Ocean Park

Once place that Jim and i had never set eyes on was Ocean Park. The Hong Kong equivelent to Disney, before Disney actaully came. It was a nice park. Reasonably priced and not crowded at all by any standards. They had 4 pandas, two really old ones that were sleeping and one 3 year old couple. They were frisky and rolling around and playing with each other. Very Cute.
Now i don't know anything about the evolution of OP but it is an interesting set up a tiny bit of the park is pretty close to the main part of HK, with the pandas and some small rides etc, then you get on the longest cable car that i have ever been on and go over a mountain to the other side for the rest of the park. I am getting to be an expert on cable cars and this was a fantastic one, four seperate lines that went for a mile or so up an incredible cliff face and over solid jungle. It was worth the entrance fee to the park.
The rest was the standard roller coasters and the like, but of course build in HK style on the mountain face with incredible views. The kids loved it and we got lucky when a cloud showed up and cooled us off at the highest point on the ferris wheel.

Apartment 6B

Wai On house is still standing strong with a new very classy baby blue paint job. The 7/11 in front of the bus stop is gone though. What is up with that? I was pretty sure that they only added 7/11's here. Fun fact, HK lore says that there is no other place in the world with a higher concentration of the stores. It seems to be true as on the street in front of the hotel there and two in one block!

The Peak

A visit to the Peak in Hong Kong is probably the most popular tourist trip. Today was our sunniest day yet so we made the treck. We got a late start and as we waited in line for tickets (i am pretty sure that i have not waited in a line that long to go to the peak before) Jim read that on averge 8,500 people visit the peak a day. Whoa! I mean in the early 90's there was only one restaurant up there.The second one was finished in 95. What in the world was going on up there i wondered?
Well let me tell you...QUITE A BIT! There is now a new 5 story shopping and entertainment center at the tram station. It was HUGE and full to the brim with people and shops selling little chinese outfist and hats with pony tails. It was all there, every Chinese tchotsky known to man and a few new ones! We got out of there as quick as we could and headed accross the street to the building that used to house the Peak Cafe where i had celebrated my 25th birthday... August and Evita were soooooo impressed. But they quickly changed thier tune when the ice cream came! We ran it off on the almost unused shady trail around the area. HK is so weird that way, insainly crowded in one area and then just a few meters on nothing. It was great.
Oh yea, what about that awsome view!! World class.

Just interesting to some

OK so this is my old office building at Exchange Square, it had a walkway and the harbour in front of it. Now the photo below is of the newly coined by Jim "Chairmans Member" that now dominates the HK skyline, ok, check out in the bottom left hand corner of the photo you can see one of the exchange quare buildings. The member is sitting on land that didn't even exist 10 years ago. Impressive!

Tin Hau Temple

Although there is a minimum of information in English about the temple workings, it is always somewhat of an adventure to find these islands of calm in the sea of crazy urbaness. The Tin Hau Temple is no exception. It is located in Ya Ma Tay, whose claim to fame is being the most densly populated place in the world and home of the "cage men". The temple is to the god of seafarers, as this used to be a little harbour. It is all reclaimed now of course.
The Temple is full of spirels of insence, you can buy the spirals for any person that you want to give luck too, they last for 10 days. The whole place is soo full of burning insence and smoke that the maximim time to explore the inside is about 3 minutes! It is a neat environment and very exotic!

From the city of Lights

I know Paris is the the 'real' city of lights but why. Most cites have lights and i think that Hong Kong has got to be in the running for the most. It is a spectacular city. Soooooo hustling and bustling, full of energy and well some serious smells! We were out and about alot on the first day, boring August to tears with Oh yeah and that is were I worked before you were born, i lived, i ate i am pretty sure he was just smiling and nodding. We loved it. The first night we arrived HK was struck by a Typhoon. Number 8, which is how they rate the storms. The rating goes up to 10. Our windows in the hotel shook and it rained like cats and Char Peis. Well the downside of all that is that it is 5 days later and it is still raining! Yeppers, we are fully waterloged, but also know all of the secret patway though building etc..Lots of the things to do in this city are indoors. The bummer is that most of them involve shopping...he he!
I realize looking at my photos that i have been remis since i arrived mostly because of the rain, but also i forget to take a photo since i have seen most of it before.I will try to be better.

