o kram

Ola and Agnes

TRADUCTION (c kdo !)

Hello chers lecteurs…

Nous sommes maintenant dans une ville du nom de Xi’an à 17 h de train de Shanghai. Nous pensions qu’une fois sortis de Shanghai pour aller plus au centre de la Chine, nous trouverions de plus petites villes, mais non… à Xi’an, il y a environ 7 millions d’habitants, autant qu’à Londres. Mais on peut supposer que dans un pays de 1.3 milliard d’habitants, il est difficile de trouver des villes de seulement quelques milliers d’habitants…

Cependant si ce n’était pas cette surpopulation, c’est plutôt une jolie ville, pas mal polluée mais qui offre quelques belles choses. Il y a pas mal de musulmans qui vivent ici et il y a un quartier musulman et une grande mosquée. Il est très agréable de se promener au milieu de bon nombre de marchés, de terrasses et de boutiques.
A Xi’an, il y a un très grand contraste entre le neuf et l’ancien. Le centre de la ville est protégé par une ancienne muraille de forme rectangulaire de 14 kms, et on peut en faire le tour en vélo. C’est ce que nous avons fait aujourd’hui, notre dernier jour ici. C’est agréable parce que l’on peut voir tout le centre d’en haut. Il y a un grand nombre de vieux bâtiments, de tours et de temples mais aussi beaucoup de commerces modernes. Tout est mélangé.

Agnès a été malade dès notre arrivée ici, et nous décidons de rester plus longtemps que prévu. Les tout premiers jours, nous n’avons pas fait grand-chose mais dès le 3ème jour, Agnès s’est sentie mieux et nous sommes allés voir les guerriers en terre glaise. Ils se trouvent à environ 50 minutes de Xi’an et ces guerriers furent découverts en 197 et ont plus de 2000 ans. Jusque là, il en a été découvert environ 8000 et on dit qu’il y en aurait peut-être eu davantage.

Il y a 3 différents sites (fosses) où l’on peut voir ces guerriers mais le site n°2 était fermé. Il y en avait donc seulement 2 d’ouverts plus une exposition avec quelques spécimen du site n°2. Le 1er site que nous avons vu était petit mais le 2ème immense. C’est comme un hangar d’aéroport avec des rangées de guerriers et de chevaux. C’est tellement de les voir et apparemment, quand ils ont été faits, ils étaient peints de couleurs vives, et ils avaient tous de vraies armes mais beaucoup ont disparu du fait de vols il y a trèèèèèèèès longtemps….

Le but de ces guerriers, c’était de diriger un autre empire avec l’Empereur Oin Shi Huangdi dans la vie de l’au-delà. Les guerriers en terre étaient placés dans les fosses en formation militaire précise selon leur rang et leurs fonctions.

Le dernier jour, mise à part notre promenade à bicyclette le long de la muraille, nous nous sommes baladés dans un parc voisin où l’on peut voir les gens pratiquer le tai chi, jouer aux échecs chinois et se rassembler en groupes pour jouer et chanter. C’est très sympa de voir les gens se joindre les uns aux autres et faire des choses ensemble.
En ce moment précis, nous attendons notre train pour nous rendre à Chengdu (à 16 heures de là) dans l’état du Sechuan. Nous attendons avec impatience de découvrir la nourriture et de voir, on l’espère, un peu de nature.



permalink written by  agnesola on November 23, 2007 from Xi'an, China
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Shanghai, to surprise Ma Janou!

Shanghai, China


Helllloooo!!

Alright! After wandering aroung Beijing for quite a while and seeing the Great Wall...,
we took a train fro Shanghai. We were supposed to arrive in Shanghai only a few days later but I got a little sick... so we decided to hurry to Shanghai!! And also it was a good occasion to surprise my friend Jeanne who was in Shanghai to visit her sister Clemence!!

We have walked quite a lot in Shanghai, to see the different areas: the French and English concessions, the shopping streets and the markets...
We walked along the Bund, where you can see old buildings of Shanghai on one side and on the other side, across the sea, you can see some of the most amazing and futurists buildings.


We also visited the old town (there is little left of it unfortunately) where the old style of bended roof tips, dragons sculptures and the small streets are still intact (or almost), even if the touristic shops have taken over the whole area... we still managed to catch a glimpse of the old times when we saw two old chinese guys playing some kind of chest game...!!

After the old town, we had to discover the new one... and in terms of new stuff, chinese are quite good!! Big TV screens everywhere, amazingly tall buildings, lights all over the place... the streets rivalise with creativity and modernism!

After a few days in Shanghai, Clemence took us out of the BIIIGG town and took us to a

small water town built around the rivers and water streams. There, most of the buildings are very old and we could visit many old homes and gardens... The old
architecture of the chinese towns is pretty beautiful as well, all made of dark wood and carvings, the gardens being made of stones, water and trees...
We could have gone around the town on a boat, but we thought that it would be much more amusing to dress like chinese people of the old times... hummm I am not sure it was the right choice, but you can judge by yourself!

