China 2014: Day 2 (Xiamen)

On the second day of my trip, I visited Huandao Road (环岛路). It is a road that runs along the western and southern coastline of Xiamen. It was a sunny day, and the weather wasn't too cold other than the wind at the seaside which was brrr. There were many couples taking wedding photos at the beach though. Hats off to the brides-to-be for braving the chilly wind! People were sitting on the sand, enjoying the warm sunlight, while some of them played in the sea. The sunlight was glistening in the sea and it was a beautiful day.

The sea!

En route to the beach!

What a beautiful day /inserts peaceful face/

Long hair don't care? More like windswept messy hair don't care :D

(Apologies for my slightly derp-y looking face)

People taking wedding photos!

Next, we went to a strawberry farm. Surprsingly, there were still strawberries in winter! I picked a few strawberries. It was rather pricey, and the strawberries tasted okay-ish. However this is something I've always wanted to do and hence I was rather happy to pick those strawberries hehehe. And oh, for the first time, I finally know how a strawberry flower looks like!

Strawberry! Yummmm.

The flower of the strawberry!

We then went to a more popular stretch of beach that's located close to Xiamen University. There were significantly more people on the beach, Many people were selling things on the beach, such as flower crowns, malt candy, flowers etc. I saw 2 people in Mickey Mouse costume walking around and I was legitly confused /inserts laugh cry emoji/ I caught the golden hour at the beach, and it was a pity that I couldn't stay for the sunset. :(

A vendor selling malt candy, using those traditional weighing balance thingy to measure the mass of the candies.

People in Mickey Mouse costumes...

Saw the cutest dog at the beach!

My outfit of the day hehehe.

Love the lights and shadows (except the dotty lens flare which isn't very pretty :/)

Caught the sunset on the way to dinner! The window of the car gave the sky a green tint

Some really spicy stuff I had for supper

My supper consisted of constant sniffing, as the food was really spicy, and shivering every now and then, as the seat was outdoors and the wind was really strong at night. After supper, my cousin decided to get some hot drinks to warm ourselves up. I got hot chocolate, and I was walking in the streets with a coat, a scarf, while holding the cup of hot chocolate. Can I just say I felt really Tumblr at that moment hehehe. I should've taken a photo of myself :( anyway. After some walking in the chilly night, we did some shopping (for food) at the supermarket. Here's a photo of my haul:

The leftmost packet of snacks tastes REALLY good.

So this pretty much concludes my post for Day 2 of my trip! Hopefully I can finish the whole series of posts as soon as possible. :)

Elsa

China 2014: Day 1 (Xiamen)

Hello everyone!

So I just got back from my solo trip to China a few days ago and I am determined to blog my trip this time. :D /inserts guilty face regarding my incomplete UK posts/

I spent 7 days in China, from the 4th December to the 12th. I was in Xiamen from the 4th to the 6th, and in Wuyishan (Mount Wuyi) from the 7th to the 10th, and in Xiamen again from the 11th to the 12th. The main reason of my trip is to do some sightseeing, some mountain climbing and to visit my relatives in Wuyishan.

Xiamen is a lovely and lively coastal city, while Wuyishan is a beautiful place with amazing landscape (and geology!) and an interesting history. Overall, I really enjoyed my trip. And can say that I'm an experienced solo traveller now? /inserts the sunglasses emoji/

All right, without further ado, let me begin the post proper! :)
(All photos in this posts and the upcoming posts are taken with either my iPhone 5 or my Canon EOS 650D. Most photos are unedited.)

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It was the first time that I'm travelling alone (taking an airplane alone!), and it was pretty nerve-wrecking. Well, technically I took an airplane alone when I was 9, but that's a different story...anyway. It was a 4-hour flight, without those in-flight entertainment consoles, and without anyone to talk to. Hence, I got the window seat (by luck) and the view outside entertained me for the whole 4 hours.

As my flight departing Singapore was in the afternoon, I caught the sunset on the plane! It was the third time seeing sunset from the plane, but nevertheless it was a breathtaking sight.

After take-off!

Can you see the 2 different shades of the colour of the sea!

All the ships look like toy ships hehehe.

Changi Airport from above! All the planes look like toy planes too hahaha.

Pulau Ubin!

The amazing sunset!

And since it was night time when I landed in Xiamen, I also had the view of all the city lights. It was so pretty but my shutter speed was too low and the plane was shaking slightly (don't worry, it was all fine), my photos was not sharp. :/ After a slightly-boring 4-hour flight, I finally landed in Xiamen! My aunt picked me up, and we headed to a cafe to have some dinner/supper. The cafe was really interesting, as it features some Chinese dishes too. I was quite disappointed as they did not have hot chocolate. Since I'm not a coffee person, I always go for hot chocolate at cafes hehehe.

This is potentially another favourite shot of mine but it's not sharp SIGHHH.

Xiamen Gaoqi Airport!

Fried rice from the cafe!

They even have kimchi!

Waffles! Yummm.

And that's it for this post! I will write a separate post for each day so as to keep the post short. :)

Elsa