I am taking a ferry/ship from Haikou to Guangzhou. The trip is about 19. hours. It is the first time I have been on the open sea. I am on the China Sea. Currently the boat is rocking back and forth and side to side, however, I am not getting sick (must be all those years of bed spins from my friends Jager, Jose, Jack and Southern 1x), The sunset was great and the idea of being out here is even better.
My 7 days in Haikou were ok, not great just ok. One of my friends got sick and the other was typical Chinese, never thinks about the other person. But, it is also my fault for not speaking Chinese better. If I spoke ok Chinese I could have done more.
I am posting some pictures of the boat, harbor and sea. I will post more about Haikou (The Wugong Temple was nice) later.
This ship has satellite television, so I get 2 Chinese channels (on five different station settings).
I am listening to Traffic while writing this. It is the Low Spark of High Heeled Boys in honor of the gay Chinese couple shipboard. One is a flamer.
Even though it is very big, the ship rolls over the water, it feels like it moves forward in surges. I got good pictures of the sunset, but it is cloudy and I can't see stars. Will try later to see the sky,
Oh, I have a first class cabin (such as it is) all to myself. twin bunks, a sink, TV and couch, And, I got free dinner. I am not complaining, a student from school father has connections and I got it for free, saved me 300 RMB. Yea, I am happy.
I am going on deck in shorts, the Chinese people will look at me like I am crazy. Everyone has to be the same here in China. After October 1, in central to north China, they no longer have cold beer available. I am not talking about Beijing or Shanghai or Fuzhou, but the smaller cities that have not had the exposure to other ideas consistently.
The swells have picked up quite a bit. It is not making me sick but it is awkward moving around, don't know how sailors stay upright in a violently roiling sea.
I woke up at 3 in the morning and looked out the window and saw a bright moon in a mostly clear sky. I went on deck to look at the sky. Without city lights I was hoping the stars would look close enough to touch. The sky was full of stars and a couple of planets. The did not appear to be close enough to touch, but there were many many more than I normally can see. It was the first time in a long time I was able to clearly identify the Big Dipper and other constellations.
Now I will try to wake up at 6:30 to see the sun rise.
Sunrise was ok, nothing spectacular. Pretty, but when it came up there was a marine layer, so by the time it was visible it had been up a while.
Later we passed my many small islands. At first they appeared to be just rocks, as we got closer you could see green foliage. Some had antennas on it's highest point. One looked to be a resort. We are going through the Yangtze River to get to Guangzhou and there is a lot of activity by smaller ferries island hoping.
I forgot to mention that as we left Haikou there was what appeared to be a sail surfing competition about a mile off shore. It was pretty cool. If the pictures are acceptable I will post them.
We are to arrive in port at 11.30, 20.5 hours after we set sail.
TTYL
Terry
We are going to be 2 hours late arriving. I don't know for sure, but we may have been slowed by the weather on the China Sea. The small islands we passed were nearer to Shenzhen than Guangzhou. This is a heavily traveled water way. That makes sense because Guangzhou is a huge manufacturing center. I have been told that this is where New Balance, Nike and the rest of the shoe companies have their factories.
I have eaten two meals on board, both the same and both hit my stomach like a lead balloon. The lunch today seemed to be what was left from yesterday that they did not expect to serve, but because of the delay they served it to us. At least it was free.
We disembarked at 2:40 p.m. It was an interesting trip, but next time I will not do it alone.
Below is an image of the China Sea. If you look closely you will see a large island (Hainan) just south of the central part of China. There is a line drawn from the s.e. corner of the island to Guangzhou, that is the route the ship took.
