tunnel vision

“Where are all the mountains?” I asked my son, who lives in Switzerland.

After all, the first thing you would think about if this country came up in conversation would be the mountains. However, where Siegfried lives the terrain is merely undulating.

So he suggested that we visit the Walensee, a large lake to the south of where he lives.

On the way there, the rain was so heavy that I could barely see the car in front. I almost suggested that we turn back, but I’m glad I didn’t.

There is a motorway running along the south side of the lake, and also a regular road, which we followed. The traffic on this road was quite heavy, and progress was slow, but we eventually reached the western end of the lake and turned onto an extremely narrow single-track road. There are no passing places on this road, and the traffic arrangement to compensate for this is something very unusual. At the start of the road, there is an open area where cars wait. They have a seven-minute window, starting on the hour and half hour, when they can proceed. Vehicles travelling in the opposite direction also have a seven-minute window to proceed, starting at quarter past and quarter to the hour.

When we reached the end of the road, we were able to get out and walk around, and I took these photos of the lake and the surrounding mountains:

…and also this quite spectacular narrow waterfall:

…while Paula took these photos of an obvious temperature inversion (the rain had stopped by this time):

On the way back along the narrow road, I shot this video to illustrate how tricky the narrow road is to drive along:

If you do watch this video, be sure to turn the volume up, because the car’s sensors were constantly being triggered by the proximity of the walls. Siegfried said that he’d walked along the road previously, which must have been quite harrowing, because there are no opportunities to avoid the tunnels on foot, although he’d never driven along it.

And that was yet another great day in Switzerland, a country that I’d not previously visited (I was pulled from a school trip to Interlaken at 24 hours notice back in 1964 because I’d led a canteen protest earlier).

extraordinary egret exhibition

I often see egrets in our local river (Ng Tung River), but they are almost always solitary individuals, with just the odd occasion when I see two or three. This is in sharp contrast to the situation on the Kam Tin River (out west), where I frequently see large groups of egrets, together with cormorants, black-winged stilts and even the occasional spoonbill. However, this can be explained by the section of the Kam Tin River that we cycle along being a typical estuarine environment, with large areas of mangroves along the shore, while the Ng Tung River is about as far from the sea as it’s possible to get in Hong Kong.

I do see the occasional grey heron here, but nothing could have prepared me for the recent sight of dozens of egrets lined up alongside the winter channel of the river (all the rivers hereabouts have been canalized to prevent flooding, which I surmise would once have been a regular occurrence). And it wasn’t a one-off sight either. Each day for a week, it was party time for egrets on the section of the river that is visible from the road bridge linking the villages of San Wai (where I live) and Siu Hang.

18th december
On this date, Paula and I had walked up the river—something we rarely do nowadays because of the construction in progress—and when we reached the bridge we couldn’t fail to notice all the egrets in the river:

You can see a small part of the ongoing construction in both photos, and also the confluence with the Ma Wat River, which joins the Ng Tung River from the left in the middle distance.

19th december
The following day, when crossing the river, I couldn’t help but notice the concentration of egrets upstream from the bridge:

There are thousands of tiny fish in the winter channel—hence the lines of egrets on each side—which you can see from the bridge on sunny days because the light catches them as they move through the water.

Incidentally, the mountain in the distance is Hung Fah Leng (‘Red Flower Ridge’), otherwise known as Robin’s Nest, although I avoid using silly gweilo toponyms.

20th december
It was sunny on this day, although the fish are too small to be captured by my camera:

This is a closer view of the crowd of egrets where the river bends to the right:

21st december
The crowds were definitely largest on this day:

The first three photos were taken from different positions along the bridge on my way downriver, and the other three were taken about 20 minutes later, on my way home. I couldn’t decide which photo(s) to leave out, so I’ve included them all!

22nd december
This was undoubtedly the quietest day in the seven-day period:

23rd december
This occasion was the only one where I saw egrets close to the bridge on the downstream side:

The mountain in the distance is Lung Shan (‘Dragon Mountain’).

This is a view from the bridge of the same scene, looking directly down to the water:

24th december

Although I walk across the bridge every day, this was the last day when I saw more than two or three egrets. Perhaps they’d exhausted the fish supplies.

*  *  *

Regular readers of this blog will be aware that I’ve posted no new material for the past two months. It’s my ongoing problems with a lower back injury sustained back in July, which means that I cannot sit for extended periods. However, I wanted to post something before the end of what has been a fairly dismal year, and my recent encounters with egrets in our local river seemed a fitting subject.