This is on the overpass to Queensway plaza looking at the (bottom only) Bank of China Building. Which used to be the most prominent thing in the skyline, now it is dwarfed by this building that Jim immediatly dubbed the "chairmans member" and many others. My old office which used to be on the water front is 3 BLOCKS back. And many more. There are lots of lovey things that remain the same. Great food at every corner. We had fantastic Korean BBQ the other night, lots of lovely cantonese and every other South East Asian fare. Plus don't forget the cheapest McDonalds in the world!

Bum Boat!

This is the final photo from the Lion City. We went on one of the tours around a kind of inlet into the center of the city and finiacial ditrict. We went in a Bum boat which is named that for the Dutch word for tree, since the boats were all made of wood. I was trying to listen to the recording, but Alison was cracking me up! We love Singapore!

Cable car

The Cable car in Singapore goes over to an entertainment complex in the harbour.It is a great ride and a pretty good bargain. We went on it twice, and this last time in a glass bottomed car. My stomach was in my throat the whole time. The large building in the bottom photo is the mid way point.

The first little blue pill

In little India. Check out the size of this add. There is a guy walking on the street beside it. I won't say another thing.

Requsite Python Pose

It seems like everywhere you go in Singapore there is a guy with a snake and a hat. Well we deffinatelly wanted to be a part of that action!! August was super gung ho at first and then a bit overwhelmed on how heavey the snake was..I guess he had just eaten his last client, so i could understand his concern! Anyway, i like this photo best since you can see how the creature is winding himself around August' leg. We had to use three men to pull it off!

The Singapore Zoo!

The Singapore Zoo is deffinatelly the best zoo that i have ever been to. That being said i have never been to the San Diego Zoo, which is supposed to be pretty dang good too.

What i loved about this zoo was that it was totally shady (and Singpore is HOT!) everywhere we went. And at every area there were LOTS of animals that you could see up close and very presonal i forgot to post the photo of the fruit bats, but we could see every detail of those guys (!) chomping away on thier papaya.

August actually had a lemur walk by him on a branch and brush him with it's tail. Very cool. We were greeted at the entrance by this big black ape hanging on a branch. Every were we went it was feeding time and the animals were out and about. The Bengal white tigers were awsome! And their enclosure looked pretty good from may perspective, not being a tiger and all. In my mind they were the most wonderful of all. Of course there were elephants and giraffes galore and lots more. A good time was had by all!

Nematodes!

Yes we are in HK now, but i haven't gotten a chance to post the rest of the photos from Ingpore, so bear with me!

Have you ever seen the Sponge Bob epasode about the Nematodes? well these things at the Singapore Aquarium look just like em! They ate Sponge Bobs pineaple in like 3 seconds! Funnily enough the SA thought that they were "Sea Worms" Who has ever heard of that!

Underwater world

Well the title really says it all. We went to UWW and it was great!! Lots of fish you can touch and plenty of shade and AC!

Shoot i have other photos but i can't get them uploaded! We have been tearing around Singapore like....well TOURISTS! It has been great. We have seen the Zoo (best ever) been on a boat in the harbour, done lots of eating and shopping, gone on a cable car....TWICE! and a LOUGE...twice. Imagine. I went to a lovely Modern dance preformance on Saturday, la la la Human Steps. From Canada no less.

We are off to Hong Kong Tomorrow!! The time has flown by. Damn! But i hope to get the photo scenario sorted there! See you in......

