(2023) 6-days in Kyushu, Japan --- Overview

Our first overseas holiday trip in three years finally materialized at the end of May this year. Being able to be away for only 6 days, we opted for a fairly leisurely trip to North Kyushu. We had visited Kyushu two times before, but both of those were fairly brief visits, and there were still a lot of places we would like to see. Not wanting to be tired out by driving long distances, the JR 5-days North Kyushu rail pass was the perfect option for us.

It turned out it was not the best time of the year for travel to Kyushu, weather-wise at least. June is always the start of the rainy season. This year, our time in Kyushu happened to coincide with the passing by of Typhoon Mawar, which had wrecked much havoc not only in Guam where it originated, but also in the Philippines, before it made a rather unusual U-turn northwards and passed directly over Okinawa. We could count as being fortunate in Kyushu as the typhoon only brought torrential rain on two days and not flooding or more severe damage.

Overall, we were pleased to see all that we had planned, and more. Here is an overview of our itinerary.

Day 1: Afternoon arrival at Fukuoka International Airport. Take Airport bus to Hakata Station. Picked up our pre-booked JR North Kyushu Rail Passes.

5-days JR North Kyushu Rail Pass

(2022) Hong Kong Disneyland --- Follow your dreams

Not having gone out of Hong Kong for an overseas vacation since the start of the Covid pandemic in early 2020, our recent visit to Hong Kong Disneyland truly gave us the most holiday-like feeling we had had in the past two and a half years. This was only our second visit to the park, the first time being over 10 years ago, which was not long after the park opened. One of the common reasons of dissatisfaction of the park in its early days was its small size and the consequent over-crowding. Since our last visit, the park has much expanded. Not only are there several more themed areas with new rides and shows, the centrepiece Sleeping Beauty Castle has been replaced by a grand Castle of Magical Dreams in late 2020. And with the drop in the number of tourists from outside Hong Kong because of the pandemic restrictions, it is now actually a very good time for locals to visit the park. 

Halloween spirit starts early at the Hong Kong Disneyland

(2018) Cambridge, UK

I don't remember when I first heard of Cambridge, though that must have been in my secondary school years. It might be by virtue of the renounced Professor Stephen Hawking, a holder of the Lucasian Chair of Mathematics at Cambridge, popularly known as the Chair once held by Isaac Newton. I still recall reading a Scientific American article on the remarkable Professor Hawking and his work. Or I might have come to know of Cambridge through Xu Zhimo's romantic poem "Farewell again to Cambridge", a set piece in the Chinese Language curriculum in Hong Kong. Or even, it might be because of any of the countless number of scientists at the University who had made ground-breaking discoveries.

While I had been to Cambridge on a couple of occasions in the past, each of the visits was fairly brief and I had not really seen quite enough of the university. So it was with delight that we planned a trip to Cambridge while we were in the UK several summers ago.

"Looking for dreams? Push with a long pole and roam towards greener pastures..." (Farewell again to Cambridge by Xu Zhimo, my translation.)

(2020) 6 days in Ireland --- Day 6: Dublin

The last day of our 6-days trip in Ireland was in fact only a half-day in practice. It is because we had a  flight for London to catch from Dublin Airport in the late afternoon. That limited the places we could visit to those within a short walking distance from our hotel in Temple Bar. Even so, there were no few choices. Our walk along the northern bank of River Liffey took us past buildings of Dublin old and new --- the neoclassical Custom House set in stone contrasts with the modern glass structures of EPIC The Irish Emigration Museum and the Convention Centre Dublin.

The Custom House, Dublin

(2020) 6 days in Ireland --- Day 5: Tour of Glendalough, Wicklow Mountains and Kilkenny

Because we had minimal planning of our impromptu trip to Ireland, our easy way out was to join a bus tour. Having very little knowledge of Ireland, our criterion for choosing the tour was that it was a full-day tour with both scenic and historical elements. We found a tour that satisfied this requirement --- with visits to several places south of Dublin, including the historic Glendalough and Kilkenny, and the scenic Wicklow Mountains.

