TRIVIA 12

Policemen in shorts and knee hi socks, as seen in Bermuda, was a common sight. I like the look!

A road train is 3-5 18-wheelers hooked together. They are quite common in the sparsely populated Australian outback and those trucks are really long.

Mount Lofty House is outside Adelaide, in the Lofty Mountains. It is a beautiful 150-year-old mansion, built 1852-58. Originally the house was built as a cool summer home for politician, lawyer, businessman Arthur Hardy and his family. The sandstone mansion had seen many owners before it was destroyed with only the massive stone walls surviving in the bush fires of 1983. An architect bought the estate and rebuilt the mansion to its former splendor. The new mansion opened in 1986 with eight guest rooms; the next 21 rooms in the Summit Wing were opened in 1988. Our room was huge with a large sitting area and French doors that opened out onto the manicured grounds. What a gorgeous place for a quiet, restful vacation!

From Mt Lofty one descends down into the Barossa Valley, which is called a hung valley because one end of the valley is 600’ above sea level while the other end is only 150’. The valley is a well known wine producing area with many small wineries and tasting rooms and where 16 varieties of grapes are grown. We ate dinner at one of the larger wineries and were served kangaroo which is a very lean meat with only 10% fat content compared to beef’s 25%. Because it is so lean it can quickly become tough, so is best if marinated and undercooked.

In Europe the toilet is exactly that or the WC. When we were hiking in England and was nowhere near a loo and needed to revert back to nature we used the green room, a rather nice euphemism. In China on long bus rides through the countryside we’d often stop for the happy room.

In Tibet at the Potala Palace we stopped to watch people making crushed gravel from boulders. There were people at different stations, first breaking the boulder up, then hammering away to make smaller stones, then another pounding to make pebbles. Incredible!

Ten resident cats at the palace keep a mice/rat population under wraps!

China’s money is called Renminbi (RMB). The basic unit is the yuan, pronounced Juan as in 

 Spanish, which is divided into ten jiao, which again is divided into ten fen. One US dollar

 was equal to 8 yuan.

Crusty hard rolls. Impossible to eat without making a mess but ohhhh so good.
 
All through the Alps on our Alps hiking trip we noticed an unusual structure over various 
parts  of roads. Some were log enough to simulate a tunnel, but were open on the down side
 of the road and supported by posts every few feet. The mountain side of the structure seemed to be built into the mountain itself. The roof slanted ever so slightly to the valley side of the road. After inquiry I learned they allow the avalanche to continue over and past the road with the snow dumping over the side. They kept the road clear in avalanche-prone areas. What a simple solution!
 
I often have a spitze at home. I picked up the half cola, half lemonade in Austria while bikeing and I really like the combination.

               China clay, a kind of clay not a Chinese clay, is quarried, but only
 a small amount of it is sent to the china industry. It is the paper industry
 that has a big demand for it, as it is the substance that makes shiny paper 
for all those colored ads.

TIBET'S POTALA PALACE

                       The World's Highest Palace

            The first thing anyone arriving in Lhasa, Tibet notices is the Potala Palace, which dominates the Lhasa skyline. The extraordinary 13 story Palace, one of the grandest monuments in Asia and the world, towers over one of the world’s highest cities. Stretching 400-meters east to west and 350-meters north to south, it would be hard to miss! It stretches 400-feet toward the sky on top of the red hill and is 1000-feet above the valley floor. It definitely dominates the city. At an altitude of 12,359-feet it is the highest ancient palace in the world. The name translates into Buddha of Mercy.

            Built in the 17^th century it boasts 10,000 chapels, a labyrinth of mysterious dungeons and 1000 rooms, including the Red Palace, where the Dalai Lama once lived. It took 7000 workers and 1500 artists/craftsmen more than 50 years to build the adjoining Red and White Palaces that are known as the Potala Palace.

            A small bus drove us up the hill to the 5^th level of the palace. From there we walked up one level at a time until we eventually reached the top. There were not too many stairs and the climbs were not too steep.

            The palace has a complicated  layout of halls, chapels, libraries, small galleries, and winding passageways on several levels. The Great West Hall, the largest at 7800 square feet, is surrounded by three chapels. I thought the inside of the palace was dark, dank and dingy even  though it houses a stunning array of treasures including bright brocades, religious scrolls, murals, gold and jeweled-encrusted tombs, 200,000statues and hundreds of Buddhas. The Palace was designated a UNESCO site in 1994. Some restoration was in progress.

            The Red Palace is painted red to symbolize stateliness   and power. The White Palace  represents peace and serenity. The building was started by the 5^th Dalia Lama in 1645 and only two parts of the construction remain that date to the 7^th century.

            We spotted 3-4 of the ten resident cats of the palace that are kept to keep a rat population under control.

Sweeping views of the city below could be seen from various vantage points. It was a clear sunny day and at the very top of the world we were surprised to see how large the city actually is. At ground level it seemed smaller.

Top of the world was a perfect place for a group photo. We lined our cameras on a bench for our guide to take the pictures. We were the focus of many Chinese also visiting the temple and it was fun to see so many of them line up to take pictures of us. It was a new experience to be an attraction. But there was no way an American group could blend in to that society.

A walk down many many steps returned us to street level. However, for the most part the steps were not very steep and pretty easy to navigate.