Sharing of Cycling, Travel, Baking and personal feelings
Doing window shopping is one of my favourite activities when having overseas visits. In my latest Osaka / Biwako tour in end August, I had included optional visit to some of the bike shops in my plan. Right before the day I returned to Hong Kong, I have spared some time to visit these shops.
When I'm on cycling tour, making video summary is one of my mandatory works. How I capture those video? Let's take a look at how and what gadgets I used in taking video clips.
Today's journey started at the Tatara Shimanami Park in Omishima. Major reasons are availability of bus service from Imabari and the Rent-a-cycle Terminal. Moreover, it is close to Setoda Sunset Beach where we would have our lunch. The only downside is that we have to ride the Tatara Bridge twice just like what we had for the Kurushima Kaikyo Bridge in yesterday's ride. It took around one hour to arrive at the Omishima BS. Quickly we picked up our bikes at the Rent-a-cycle Terminal and started our ride towards the Tatara Bridge.
When I looked out from the hotel window early in the morning, I just couldn't believe what I had seen. Blue sky, bright sunny day and flock of seagulls. That's completely different from what we had the day before! Weather report stated that typhoon Noru had moved across Honshu, the main island of Japan, towards the Sea of Japan. What an excellent forecast work by JMA (Japan Meteorological Agency)! To allow more time for the ride, we planned to take the 9am local bus to Innoshima/Setoda.
My friend got me some books and magazine to kill time while I stayed in the hospital. One of those is "Artisan Baker 火頭工 説麵包、做麵包、吃麵包" by Philip Wu 吳家麟.
My wife and I are not those die-hard Japanophiles who always visit Japan as a kind of worship. Instead, it is the excellent culture and the friendliness of Japanese that make us not tired of visiting Japan. For this summer holidays, we continued to explore other parts of Japan - The Biwako area in the Shiga Prefecture. This was a downshifting journey for us to enjoy the beauty of the Lake Biwa, the country life and the cultural side of the Shiga Prefecture.
Woke up in the morning after having a good sleep, my wife and I were busy checking the weather report on TV and from the Internet. It was mentioned that typhoon Noru was moving over Shikoku and towards the main island of Japan during the day. Due to the slow pace of Noru that might result in extended periods of heavy rain, evacuation advisories in Shikoku and warning for river flooding, landslides, strong winds and high waves in other affected areas had been issued.
During my Chinese New Year holidays in Hiroshima in early 2017, we had an one-day trip in the city of Onomichi. Fascinated by one of the top cycling courses in the world, Shimanami Kaido, my family and I had an ad-hoc short ride from Onomichi, crossing Mukaishima (向島) and arrived in Innoshima (因島) via the famous Innoshima Bridge (因島大橋). The scenery along the cycling course was stunning. The cycling infrastructure was great and convenient to the cyclists. Together with the friendly drivers we met along the way, Shimanami Kaido gave us a wonderful cycling experience. By the time we arrived at the Innoshima Ohashi Memorial Park, it was already two o'clock in the afternoon. As we had to catch our train back to Hiroshima by the evening, we had no other choice but to head back to the Onomichi station. On the return trip, my boy asked if we could come back again and ride along the Shimanami Kaido from Onomichi to Imabari. Why not! I said. Living up to my promise, I had gathered all the information on Shimanami Kaido, working out the itinerary and making all the necessary reservations. During my boy's summer holidays in 2017, we sat out to conquer the Shimanami Kaido.
Like a lot of the Hong Kong people, egg-tart is one of my favourite pastries. Here in Hong Kong, we have two different styles of egg-tarts, one comes with a butter pastry (撻皮) base while the other one comes with puff pastry (酥皮) base. Personally, I prefer butter pastry base which is more crispy over the puff pastry base. This week, instead of making bread, I will practise making my first Hong Kong style Egg-tart with butter pastry base. Hong Kong Style
Woke up in a hot summer morning with nothing to do. My wife asked if I would like to have a short trip to Stanley with our boy. Well, why not??
Kaohsiung, the third biggest city of Taiwan, is not only famous for its port, night markets, food, prettiest metro stations and enormous public artwork, but also the emerging scene of fine dining. During our bike ride in Kaohsiung in late March, we had a chance to be the guests of our closed friends, at one of the great restaurants, the LA ONE Kitchen & Bakery.
