Citronella Plant

Got some citronella plants （驅蚊草） from Mongkok the other day. For HKD 20, they are a good little herb to grow at home. The smell is pleasant and in fact if you go to Thailand for holidays, you would notice the smell immediately.

If you think they are going to drive mosquitoes away as they claim in the flower market, you are probably out of luck. As most studies indicates that the plant is ineffective in mosquito repelling.

Doubtful Sound

Alas, they didn't go to the Eighth Wonder of the World, Milford Sound. But instead they headed in a same direction from Queenstown to Te Anau and took a cruise round Doubtful Sound, less famous than the 8th Wonder but bigger and less accessible. Along the cruise, there were many waterfalls like the one shown here. Constantly surrounded by mist and fog, this rain-forest houses an amazing variety of luscious green flora and fauna. They got glimpses of some wildlife like the bottlenose dolphins and fur seals. Well worth a day-trip if just for the escape into the serenity of the Fiordland.

The Kea

While they didn't see any Kiwis, they saw this bird, Kea jumping around when they arrived at Manapouri on their way to the Doubtful Sound. It walked in a funny gait similar to how other parrots walk. Given how cute it look, it's hard to imagine the excerpt from wikipedia below:

"Now uncommon, the Kea was once killed for bounty as it preyed on livestock, especially sheep, only receiving full protection in 1986."

New Zealanders have made a lot of effort in conserving their environments. They eradicated foreign animals brought from Europe to create many bird sanctuaries around the area near Doubtful Sound. Wouldn't it be wonderful if everybody is so environmentally conscious!

Amisfield Vineyard

Central Otago produces some wonderful Pinot Noir and Amisfield was just one of the 3 vineyards visited in this region, the other 2 being Felton Road and Mt. Difficulty. Central Otago's pinot noir is characterised by more complexity and aromas than other wine regions in New Zealand. This is immediately obvious even to a novice drinker. Unlike Burgundy's pinot noirs, most of Central Otago's pinot noirs are drinkable and delicious when it's released.

Amisfield offers beautiful cellar door and a bar restaurant serving high quality local food for lunch. Mum and dad shared a "Trust-the-Chef" lunch set menu and for NZD 90, they got 7 different dishes from a selection of appetizers to a few main courses. Shame they never brought any leftovers home!! Mum did ship a few bottles of those pinot noir home though, perhaps dad will let us share the spoil:)

Aoraki/Mount Cook

If you expand the above photo, you will see a snow-capped mountain at the far end of the lake. This is the highest mountain in New Zealand, for more details refer to the wikipedia entry here. The Hermitage Hotel in the Edmund Hilary Centre offers simple and fresh lunch in a canteen style. Best of all, you can enjoy the view while you grab a quick bite. But it's not such a good idea to climb up and see the Hooker Glacier though. It's a tough climb on a hot day and you don't see an awful lot.

Seresin Estate - Panaromic view of a vineyard

View from the cellar door of Seresin Estate. This perhaps made the deepest impression among all the vineyards visited during this trip. The olive oil is very fragrant and they brought home a bottle, which both of us are eager to try!!

Seresin Estate

"Have you been to Seresin Estate yet?" asked an American lady who was also touring New Zealand. The name did not register as we only know a few vineyards at that point. "Ah then, you've got to go! It's owned by MICHAEL Seresin, a famous director." as she eagerly introduced the spectacular view there. Dad, ever so incredulous, then asked "so which movie is he famous for?" "Eh, no idea...."

Regardless the accuracy of the facts, it was a great recommendation. Thank you.

Wendy Campbell's French Bistro

As any internet junkie will do before going on a vacation, dad got list after list of things to do, places to go and, of course, restaurants to visit. This is just one of those lists detailing 33 restaurants across New Zealand. They ate in 4 out of the 33 and were most impressed by the dinner they had in Martinborough, Wendy Campbell's the French Bistro. (The other three are Terroir, Amisfield and Saffron. Saffron was a bit of a letdown.) The restaurant doesn't seem to have a website and because the menu is handwritten everyday, there isn't a copy in the internet either. But if you ever go on a wine tour in Martinborough, this restaurant is well worth a visit. Just a couple of pictures for you to savour.

Lake Wairarapa and Cape Palliser

This is not a famous tourist attraction. Mum and dad didn't know about the two places until they arrived in Martinborough. But then both offered something different and definitely worth the car drive out there. Mum was like walking into the end of civilization in the Lake Wairarapa picture. But the drive from Lake Wairarapa to Cape Palliser does feel like journey to the end of something, especially when most of the road surface was unsealed.

Hawke's Bay Winery Map

Always fascinated by maps and how people get lost holding their maps. For us, we just leave a mark wherever we go!! The map below shows the vineyards that mum and dad visited and bunches of grapes that you see everywhere in Hawke's Bay and in fact all the wine regions in New Zealand. Below that from left to right, cellar door of Trinity Hill, cellar door of Church Road and the entrance to Mission Estate.

Unison Vineyard

One of the boutique vineyards in New Zealand, your first impression of Unison in Hawke's bay is the intense smell of wine when you go into the cellar door. You can see the two big barrels sitting next to the small counter with several rows of smaller barrels inside.

Sileni Estates

If you visit Hawke's Bay, you should try Sileni for lunch, the result of totally unscientific survey of a few locals. You will be seated among beautiful vines and the quality of food is excellent.

Terroir - Craggy Range

Hot chocolate fondant - yummylicious :)

Craggy Range

Imagine staying in a vineyard........
Craggy Range is one of the vineyards which offers accommodation. This was the view from the "Cellarmaster", a small cottage where they stayed for 2 nights.

