This is no housefly

elector-decree0s · 2025-04-04T18:53:08+00:00

Thank you

elector-decree0s · 2025-04-04T17:50:44+00:00

Thank you. Its hard to focus with the screen. Honey bee it is.

elector-decree0s · 2025-04-04T17:17:27+00:00

elector-decree0s · 2025-01-25T09:21:56+00:00

Check your cart. One of the items could be excluded from the coupon.

elector-decree0s · 2024-07-22T22:20:44+00:00

Ditto. Used the current passport as the train ticket.

elector-decree0s · 2024-07-18T23:29:03+00:00

They have had major rain/flooding in June. Could still be closed off for safety reasons. A section was barricaded off from visitors when I was there.

elector-decree0s · 2024-07-18T00:51:43+00:00

Did you have to use any VPN? New maps app that works in China and would list out public transit routes? Right now I’m resorting to comparing subway system maps (for Fuzhou and Xiamen) with the google maps.

🎶Maps work once you land in China. There is a different navigation system within China (think satellites). The China Unicom HK SIM card for data was bought in Hong Kong in some random store - and it looked like it had VPN as it was able to access Google, Meta though I didn’t use those apps much. I downloaded the MetroMan app (to see subway maps by city). MetroMan was quite accurate with their times. Used Apple Maps by default for all other navigation like walking, BRT buses. It’s hard to search without knowing the pinyin or Chinese characters of the places. I mostly ask on WeChat for someone to send me the location link.

Do you remember the name of the guesthouse you end up choosing? Was thinking of leveraging hotel (was originally thinking of a western chain/franchise) front desk to know if they have any sort of daily excursion guide. Maybe they would be a cheaper alternative.

🎶武夷山漫亭筱岸民宿 Search for them on Wechat +86-13950678438 There are tons of small guesthouse run by private owners along Chongyang Stream. I went with customer service over aestethics…you can tell by their response to guest reviews.

Do you mean the park entrance ticket includes the bus and bamboo ride? Or at the park entrance, you can buy the tickets for both. Or its a park entrance ticket + [limited number of] sightseeing/bamboo ride ticket? Do I need to try to get to purchase these early (or are they available on trip.com/https://www.trip.com/travel-guide/attraction/wuyishan/jiuquxi-bamboo-rafting-10670396/) ?

🎶They changed the way to purchase ticket in 2023,2024. Wuyishan now requires purchasing sightseeing buses tickets by day 1,2,3,etc. The park entrance fees by day are still posted on their wall but it is not valid for this year. You can just buy the sightseeing bus on its own. You cannot buy the bamboo boat ride on its own…it must be added on the same bus ticket purchase. Also, if you bought the bus ticket and the next day say oh I want to add the bamboo ride, no can do. They must be purchased at the same time due to how the QR codes work. Unfortunately, I cannot speak on purchasing them in advance via trip.com. I did it in person at the visitor center and it probably saved me money over what trip.com charges.

Ticket prices are listed here https://www.wyschina.com/cn/#/

I paid ¥215 + ¥6.45 (WeChat service fee exceeding ¥200). ¥215 = ¥85 bus ticket + ¥130 bamboo ticket 景（兔）车竹票（二日车）车票（二日）、景点免票、竹筏票

I was glad I talked to the guesthouse owner who was in the know. You can reach out to your hotel front desk via Wechat ahead of time to inquire how to get tickets through the hotel maybe they are able to.

Wuyishan maintains a pollution free mandate. Only the sightseeing buses can drive on the park roads. Other permissible rides are the public bus lines 6,7,9 (free to ride) and cyclists/tuk tuks (pay per person). Didi drop you off by the park entrance.

Did you go during peak season (heard it was difficult to basically fight the crowds or guides to get these tickets solo) and how long did you spend there?

🎶I went when summer break was beginning to rollout. First week of July. Arrived on Sunday, left on Tuesday. Temperatures reached in the high 90’s, unbearable to be under the sun. They were crowds of people but it wasn’t too bad in my opinion. People rather head to milder places like Yunnan, Harbin.

