Tag Archives: Zhangjiajie National Park

Two More Weeks

16 Dec

Gosh, 2025 is coming to an end soon! There are two more weeks left in the year. And what a year it has been for me. As always, there were ups and downs, as well as memorable and sad moments, to mark another eventful year.

For me, the highlights have been my international travels! This year, I visited Bangkok, Halong Bay, ZhangJiaJie, Kyoto, and Osaka. And not to mention several local road trips within Malaysia. A good mix with family and friends, I would say, in terms of activities like shopping or golf, sights, and gastronomic adventures.

2025 saw my golf skills fluctuating up and down too much. I experienced both great games and frustrating ones, whether it was putting issues, chipping challenges, or just inconsistencies in my swing – I have encountered it all!

When the mindset leans more towards treating the game as a social outing, the focus on doing well tends to falter. If I want to play to win, I have to be very disciplined and change my mindset. We shall see.

2025 was also when hubby and I became serious pickleball players. We invested in better paddles, balls, and shoes, thus making our weekly games more enjoyable. When one has the right equipment and apparel, it makes the outing more comfortable and fun. And it’s a great alternative to golf, especially during the rainy season, because we play the sport indoors, covered from the weather in an air-conditioned space!

Thank you, 2025! But it’s time to store these wonderful experiences and memories away soon, and make way to usher in 2026 with a bang!

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Back to Golf!

6 May

It’s been a month since I last played golf! That’s a long layoff in my books. The trip to China took nine days; upon my return, I fell sick. And it’s taking a long time to recover from this bout of illness. It’s a potent germ from China. The plus side is that I lost some weight, which is nice because it’s so hard to shed a pound or two these days.

Exactly a month on, I played my first game today. How did I fare? There was some rustiness in swinging the clubs. The short game was horrid, but my putting was good, thanks to the ever-reliable Scotty Cameron putter.

All in all, it was a decent return. The tee-offs were respectable and even spectacular at times. But this could be the fairways being so hard, and the ball was able to roll some additional distance. The three- and five-woods were striking well, but it was the short irons that I had trouble.

Such is usually the case with a month’s layoff. All muscle memories are gone when gauging strength and distance. So I shouldn’t stress over this issue. I need to play more to get back my golf mojo, then I will be fine.

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The Overwhelming Trip Continues

29 Apr

On the fifth day of our trip, we visited Wulingyuan, a different historical and scenic site of Zhangjiajie National Park. We see so many rock formations that I have lost track of what is what and where. My knowledge of this place is terrible, as I didn’t do any research before coming.

There was another queue for a cable car to the peak to see more rocks! Hahaha. Another long trek day. I was hitting all sorts of records on the Fitness app in my AppleWatch. Yay!

Wulingyuan

That evening, we decided to attend the large-scale musical, the Fox Fairy Show. The live musical performance was very entertaining and colorful. I was most impressed by the outdoor theater setup at the foot of Tianmen Mountain. Costume and character changes were instantaneous without glitches with AI technology. Very impressive!

The Fox Fairy Show

The next day, we queued again (what else is new?) for the Bailong Elevator. Although we paid for VIP tickets to cut down our time waiting in line, it was still an hour before we could go up to the top. The Avatar Mountains were the highlight of this trip, but again, for me, the crowds marred the experience of seeing the floating mountains. I think the depth of the terrain was hardly visible, with so much greenery below. It was hard for me to grasp the sheer beauty of the place.

The floating Avatar Hallelujah Mountains

At all the attractions we visited, it felt like the whole world was there to see what we wanted to see. And if I thought it was the last of the long queues at Bailong, the next day’s attraction at the Zhangjiajie Grand Canyon Glass Bridge was another one for the record!

At the Glass Bridge

We gave up the last tour to visit Orange Isle when we saw the queues again. Hahaha. After so many days of long queue experience, we could not handle another long queue to see the statue of Mao Zedong. Everyone agreed we should go shopping instead.

Mass crowds from every attraction we went to!

All in all, this trip was all about nature, crowds, and queues. I have never been so overwhelmed surrounded by people. The trip culminated in the final two days at Changsha with a colorful cityscape skyline, more people, interesting food, and shopping.

So colorful!
Array of street food. Bottom right: bowl of cut chili is called a dipping sauce

Nine days were rather long, and although there were more downsides of crowds, queues, and packing the wrong clothes as far as the weather was concerned, I am taking the positives from this trip, checking off my bucket list, and cherish the time I had with the friends I grew up with.

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