Photos

I can't figure out how to post more than one photo per entry that looks the way i want it, so here are a couple of shots higglely piggely.  The one one below is another one from the Botanical Gardens, feeding the fish. Evita totally stole this little kids fish food, luckily Singaporeans think she is cute and took lots of photos of her.

The one on the right is from Alison's living room. Check out her neighbors!  Singapore is definitely all about apartment living.  More later!

Singapore!!

Well after a can we say, a looooonnnnnggggg flight, 14 hours from LA to Hong Kong, waiting on the tarmac for a couple of hours, weather delay, then another 3 to Singapore we arrived at 2:30 am on Saturday morning. (having left at 1 pm on Thursday afternoon...you figure it out!!) 

Of course we leaped out of bed the next day and bounced around the immediate proximity of my friend Alison's house. Our first stop after lunch was the Singapore Botanical Gardens. It was lovely! We think Mexico is lush, this place has got us beat hands down. Every tree is HUGE and covered with ferns and other interesting bearded growths. Those plants in the photo in the foreground are similar to these elephant ear plants that i just can't get to grow at Eden. Well these look awesome!! 

 We fed gold fish and turtles and Evita made friends with lots of small children and babies. It was great. We love Singapore!

Everybody hates a tope!

And Jim is no exception! It was poring down cats and dogs today and our tope to the north, the one right past our service entrance showed us it's alternative pourpose! To block the water from going down to the natural beach outlet at Monteverde and to allow it to puddle up and come in our back gate! Well that was not going to happen on Jim's watch, he went out there and destroyed it pick and tiny shovel! It worked. The water is flowing smoothly down the street and we are high and dry, just the way we like it!

It was good to get a soaking rain. We are leaving tomorrow and felt like it just wasnt summer time with out some mud between our toes! Yea, squish squish! We have hopefully gotten all of our ducks in a row. Every body paid up and happy. We went to Patzcuaro last weekend and ordererd new colmns for the entrance and a fountain for the entrance area too. Eeek, it should be done by the time we get back. How exciting!

The shop in Zihua will be open all summer so if any of you dear readers are in the neighbourhood please stop by and give saludos to Karina, Diana or Sandra, they will be holding down the fort.

I will be writing next from......

The sign is starting to look a little worn but it still gives us that warm fuzzy feeling that we are nessled in our cacoon for the summer. Kind of like being snowed in at a ski lodge but with out the snow, or fireplaces, and with a beach. It's great! WE LOVE our guests don't get me wrong, but...well i am sure you understand...it's VACATION!!!But we still have to work. We are re-roofing bungalow 8 and bungalow 9. We will be putting new columns on the reception area. Maybe you noticed the scary looking mold on them this season. Well turns out those solid looking huge beams are rotton to the core. Oh well, it gives us a reason to go to PATZCUARO! Yeah.


We will go up this weekend (we can since we are cloooossseeedd) and order some new columns, and also hopefully a new fountain type thing that will go on a new wall that we are putting in the parking lot to block car lights from shining into suite 3. That is the idea anyway. Mariana will be incharge of these projects since we will be zooming around Asia!! Yeah that is where the vacation thing kicks in!

We will leave here on the we will leave on the 12th of June and get to Singapore on the 13th! Whew that is a long trip!! I am buying an extended battery for the DVD player and lots of presents for bribing unhappy children! The only thing that will be getting us through the 16 hour plane flight is the fact that once we get there we are there for 2 months! Wooohhooo. Jim will be answering e-mail in the usual Jim like way (if you know what i mean) but never fear if you don't hear from him, he will catch up when we get back.

I am hoping to post more since we will be doing stuff that is possibly INTERESTING. YEA! So we will be in touch! Have a good summer!

Come on down!

My travel agent wrote me and said.....

From/to LAX
240.84 roundtrip INCLUDING the tax.
Its currently good for travel up to a year from now.
There are certain black out dates where it goes up by 30.00 each way.
This is a darn good deal! So don't say I didn't tell you!