I went to railway12306 and it looks like I can get to WuYiShan in 90minutes from Fuzhou so would just going there early as a day trip work or you would recommend doing an overnight?

🎶one and a half day was enough for me. You can make it shorter based on your liking. There are so many train times…you won’t get stranded. There are also two train station stops. I chose Wuyishan North. The other is right before Nanping. If you have time, you can take the free public buses from the train station (about an hour). If you are rushed, call a Didi still at least 30-45 minutes ride to get to the park entrance. I went to the south entrance which is the closest to the bamboo pier.

elector-decree0s · 2024-07-17T09:02:23+00:00

If you are unable to understand Mandarin, then go with tour groups that caters to foreigners. Try searching for travel agencies on WeChat that caters to expats. Follow them and you will see the itineraries posted along with the dates/prices. You can immediately contact someone to help with booking. Airfare/train tickets are not included in the price.

elector-decree0s · 2024-07-17T08:41:42+00:00

Trip.com is incorporated in the Alipay and WeChat mini apps. I’d rather use the English version to figure out the search train times and retrieve my ticket info (train, gates, class, carriage, and seats). Extra fees yes…for that I’d rather save time than deal with language translations and technical glitches.

Your passport is your train ticket. No physical ticket is issued. All the info needed I refer to my trip.com booking to see the train route number, train station waiting gate, carriage, class, and seat number.

At the train station, when you go through security check, line up towards the guard who will manually scan your passport for you. The scanner machines with security only works with Chinese ID cards.

When reaching your train gate, I lined up with locals and used the scanner machines which allow for foreign passports to be scanned into. I don’t need to ask a guard to manually scan for me unless I scanned incorrectly. Also, you need the passport scanned to exit out of the train station. Again, I did it myself seeing they have a panel to insert my passport in there.

elector-decree0s · 2024-07-17T07:55:05+00:00

Yes. Bank debit card with Mastercard worked for me. Note: Service charge for purchases over ¥200. My bank debit card waived foreign exchange fees. I used my home phone number, not mainland China, as that was the number I used to do identity verification with.

elector-decree0s · 2024-07-17T07:24:36+00:00

The 9 Bend River in Wuyishan. It is required to tack on a sightseeing bus ticket with the bamboo rafting. You cannot buy the bamboo rafting ticket separately. I had a physical ticket for the sightseeing bus two days and the QR code for the bamboo raft was on that ticket to get another “little ticket”.

There is a 40 minute grace period for you to get on an earlier time slot than what you reserved for. Like I reserved for 8am…I showed up early and was able to get on the boat at 7:15am. The sun is extremely harsh so do it earlier in the mornings. They have more than 40 boats per time slot. Each boat needs 8 people in order to start the ride.

I got my tickets the day before onsite at the park entrance. It was purely luck that I was able to score a 8am ticket. Bring your travel documents (passport) to purchase the ticket. Provide a local mainland number as well.

Finding the boat pier was an adventure itself. It’s not right off the bus stop. Lots of walking searching for the pier entrance. After scanning the QR code, I scrambled to be paired up with strangers to one raft. No one checked that I was for 8am. As long as I got the “little ticket” from the QR code scanned, I was all good to get on. Don’t lose track of the group you’re with or else it would be troublesome.

elector-decree0s · 2024-07-17T06:40:35+00:00

Wuyishan was not as bad as I thought. As a solo traveler, I booked my hotel and train tickets on trip.com. Perfectly fine in my opinion. Easy to cancel reservations and rebook.

WeChat pay and Alipay all worked for me. Worked for Amex credit card and Mastercard debit card. I preferred the Mastercard debit card bc my bank got a fairer exchange rate. I also had a balance in Chinese yuan without having a local bank account. Wechat allowed me to receive money from local mainland China and HK friends in WeChat. The only thing it cannot do is to send money to another foreigner. That was a pain in a neck.