St Peter and St Pauls' Cathedral, Glendalough

(2020) 6 days in Ireland --- Day 4: Dublin

With a full day to explore Dublin on Day 4 of  our trip to Ireland, we chose to see a small number of places in some detail rather than rush through a long list of attractions, of which there are plentiful in the city. So we picked some of the famous sites within walking distance from the Temple Bar district where we were staying. Following visits to a number of historical buildings, including the General Post Office, Christ Church Cathedral, St Patrick's Cathedral and Dublin Castle, we ended the day on a high note --- a  dinner with live Irish  music and dance. 

The Merchants' Arch alley leading from the quay to Temple Bar

  

Map of the sites we visited on Day 4

(2020) 6 days in Ireland --- Day 3: Dublin

After a nice breakfast at the hotel, we walked to Galway coach station to take the Citylink coach to Dublin, where we would stay for the rest of our trip to Ireland. We had chosen to stay at a hotel in the busy and lively Temple Bar district in Dublin, mostly because of its central location and it being walkable from the bus stops of the Galway-Dublin coach and the Aircoach to Dublin Airport.

As the coach approached Dublin from the west, we realized we were arriving by first seeing the famous Guinness Brewery from a distance, and driving along a river, which we guessed was the Liffey that flows through central Dublin. It was not yet check-in time when we got to the hotel, so we left our luggage at the reception and began our walking tour of the beautiful city.

Parliament Square, Trinity College, Dublin

(2020) 6 days in Ireland --- Day2: Cliffs of Moher tour

With minimal planning prior to our trip to Ireland, we took the option of booking a bus tour from a local operator after arriving in Galway. Having one full day to spend on the western coast of Ireland, an easy choice was a tour that included the famous Cliffs of Moher in its itinerary. Not surprisingly, with the popularity of this attraction, there were a handful of operators who offered fairly similar tours on this theme. The one that we picked was a full day tour, which made stops at several locations representative of the landscape and history of west Ireland --- Aillwee Cave, the Cliffs of Moher, a lunch break at the small village of Doolin, coastal drive viewing the distinctive landscape of  the Burren region, and finally a stop at the 16th century Dunguaire Castle.

Cliffs of Moher

Day tour of Cliffs of Moher and the Burren region

(2020) 6 days in Ireland --- Day1: Galway

Because our decision to go on a 6-day trip to Ireland was extremely impromptu, the only things that were fixed before we took off were the flight and hotel bookings. After browsing through several travel blogs for tips, we decided on spending two days in Galway on the west coast of Ireland, and four days in Dublin on the east. Fortunately, we found Ireland to be very traveler-friendly and it was very easy to plan a trip there. In fact we just made up our itinerary on the go, checking for suggestions in tourist information centres after we arrived and booking a couple of day-trips offered by local tour operators.

To make things simple, we booked a hotel in Galway that was within walking distance from the coach station. So, on reaching Galway by CityLink coach from Dublin Airport, it was a fairly short walk to the hotel. After settling down, we spent the rest of the day exploring Galway city centre.

Galway Cathedral

(2020) 6 days in Ireland, overview

We were in the UK in early 2020, not long before the whole world started to feel the full brunt of the Covid pandemic. During that time, we took the opportunity to make a trip to Ireland within a 6-day window. This was our first visit to the Republic. It must be counted as one of our most impromptu trips, with the flights and hotels being booked just a couple of days in advance.

Because of the spur-of-the-moment nature of this trip, we didn't even have a guide book on Ireland to do any planning. But thankfully we found plenty of information and travel tips on the internet. As always, we hoped to include a mixture of scenery, and cultural and historical elements in the trip. We settled to divide the time between Galway and Dublin --- cities on the west and east coast of Ireland.

We were very glad we did make this trip, which left us an excellent first impression of Ireland. The coastal sceneries in western Ireland were spectacular. Galway and Dublin are both rich in history and culture. But I was most impressed by the friendliness and politeness of the locals. Everywhere we felt very welcomed.

The General Post Office, Dublin