Welcome Fruity Keiko in ZIhuatanejo

Well, if you have ever been strolling along the streets of Zihua, thinking why am i here, and really there is NOTHING better than the shop at Hacienda Eden, stroll no further than number 5a Vincente Guerrero!


I have opened a branch of Fruity Keiko in Zihuatanejo. It is in the location that used to house Coco Cabana, the shop that was a part of Coconuts Restaurant. Not that i am trying to urge our guests to leave paradise or anything , but rather to be able to have an office that stays open all year. That way we can shop and do things in the summer that before we could do only in the month of October, which can get a little stressful let me tell you! Our grand opening was on the first of October and seemed to be a (am i allowed to say this and still stay humble?) success! Yeah! It has been a great experience getting to know the folks in Zihua better. 100% positive!
For anyone worrying, i carry almost all of the same things in either store. But i think that there are lots of people in Zihua that never come to Troncones so hopefully it will work out. I will let you know next year. In the mean time, here is another photo, stop by and see us the next time you are in Town!





The night of the inauguration, Christian did some lovely snacks, Esperanza, and her new assistants Diana and Karina took charge of all the details and the rest of us enjoyed a lovely champagne toast!

I like butterflys better than mold

Hello,

Here we are in the middle of the rainyiest of the rainy seasons. Wow, it rained almost every day in August and still going strong for September. Although lots of storms have gone by none so far has done any damage besides the obvious disaster of the road. I don't even want to go into it!! And the Mold! Woah!!

Of course there are lots of benifits to the rain. One is the plants go over the top, literally, the bougamvilla on both sides of the hotel are over the roof. I can't imagine how many gardeners we would have to have if the hotel were open in the summer just to keep up with it all. No dust is another big benifit, jeez i hate that stuff! And the animal and bug life is constantly entertaining. Many of you know that the kitchen at our house is outside. Ideal for the tropics where it never gets cold, but at night with the lights attracting every bug from miles around it's like cooking in the Amazon, massive beetles, mantisis, moths the size of my hand, all flying around my head at the same time! Yikes! Very interesting. August of course loves it and has a new "friend" everyday.

Some of the more pictuesque additions are the millions of butterflys like the one above. This one in in the flowers infront of the restaurant. I tried to take a long shot cuz there were sooooo many but they just blended in (as they are supposed to do no doubt). There are stripey ones, grean and black Monarch look alikes, orange, yellow, solid white huge ones and ones that "snap" when they flap thier wings. I got to look that one up! So all in all everything is going well.

We will start preparing the hotel to open next week, no big changes this summer. Will write more later,

Welcome to the new and improved edenmex!

The product of many months toil by our web designer Paul Sims. Thank you Paull!

We hope that all of our faithfull guests past, present and future will find the site a breath of fresh air. Jeez, that salmon pink was getting to be too much!! Any comments about the website just send to

I am sure one can easily find lots of mistakes on this new site. The last week i have been on the "lets just get it up and running" mode and will hopefully be able to fine tune things as we go along. So bear with me!

One of our biggest changes is not a visual one. We have added an extra e-mail address for communicating with us. One address:haciendaeden@gmail.com is for general questions, comments and requests, and our old e-mail, evaandjim@aol.com will be relegated for reservation requests only. We hope that will help to cut Jim's work load a bit and to allow us to pick up the speed on the response time.

Our past guests will notice that we have at last ALL NEW PHOTOS! Thanks to Willie McElligott for so many wonderful shots. For the most part they were all taken in December 2006 and January 2007. So what you see is what you get at this point. The site is technically very easy to update. So the theory is that i should be able to keep the photos more current. I want to add more personal photos and people photos in general, but i havent decided to make a section for that or just keep it on the blog.

Speaking of the blog, i realize that at this point i can't support comments and i have no idea how we are going to to the archives. So we will have to see how that pans out. For the moment i just wanted to wish everyone a very warm hello and smooches all around!

Regards,

Eva Myrth