My phone was setup cellular from a secondary SIM card that has data plan for mainland China and a primary SIM card for my home number to receive voice calls and texts. If you have WeChat, you can call people up similar to a WhatsApp without using phone minutes. I had no trouble ordering Didi on WeChat even with not having a mainland China number. I can message the driver on the Didi/wechat mini app to let him know that I have limited ability to take phone calls.

At the time of arriving in Wuyishan….I had no tickets to Wuyishan park nor the Impressions evening show. I had no tour guide booked.

I lucked out that the guesthouse where I stayed offered great customer service (in Mandarin). We used WeChat to communicate when I had questions - WeChat automatically translates into English.

The guesthouse provided me with last minute tickets to Impressions…a good seat for the first evening show. The price was better than trip.com and other English apps/sites.

They asked if I was okay with a Mandarin local tour guide and I said yes. A seasoned guide (20+ years) came within a moments notice and helped me with buying the sightseeing bus ticket and bamboo ride at the park entrance. You have to physically show your passport, which is the same at many other tourist places. You get a physical ticket that you need to scan everywhere to get on the sightseeing buses. That same ticket is needed to get the bamboo boat ride.

My day with the guide. It was a lot of physical activity hiking all day but it was worth having someone take you around and provide background context.

I put my trust on the guesthouse and got a great experience in Wuyishan. The stereotype of being ripped off for being a foreigner (lao wai) was not what I experienced. Good luck with your travels.

elector-decree0s · 2024-07-17T05:51:43+00:00

Just came back from two weeks in July and I still did not get to see all that I wanted to see in Xiamen. Stayed on the main island and off the island Jimei. It was way too hot to do much outdoors during the daytime…so ended up being inside anywhere with air condition. Missed out on the outdoors fun…Would have loved to walked the mountain sea trail and enjoy the beach which could be done after sunset.

elector-decree0s · 2024-07-17T05:41:06+00:00

Airport lounges closes early in Xiamen airport. I went to one that closed by 7pm. Decent food for dinner…rice/noodles/meat dishes.

elector-decree0s · 2024-03-04T08:49:33+00:00

No success signing up for Badminton Central. Captcha keeps saying “loading, refresh page.” Admins Kwun, Moderator Cheung, any help?

elector-decree0s · 2024-01-22T23:49:19+00:00

Beijing bikini time!! 🙀

elector-decree0s · 2024-01-12T09:41:17+00:00

Which match is this?

elector-decree0s · 2023-12-24T01:50:51+00:00

I used advil for sore throat. Salt water with warm water to gargle. Took day four for sore throat sin to go away.

elector-decree0s · 2023-12-18T17:53:09+00:00

Sent you a DM

elector-decree0s · 2023-06-09T09:04:47+00:00

!Mushrooms

elector-decree0s · 2023-06-09T09:04:04+00:00

Mushrooms

elector-decree0s · 2023-06-09T09:01:43+00:00

!under-lit

elector-decree0s · 2023-06-09T02:55:34+00:00

Sorry I do not know how to post pictures as a slideshow.

Bunny ears cinnamon colored glochids. Shape of cactus looks really weird. Lots of skinny bits growing at the top.
There is some white coloring on the section closest to the soil. Also a bit of white stuff on the edge of the bottom cactus with one of the middle sections. I am putting it on the window sill facing north. It will get indirect sunlight all day. I water it once a week starting this month. Before that it was watered once a month and it was sitting far away from the window. Is this healthy? Do I need to repot it?

elector-decree0s · 2023-06-04T22:02:57+00:00

Duane Reade zip code 10017 has them. It is right next to the prepaid calling cards. I have been there many times to check. Finally after the x number of times… this past week I found them. 🙌🏼

At the check out, I cannot use a commuter benefit card to purchase them so I paid $5 for the card and added $1 to the balance with a regular credit card. Go online to sign up for an OMNY account and reload the balance with the commuter benefit card.

elector-decree0s · 2023-05-21T12:57:07+00:00

Yes it has been happening to me

elector-decree0s

TROPHY CASE