Back in Shanghai, we had only a little time before going to a "beaujolais nouveau" party, which anywhere in the world has to be celebrated!! aaahh it is good to be French!!

Unfortunately the trip was coming to an end for Jeanne and Julie. We stayed another day and a half with Clemence, who took us to see more of the town. We enjoyed a bit more of Shanghai by night, and left the day after..

We are now in Xian... after a 18 hours trip on hardsleepers in the train... (quite an experience!!)

That's all Folks!!

By the way, sorry for the lack of news for a few days... So you get two bog at once !!!! cccoooooooolll!!

kisses

Agnes and Ola



permalink written by  agnesola on November 19, 2007 from Shanghai, China
from the travel blog: Baby and Baby's around the world travel...
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Beijing

Beijing, China


Allrighty! We have not done a blog in quite some time now, but we have been doing alot of stuff and also seeing friends, thats why we havent been writing, but here it is, a combined blog of beijing and shanghai!

After some trouble finding our hostel, getting lost in the alleyways (dont worry, nothing dangerous) we arrive tired and weary, unfortunately the hostel was not very nice, so after 2 nights we changed to a supernice, superclean, and supercomfortable hostel...i think it was the best bed we have slept in so far during the trip.

We spent our first 2 days doing not much sightseeing, going to the indian embassy(closed) and the vietnamese embassy to check what we should do for our visas to go there. We are getting them later is the simple answer...

Anyway, We booked a tour to go and see the great wall of China. You can see it at many places but where we decided to see it was called Simatai. It is about 4 hours from Beijing, so we leave very early in the morning.

When we arrive we can see the wall from far, and it is making it's way up a mountain like a snake. The place we have decided to see the wall at is the steepest part so we have some climbing to do...

The Wall starts with some stairs, and it is around 2-3 kilometers to the top. We are

already a bit tired after the first stairs and we realise we have a lot left. But as we walk further and further up, we can see the wall in the other direction stretching further and further, and mountains around us, it is truly an amazing sight, and
amazing to be walking on this gigantic wall. The great wall is not from the beginning one single wall, but different ones linked together around 2000 years ago. Separate walls had been constructed by independent kingdoms and then when china was unified under emperor Qin shi Huang he made one GREAT one...pretty cool dude hey.

Finally at the top, we only had a few minutes to stay and look at the view because we had to go down to catch the bus back to Beijing...But we really enjoyed it and it was well worth the hard climb up!

Next day, we had planned to look at The forbidden city and Maos Mausoleum, but the mausoleum was closed so we went to the Forbidden city and a taoist temple after that.

Before going into the Forbidden city we went to look at Tianamen Square, the worlds

largest public square (I find it quite hard to believe that there is a bigger private square though...) It is huge, lined with red flags and monuments, it is also here
that Maos mausoleum is.

the Forbidden city is big, very big. Truly a city within a city and it is easy to get lost in

there. There is alot of artifacts from the emperors to see, old weapons,
costumes, poetry and more to see, and of course the buildings and gardens. I think the most impressive are the gardens, very nice with different shaped rocks and trees. in
some places you can also see how they lived, it was indeed a life of luxury and seclusion. The emperors and their family rarely left the forbidden city, their so called pleasure dome, unless they really had to.

After the forbidden city we hurried to see a taoist temple before it closed, it is still working and you see taoist monks walking around, taking care of the temple. It was very nice and calm with incense burning everywhere and different altars for all the different taoist gods. There was also people coming there praying to whatever god they needed help from. It is interesting to see people so devoted and believing so hard in something.

Other than the sightseeing in Beijing we went to look at some markets, ate alot of nice cheap food and just enjoyed walking around. So next stop is shanghai to meet Jeanne and Clemence and enjoy shanghai!

Puss Puss Kram Kram

Ola and Agnes


TRADUCTION !
Nous n’avons pas écrit de blog depuis quelque temps maintenant mais nous avons fait pas mal de choses et avons vu des amis, c’est la raison pour laquelle on vous fait un mix entre Beijing et Shanghai aujourd’hui !

