Xiamen & Gulangyu Island

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It was a really sunny day in Xiamen when we arrived on Saturday, we decided to get the ferry over to Gulangyu Island as we had the address of a hostel we thought we could stay in. We got what we thought was the passenger ferry across & I had checked with the lady in the ticket office that it went to Gulangyu & pointed to my map, she said it went to the location I was pointing to, (I should know by now not to trust what people say).

The boat arrived at Gulangyu but on the wrong side of the Island so it was really hot, starting to go dark & we didn't have a street map. We trekked across the Island, (which has no cars or motorbikes on, just golf buggies & push bikes), & finally found the road we were looking for. When we got to 21 the numbers jumped to 11 then to 8 then to 1, we asked several people who didn't understand us or pointed in different directions; we could not find 17 at all so we checked into a hotel in the end & got some food.

The following day was really hot so we went & ate our breakfast on the beach & walked around the Island seeing the sights, (Sunlight Rock, the Harbour, the statue of Zheng Chenggong & looking down all the side streets), before getting the ferry back to Xiamen. We headed for the train station on the mainland but our map was completely rubbish so two Chinese girls showed us the way. We managed to communicate very easily that we wanted tickets to Gaungzhou & after lunch we walked for miles, through the centre & past Nanputuo Temple & then back to the ferry.

It was so hot that in the afternoon we had a bit of a tropical rain storm which was actually really nice. We stayed another night in our hotel & checked out on Monday & relaxed in the park before getting the ferry to the mainland & heading to Gaungzhou on the train, (overnight) just for Tuesday & one night.

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Photos

Gulangyu Island at dusk
(From the boat)