Friends & the Four Corners

The four corners (the point where Utah, Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona meet- the only place I know that allows you to be in four places at once) is a wonderful national sight I have had the pleasure of visiting twice, both in the company of very good friends. It is ALWAYS a fun place to visit; along with the four corners point there are gift and food stalls, and quite a bit of scenery to see on the way there.

Four Corners or Bust! (Originally the goal was the Grand Canyon, but for the sake of time and other things, compromises had to be made)

Unlike the Grand Canyon where you pay $25 to enter, at the Four Corners, you only pay a modest $3 entry fee

And apparently, the fee is waived on Thursdays

As someone who has (much to my own surprise) become a frequent visitor of the four corners site, I have seen the place be redesigned.

Originally the 4 corners point was up on a platform

Now its been lowered so the gift stalls are above it. This makes the space more accessible and open in order to deal better with crowds. (This picture is not good proof of this, as this was taken 3 minutes before they shut the place for the night, and consequently the only people there were us and the security guard waiting to escort us out)

Macau

After looking through some Hong Kong guidebooks when I got there, I realized I could take a day trip to an entirely different country (well, different special administrative region in China) called Macau. Like Hong Kong, it used to belong to a foreign power, (Portugal) and has only recently been given back to China. And like Hong Kong, it is a special administrative region, and has its own rules about certain things (like allowing US citizens to enter without visas). So, once I figured out it was legal to go, and it would be an entirely new stamp in the passport, I decided to make a day of it, and explore Macau. Its accessible by helicopter, or an hour-long ferry ride. I took the ferry there in the morning, spent the day, and made it back in the early evening, early enough to have drinks with my wonderful host, Michael (who is a gracious, very kind person who put up with me crashing on his futon for a week). It honestly took me longer to get back from Lantau (which is a part of Hong Kong) then it did to get to and from Macau, which is technically an entirely different country.

One of the main squares in Hong Kong. I thought the pavement was really cool.

Macau’s current claim to fame is that it is the Vegas of Asia. There are tons of casinos all around the peninsula. Other then that, it has the tallest tower in the world, which people can bungee jump off of.

A casino on the coast

There are historic temples which are similar to the ones around Hong Kong, and also historic churches because of the Christian influence that its had over the years.

One of the historic churches

I got a tour around the city to see the highlights- and got to go up the tower and see the city from a birds-eye view. Unfortunately it was rather smoggy, but it was still a really neat sight to see.

The two black towers across the water are the entrance to the Schenzen region (mainland China)

The Macau tower, the tallest in the world

Hong Kong: Lantau

One day when I was in Hong Kong, I went to the Outlying Island of Lantau, which is a very interesting place. On it they have Hong Kong Disneyland, the airport, and a shopping village with a monastery and a giant Buddha. You can take a cable car up to the village, and walk around, visit the monastery, and climb up to the Buddha.

This is a "tea tasting" I went to where I tried traditional chinese tea...it was cool flower tea where it "bloomed" under the hot water

This is the view of the Buddha from the cable car

I took the cable car to the village, walked around the small town and did some souvenir shopping. Then I went to the hill with the Tin Tan Buddha and climbed the 300 and something stairs to it. This was huge! And it was a beautiful statue, along with all of the other statues around it. Inside the base, you could walk around and see revelations and writings of the Buddha (this was all in Chinese so I am not really sure what I saw but that was the general feel I was getting). There were also these incredible tapestries that had illustrations of the Buddha’s story.

All of the stairs up to the Buddha. There are more then 300 stairs to climb!

I made it to the top!

While walking around the Buddha, I was lucky enough to see a religious ceremony take place. The priests who were walking around were very friendly, and stopped to say hi to all the foreigners and to ask where we came from. After climbing down from the Buddha I went and had dinner at the monastery. It was a really nice simple vegetarian meal and was delicious. It was a really fun day, and nice to get out of the city itself, go somewhere more rural, and see something truly spectacular like this Buddha.

The religious ceremony at the Buddha