Après avoir eu un peu de mal à trouver notre hôtel, nous sommes arrivés très fatigués et malheureusement l’hôtel n’était pas extraordinaire. Après 2 nuits, nous avons changé pour un hôtel très mignon, très propre et d’un très bon confort… je pense que c’est le meilleur lit dans lequel nous avons dormi depuis le début de notre escapade.
Pas grand chose durant ces deux premiers jours du fait qu’il nous fallait aller à l’embassade indienne (fermée) et l’ambassade du Vietnam pour vérifier ce que nous devions faire pour obtenir nos visas. Nous aurons plus tard, avons-nous obtenu comme simple réponse…
Nous avons tout de même pris une excursion pour la grande muraille de Chine. Nous pouvons la voir de plusieurs endroits mais nous avons décidé de commencer par Simatai. C’est à environ de 4 heures de Beijing donc départ très tôt le matin.
On voit la muraille de très loin et elle serpente très haut dans la montagne. De l’endroit où nous avons décidé de voir la muraille, c’est la partie la plus abrupte donc il nous faut grimper…

Au démarrage, ce sont quelques marches et puis 2-3 kms jusqu’en haut. Nous sommes un peu fatigués après les premières marches et nous réalisons que nous en avons déjà gravi un bon nombre. Plus nous montons, plus nous voyons la muraille s’étendre dans l’autre direction et les montagnes nous environner. C’est une vue splendide, et c’est surprenant de marcher le long de cette muraille. Ce n’est pas une muraille d’un seul tenant mais plusieurs murailles jointes les unes aux autres il y a environ 2000 ans. Des murs séparés ont été construits au temps de royaumes indépendants, et quand la Chine a été unifiée sous l’empereur Oin Shi Huang, c’est devenu une muraille d’un seul tenant…
Arrivés au sommet, nous n’avons eu que quelques minutes pour admirer la vue car il nous fallait déjà redescendre pour attraper le bus de retour pour Beijing… nous avons vraiment beaucoup aimé, mais quelle montée !

Le jour suivant, nous avions décidé d’aller dans la Cité Interdite et au Mausolée de Mao qui était fermé. Nous sommes donc allés à la Cité Interdite puis dans un temple taoiste. Avant de nous rendre à la Cité Interdite, nous nous sommes arrêtés à la Place Tianamen, la place la plus grande du monde (difficile de croire qu’il s’agit d’une grande place privée…). C’est une place immense, bordée de drapeaux rouges et de monuments. C’est là aussi que se trouve le mausolée de Mao.
La Cité Interdite est grande, très grande ; une ville dans la ville et il est facile de s’y perdre. On y trouve des reliques des empereurs, des armes anciennes, des costumes, des poteries, etc. et bien sûr, les bâtiments et les jardins. Ce qui m’a le plus impressionné, ce sont les jardins, très beaux avec des pierres de formes différentes, des arbres. On peut voir à certains endroits comment ils vivaient. C’était une vie de luxe et de fastes. Les empereurs et leur famille ne quittaient que rarement la Cité Interdite…

Après la Cité Interdite, nous nous sommes dépêchés d’aller voir le temple taoiste avant qu’il ne ferme. Il est encore en activité et on peut voir des moines taoistes qui marchent autour du temple et veillent dessus. C’était très agréable et calme avec l’encens qui brûle un peu partout et différents autels pour tous les différents dieux taoîstes. Il y avait aussi des gens qui viennent pour prier et demander l’aide de Dieu. C’ est intéressant de voir des gens si dévots et croyant si fort en quelque chose.

Outre la découverte de Beijing, nous nous sommes promenés dans quelques marchés, avons mangé de la bonne nourriture bon marché. La prochaine étape, c’est Shanghai pour y retrouver Jeanne et Clémence !



permalink written by  agnesola on November 18, 2007 from Beijing, China
from the travel blog: Baby and Baby's around the world travel...
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Taxco

Taxco, Mexico


Once again a new town...after around 23 hours on 2 buses altogether we arrive in Taxco, 2.5 hours from Mexico City. It is a small town, easy to walk around in, and absolutely beautiful. Again as the most beautiful towns we have seen it is an old Colonial town.
But this one is very very nice.

Taxco speciales in silver, so there is extremely many silver stores everywhere.
We visited many stores looking at all the jewelry, some quite tacky, but some very beautiful pieces.

The town has another original thing, all the taxis are old wolkswagen beetles, sometimes you can se 15-20 at once in the street.


It is so nice to walk around in town, and just where we lived there was a massive livley market, and now it was extremely busy because they were selling stuff for the day of the dead. Skulls made of chocolate and all kinds of ghostly devilish stuff...

One of the nights There was alot of kids dressed up in halloween costumes at the square and they where all funny and cute, running around like little pumpkins and ghosts.

Well, not much else to say about this town, it was relaxing, we had lots of nice food
and our room had a balcony perfect for having a drink or two at night..

..

Alot of kisses from Ola and Agnes!!!


permalink written by  agnesola on November 2, 2007 from Taxco, Mexico
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The Ruins of Chichen Itza and cenote...

Chichen-Itza, Mexico


Coucou!

So after the swimming, diving and all that... we went to visit Chichen Itza.
Chichen Itza is a beautiful site of a Maya Town...

Ok, we have seen quite a lot of ruins until now, but to be honest all of them have something particular that makes it exceptional.

