MONDAY, MAR 8TH--XIAMEN, CHINA

Just back from our “Highlights of Xiamen” 4 hour tour and we will sail in a half hour. Xiamen has a population of 2 million people and is due west of Taiwan. After Shanghai we were somewhat disappointed here. Once again they had nice, modern roads and there was a lot of construction under way. The roads we traveled were particularly nice as all along them were beautifully manicured shrubs and flower beds. Our first stop was the South Putuo Temple. It as built during the Tang Dynasty more than a 1,000 years ago. Monks are still living here. We saw several Buddhas and the Chinese people were burning incense outside and kneeling to pray in front of the Buddhas inside the temple. My pictures will show you this. Then we continued to a Chinese tea house and witnessed an authentic tea ceremony where we learned about the different kinds of teas and how to steep it. Of course they wanted us to buy some after the demonstration. We drove along the coastal highway to make a photo stop at a beach. Last stop was at a museum but don’t think many in our group enjoyed it. So all in all, I think we should have skipped the tour today and taken the shuttle bus downtown for shopping. It is overcast again today with a breeze and temperature in lower 50F’s, so is chilly. Last night we enjoyed another great dinner in the Compass Rose restaurant. The osso bucco was excellent. After dinner we enjoyed the ship’s singers and dancers in a production show from front row seats. Don’t laugh, but yesterday and today for lunch we had Slim Fast bars. Well tomorrow we be arriving in Hong Kong by noon. Weather should be much nicer and warmer. Hong Kong is the end of the 3rd segment of the world cruise and again some passengers will be leaving and new ones boarding. In the pictures that I will be uploading on the blog today, you will see some of the golf tournament I played in yesterday. Yes, it is silly but was lots of fun. We are sailing out now and the sun just came out!