Travel Life

This is a throwback article I wrote in 2012 with Lakehead University's The Argus (student publication). I wrote this in regards to a band I went to view and watch play downtown at The Apollo. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  On March 11, Zachary Lucky and his special guest Carly Maicher played live at the Apollo. The two amazing folk style acoustic musicians set the mellowed tone of a beautiful Sunday night with songs such as Lucky’s “Town to Town” and Maicher’s “See You Soon”. They set the stage and played at 9:30pm in which before that I had the pleasure of talking to Maicher and Lucky. Maicher is from Winnipeg, and has been with Lucky for about a year and change. This is Maicher’s first tour with Lucky but is having a great time. Lucky has planned that the tour will go through Southern Ontario as far as Hamilton and back up into the East and then through to the West. Lucky is from Saskatchewan and started touring four years a

 Having been to the Canton tower a couple times now, I turned down the extent of a third trip when my wife was accompanying one of her friends from out of town. Having been there during the COVID-19 pandemic, the tower was relatively calm. However it seems that the evening sunset is always busy.  The tower has now been equipped with numerous bars; lounges and restuarants. Booking in advance is always a best practice for those places. Ticket prices are not cheap, but for what it is, I mean, if one has time to just go up an elevator and look out some windows, its affordable. The expensive part is the climbing around the top of the tower while hooked on to bungee ropes, this is by far the most expensive excursion, however it is quite a spectacle to be a part of I would imagine. After sky-diving back in Canada, I figured I'd rest easy knowing what it was like falling from a a ridiculous height-knowing I would not need to again partake. There are small cars that surround the top of the

The Dandong Broken Bridge has been a tourist attraction we have visited on numerous occasions, since I moved to China, and my first trip there with Marty Avery and our driver, Autmn, to the point now where my son is interested in going to visit as a part of some normal routine that he has established when we go to visit my in-laws in Dandong. (Bono and Avery, Dandong, October 2014) (Bono Family, Dandong, Autmn 2016) (Bono, Dandong, Summer 2021) Gratefully, every visit has yielded the opportunity to introduce to someone who hasn't been there before or witness some sort of development. Last year the development was the construction of the knick-knack shop with Dandong tourist apparel (yes-I partake). This year the interesting and relatively unfortunate development has been the closure of the damaged site of the bridge. Some believe its based on maintenance others believe it is political. Politics are basically why there is a broken bridge in Dandong. The Americans bombed out the brid

 While we were in Heyuan, the local/regional museum was based on the land. The idea being its connection to KeJia People and Natural History. This being one of the main reasons we went to Heyuan. This Museum has the World's Largest Fossilized Dinosaur Egg Collection recorded. Heyuan's claim to fame in terms of dinosaur fossils lies with the bones of the Oviraptor who they depict as not so much an egg theif as much as an adoptive parent of the eggs it stole. Maybe some translation wasn't really on point, but it was a great exihibition all the same. One of the interesting pieces was the large petrified alligator snapping turtle, this being something that a highschool colleague of mine back in Port Colborne would be interested in. I recently saw one of his Instagram videos on Colossal beings of the past, Sheldon, if you are reading, head over to China! Anyways, another great exihbition worth checking out in Heyuan, great introductions to the KeJia Cui sine as well for those fo

We left Guangzhou for Heyuan through the East Railway Station where we were on the train about 3 hours (a bit less) and arrived at the very small Heyuan Railway Station. Arriving at Heyuan, its better to order a Didi taxi (if youre a foreigner or using a foreign APP Store go through alipay/wechat). the railway station is a decent trip away from the downtown area.  The downtown area isn't much of a bustling city night life location, however you can search and ask around to find a place to hang your hat the first night there. I did not frequent any as I was with my family.  We spent the time in Heyuan at the hotel (using the pool namely), and checking out the Museum as well as the lake. The lake as you see from the image on the ticket is one of the biggest natural freshwater bodies of water. This is one of the water resoviors used by Nongfu Springs Water.  While in the WanLv lake park, tourists take wharfs from one island to another, each island has a walking area, picture shooting s

This is the pamphlet information to Sacred Church in Guangzhou. A colleague attends Christian masses on Sundays, he says its very welcoming, very convenient and the delivery in the various offered languages are great. I have not had the opportunity to make it out there for a missal yet, but I really do hope to make it out that way sometime. As foreigners, there are no stipulations with going and participating. Check it out!  

A lot of these items are "goes without saying", however it is sometimes a good notice for folks who are picking up souvenir Zippos and carrying various beauty supplies that may create a lapse in judgment which ends up costing one a bit of headache or frustration upon arrival at the airport. Realistically, these are precautions taken to ensure the safety of passengers and staff on flights, however it is worth calling the airline in advance to better understand items that may be of question. It seems airports in China have very different expectations of what can and what can't as well as how hard they look through luggage, human error is more apparent going through smaller airports. An example, I left Dandong China (airport) arrived in Beijing, needed to collect luggage and go through security again where they discovered a lighter in my bag-honest to God, didn't realize it was there, was in a hidden compartment from night out.  Anyways, they were stunned that it made it

 Beautifully sunny day, scolding in heat, but beautiful all the same, my wife had some friends of ours who were in the province visiting family join us in Dandong to just have a day around so the kids could play together. These family friends of ours had never really spent much time touring around Dandong, whereas we have spent too much time touring around Dandong, however in all of our explorations, we had never come across this naval ship. The ship is located outside of the scope of the bridge, its further, heading towards New District. The ship's tickets were not too expensive, for the price, meh. However for the kids, it would have been the first and potentially the only (in most likelihood) that they would walkaboard and observe. There was not much to the history of the ship's significance as much as it was homeage to the ship's crew and the inner workings of the ship's basic functions. The ship is interestingly enough, situated to the opposite of a portion of the

 My wife was on a promotional trip sent on behalf of the educational group we were working for, this would have been around 2017, we were newly engaged and going to get married in Canada. My wife was going to Switzerland for a short trip to observe the Switzerland Education Group's facilities and campuses. This trip was to extend the relationship between the graduates of our employing school in China and the institutions that were developing culinnary arts, hospitality and tourism career-based programs. While on the trip in Switzerland, my wife picked up many great souvenirs, but the one that has been most useful and personally one of my prized belongings, has been this victorinox  As you can see the first thing to give after so many years of travelling from one place to another with a great deal of electrical equipment for carrying on flights has taken its toll on the seams of the main compartment of the bag. Unfortunately now, the bag is out of circulation. The warranty has long

 I was wondering why the military was blacking out their license plate, I asked a local friend and ultimately he believes (as he is also in the military), that the individual driving is conducting or operating and does not want to reveal their location; otherwise the idea is simply that they are driving a vehicle off base that should not actually be off base. Usually small investigations that don't warrant media coverage, are subtly handled though. Further this experience it was also interesting when we were flying out of Dandong, that the aiprort is literally structured next to/on the premises of a military training base. The air flight attendants were admiment on keeping windows closed and did not say "do not take pictures" out of the window, but really didn't want windows open until the flight was well underway. Interesting.