On the bright side, since last month, I’ve been able to walk extended periods without the aid of a stick, and Paula and I have been out cycling twice a week this month, which has included two 62km rides, although I do have to be careful when stopping and putting my foot down. Here are two videos (shot on an earlier occasion) of part of the ride we did just two days ago:

I found the spiral ramp, which occurs between 5.06 and 5.21 in the first video, to be a bit of a beast! The hidden ramp starting at 2.22 in the second video is also quite tricky, especially if you don’t know it’s there.

I expect to resume posting regularly next month. I have two more reports to write that pertain to our trip to Switzerland in September, and there was a major event centred on the local ancestral hall (held, I believe, every ten years) earlier this month attended by many hundreds of people. I took a lot of photos, and here’s a taster:

I think that you will find a full account fascinating.

okie baroquie

When Paula and I visited Switzerland last month, our itinerary was suggested by my son Siegfried, who now lives there, and a major highlight of the week was a walk around the old town section of St. Gallen, a city east of Zurich. Naturally, I took a lot of photos, and what follows is a selection of what I consider the most interesting.

We had parked in a multi-storey car park, and almost immediately upon leaving this location I took the following photo, which shows a typical narrow street with a church in the distance:

Notice what I might describe as ‘bay windows’ on the upper floors on the right. Paula took this photo of part of the nearer example, which features some intricate carving:

The next photo is a view of the second ‘bay window’ (I imagine that there’s actually a formal architectural term for these features):

…followed by two close-ups of the structure:

Notice that the structure on the upper floor appears to be slightly misaligned, suggesting that it was added to the building at a different time.

This is a general view of the next street we walked along:

…and a slightly closer view of the church in the first photo:

Somewhere between the location of the two previous photos, Paula photographed these images, which I don’t remember seeing (too many other distractions):

When we finally reached the church, Paula took this photo:

…while I took this one:

I wasn’t able to ascertain the name of this church; nor were we able to go inside. And because of the closeness of nearby buildings, I couldn’t get far enough away to take a photo of the entire edifice, but it would certainly be worth taking a more detailed look on a subsequent visit.

Shortly after walking past this church, we emerged into an extensive open area. I don’t know for certain the nature of the surrounding buildings, but when I subsequently looked online, I found extensive references to an abbey, which once had an extremely large population of monks and still has a world-renowned mediæval library. The next three photos show the buildings surrounding the open area:

The imposing building on the left in the previous photo is the abbey’s former church, now the city’s cathedral (see below):

I took the last photo specifically because it shows the intricate pattern on the roof of the church I’ve been referencing above. And now for a closer look at the cathedral:

It struck me as quite odd that other buildings came right up to the cathedral on the left.

Paula took this photo of the side of the cathedral facing the open area:

…while these are mine, looking first straight on (this isn’t the main entrance!), then to the left:

I’ve just noticed the dormer windows set into the roof in the last photo, a feature that I’ve never seen before, so I can only speculate as to what they represent. If you have any positive information on the subject, please leave a comment. The previous photo also shows another feature that surprised me at first: a clock face looking back along the roof. But I should not have been surprised. Switzerland is a very clocky country, and even humble village chapels have clock faces on all four sides of their steeples.

I also took a photo looking to the right, but first a look inside the cathedral (we hadn’t expected to be able to go inside):

Although I’d never seen a Baroque church before, I recognized the style immediately (the present church on this site was built between 1755 and 1766, while the interior was renovated between 1962 and 1967).

You may be able to see what I think is a pulpit on the far pillar on the left. This is a closer view:

It never occurred to me to check the other side of the stone column to see whether there was a spiral staircase inside.

And this is the high altar area:

Even though Paula’s camera has a wider aspect ratio than mine, she couldn’t capture the entire panorama.

When we turned to leave and I looked down the nave, I noticed a splendid organ at the back of the church:

And this is the view to the right from the side of the cathedral, which I mentioned earlier:

You can see a mural on the building on the far side of the open area outside the main entrance to the cathedral. And this is a closer view:

I cannot state with any confidence what is being depicted here, although I do suspect that there is a religious motif running through what appear to be unrelated scenes.

And this is a closer look at the raised ‘bay window’, the top of which you can see in the previous photo:

Once again, the intricacy of the carving is absolutely stunning.

I took two photos of the buildings to the right of the mural, but I couldn’t decide which one to include here, so I’ve kept both:

Which do you prefer?

I took just two more photos as we made our way back to the car. I don’t know if the imagery in the next photo is what you can actually experience in the restaurant:

Unbelievably, this final image has been created by chiselling off some of the cement rendering on the wall of the building:

I’ve no idea what ‘Zur Lerche’ refers to (or means).

And that’s the old town of St. Gallen. The abbey/cathedral is a UNESCO world heritage site, and I’m sure there’s more to discover here, if I get the chance.