The restaurant Terroir is also a famous fine dining hub in New Zealand. They serve some of the most delicious potatoes, Terroir fries! The outdoor dining tables look over a lake where a small school of wild ducks live. Dining menus in New Zealand are all fairly similar in terms of price and dishes on offer.

Huka Falls

This waterfall is neither famous for its size or its height, but the amount of water (200,000 liters per second) which manages to squeeze through a tiny stretch of canyon (15m wide). Not a bad spot for being a 5-minute tourist if just for the impressive sound the water makes and the negative ions it generates.

Treetops Lodge

Treetops is privately owned estate which is truly special. Mum and dad were most impressed by the magnificent flora and landscape surrounding the place. And they only went there to have lunch!!

Trip to the Land of Kiwis

This blog has always been about us, the mutts, hardly anything is written about mum and dad. But then they recently left us home for a 2-week long vacation to New Zealand. So it's party time at home!! Guess you have more interest in the finer things in life like pinot noir than our daily mischief. So here you are, a sneak peek into the north-to-south journey they took.

Most people take a direct flight from Hong Kong to New Zealand, but then mum being ever so inventive managed to redeem business class flights via Singapore. So the journey started with the hawker center cuisine and a fish-foot spa (more on that in a separate entry). The connecting flight was schedule to depart the following morning, mum and dad decided to have a nap in the airport lounge. The short nap turned into a minor nightmare for mum when she woke up realising that her phone has gone missing. After a brief moment of frantic search for the gadget, they decided that it must have been pickpocketed.

The 9-hour flight to Auckland airport was filled with usual inflight entertainment like food served to you in tiny plates and movies on a 5-inch screen. Just before crossing customs mum dumped her bag of dried chinese plums as the sniffing Beagle edge closer to her, after having just hunted down another tourist in the baggage reclaim area. NZD 200 was probably too much to pay for the joy of nibbling dried chinese plums during the long drive from north to south.

Having decided to let fate control the hotel choices for most of this trip, they strolled to the tourist centre, i-Site, in the airport. It was almost midnight. With so many choices and no clues, they just picked something with the keyword "New" in mind. The result was Chifley Suites. You could see the Sky Tower when you look out from the room's balcony. This marked the start of their vacation in the Land of Kiwis, where they saw plenty of things dead or alive, but no Kiwis.

Yucks!! All these fish taking a nibble!!!

During the stopover in Singapore, mum and dad tried out another new fad, fish spa. They were going to kill some time and get a foot massage in the familiar spot near Tanglin Mall, but got suckered into paying more for the pleasure of having their feet tickled by hundreds of these Doctor Fish. First such spa opened in 2006 in Hakone, Japan and has found its way in many Asian countries including Macau (but not Hong Kong, perhaps the association with HK Foot is just too much to bear for some). Don't know how beneficial these fish spas are to the body, but if the place looks hygienic it's probably worth trying.

Instead of keeping Kois in our pond, we can setup our own fish spa at home. Such services are already available in the internet.

Memories

This blog has been inactive for almost 2 months, but it doesn't mean that life for mom and dad stopped for the last 2 months. On the contrary, events took over their lives which only now have settled down again. Sadly, Cadet is no longer with us in body, even though he is still very much with us in spirit.

From the first day when mom and dad took Cadet home, we knew he was a fierce one, not someone to pick a fight with!! If you own a copy of the HKDR Tribute Book 2, which came out officially mid October, you could see on pg 53 the following paragraph alongside the beautiful picture of Cadet taken by Ali.

Cadet - 2 years old, American Cocker, Favourite treat - Home made dog muffins
Like alumni in many schools , dogs that get remembered are often the naughty ones. Cadet is remembered by many at HKDR as the fierce one who packed a punchy bite despite his cute looking face and bum-shaking gait. We brought Cadet home on a stormy night in early spring this year. Due to his aggression, things were a bit tricky with Cadet in the early days- even a simple shower was a problem, let alone cleaning his drooping ears. After trying out a multitude of groomers and a dog trainer, who essentially failed in all aspects other than charging a fee; Cadet is lucky enough to have met Jack, the trainer. And now he can have his ear cleaned, his body shampooed and shaved without being sedated. In short, he can now live like any other well-pampered American Cocker Spaniel with his 2 friends, Buddy and Scottie the Schnauzers.

So far so good, what it didn't mentioned was that Cadet never quite shed its sudden aggressiveness towards human. His punchy bites have landed on all the members of the family including Jing, the helper. November 10, Cadet left his indelible marks on mom's palm and dad made the difficult decision that Cadet need to be euthanized.

For the following few days, we took extra long walks with Cadet. Then came Saturday, a sunny and beautiful morning, we walked all the way from Mount Butler to Parkview and back. Cadet had a hearty meal and was taken to Valley Vet. He took his last breath after the injection and fell asleep and said goodbye to this world after its relatively short life. Mom and dad looked on with tears rushing out from their eyes.

When they got home, they were greeted by the first boom of the Bugambilla tree in the garden, which never bore flowers in the 2 years since we arrived. Hardly a day go by without them glazing in the clear sky and saying Cadet is watching all of us from heaven........

大董 Da Dong Restaurant, Beijing

When most people talk about Da Dong in Beijing, they refer to its famous roast duck Beijing style. But a lot of their other dishes are worth trying. The presentation is often borrowed from western cuisine but the taste is 100% Chinese. They tried the roast duck as well as the sea cucumber, duck's tongue, spicy cabbage and toffee apple. Enjoyed every dish. Yummy!!