For Chichen Itza, the pyramid that stand in the middle of the site is very big and so very impressive. All the ruins are quite well preserved which makes it lovely to walk around and think that we are walking on the steps of the Mayas.

Another very beautiful thing on the site were the "thousand columns". It is a place where is left a lot of columns all in lines ... quite impressive!

After wandering around the site for quite a while, we decided to go to a nearby Cenote called Ikil.

A cenote is a natural sinkhole, usually connected to other ones through underground cave systems... More simply, it is a big hole with a lot of water!! but usually in beautiful sceneries.

The one we went to, has vegetations going along the walls of the hole and there is black fishes in... you can jump about 4/5 meters on the side of it... which Ola and me enjoyed very much!!

Back to the town, we went for dinner and Ola saw that a young girl left her handbag on the chair when she left... As a gentleman, he ran to give it to her back!!! What a hero!!!

That's all for Chichen Itza!

Kisses

Agnes and Ola

permalink written by  agnesola on October 31, 2007 from Chichen-Itza, Mexico
from the travel blog: Baby and Baby's around the world travel...
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cozumel

San Miguel de Cozumel, Mexico


So finally! the caribbean sea! and an island...time to reeeeelax.
Or so we thought...since we wanted to take our diving certificate here we first went around looking for what dive operator to choose. After seeing three we went for one called Deep Blue. We were suppose to be back the day after at 9.30 for our first lesson and dive.

Since we are in the caribbeans we are dying to get into the water, sadly enough there is no real beach in town, they are further away, and the most beautiful ones on the other side of the island. So we go to a bar that lies by the sea and they have a pier you can jump from, they nicely let us swim there without paying. the water is turquoise and beautiful...and extremely warm, around 27 degrees...very very nice...


Ok, back at the dive shop at 9.30, we meet our instructor Luis, he talks about what we are gonna do and then we get into a car that takes us to the dive site. Once there He goes through the primary stuff one needs to know about diving and information about pressure under water and alot of things. Then it is time to gear up,
and we go through all the stuff we are going to use. We slowly enter the water and then go under to feel how it is to breath through the tank, it feels strange but fine. We do some exercises under water
and then we follow Luis around on shallow depth looking at some fish and we even see a seahorse, really cool. The rest of our days (the course is suppose to take 4 days, but we get delayed because of bad weather one day) we spend doing theoretical exams, reading and doing 5 dives in total before getting our certification.

Agnes: "For my side, the training has been a little bit more painful... It is actually quite weird to breathe through the stuff and i freaked out a bit on the first time we went under water...
I had quite a few problems doing some of the exercises but at the end I managed to do it all! But our poor instructor had to take twice the time with me..."

We did some other things during our stay in cozumel, but since we had the diving in the morning, we did not do much else than some snorkeling and walking around in town. The day when our dive got cancelled because of bad weather we rented a scooter and drove around the island, it was windy, but beautiful. We stopped on the other side of the island on a deserted beach and had a swim, it was really like paradise!


And finally, the day we had been waiting for, as certified divers, to go with a boat and dive among the coral reefs of cozumel. We are going to do 2 tank dives, which is pretty
much 2 times 40 minutes. We enter the water through the boat and then descend to another world.

We drift with the current at 24 meters deep and it is so much like meditation, it is quiet and beautiful, it is very hard to describe the feeling, it has to be experienced.

we see alot of colorful fish, we bought a cheap waterproof camera before the dive, so we have some pictures, but the flash did not work on the second dive so some af the pictures miss color, since at depth in the water you need flash to see the color properly.
there was huge parrotfish, 2 big turtles, stingrays, doris from Nemo(a blue fish), a huge green moray eel, and a lot of other beautiful fish that we dont know the name of. On the
descent of the second dive I (ola) spotted a beautiful barracuda that the other people missed and Agnes was the only one to see a shark (a nurse shark). After the dive all of us had such a nice feeling, and we just wanted to go back down. Diving is truly a wonderful experience and now we cant wait till the next time we can go diving (Thailand!!!).

Agnes: "I was the same as Ola, absolutely amazed by this underwater world and I had such a great time while diving... It was quite difficult to face my fears and to do the certificate, but once down in the water, you forget about everything and you just enjoy! I really loved it and I can´t wait to do it again... Especially knowing that i was the one the most scared about seeing dangerous fishes and I actually was the only one to see the shark!! pretty cool! and I was not even scared (maybe because it was sleeping!!)
Anyway, the whole experience was wonderful....!!!"

So now we are in Chichen Itza(maya ruins) and tomorrow we are heading towards Taxco close to Mexico City.

Lots of salty wet hugs and kisses from Ola and Agnes



permalink written by  agnesola on October 27, 2007 from San Miguel de Cozumel, Mexico
from the travel blog: Baby and Baby's around the world travel...
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