Sanya: The End of the World (2nd Stop)

After Shanghai we headed south to the island of Hainan that lies southeast of  Hanoi Vietnam.  Hainan is the winter vacation destination for China and is also very popular with Russians even though Russia and China are not as chummy as they were earlier in the Chinese resolution.

One of the stops was Monkey Island.  We took an aerial tram over to the island and were greeted by many monkeys!  

Those are fish farms covering the channel of water separating Monkey Island from the main island.  Each little fish farm has a shack where a family member guards his farm.  Some shacks looked like the family all lived there.

Lot’s of mom’s with their babies in tow are being carried in a number of ways.

The monkeys were very adept at stealing food that we might be carrying.  One lady eating a granola bar while was riding in a park’s electric bus, an enterprising monkey who jumped on the little bus, grabbed her bar and jumped back off before the little thief could be stopped.  I bought an ice cream bar in what I thought was a safe area….no monkeys to the left or to the right.  I was at the vendor’s stand and started eating my ice cream bar and all of sudden my ice cream bar jerked upwards and a large chunk of my ice cream bar was gone!  There was a monkey on the roof above the food vendor and the monkey reached down to snag a taste.  I debated between the risk of dying from some monkey-bourne disease and decided that I’d rather run the risk rather than waste the rest of my Magnum bar!

They also had performing monkeys.  I got the biggest kicks out of the monkey doing a handstand on the horns of a goat balanced on a bar. And the monkeys running around on stilts.

There were also big sandy beaches (the chinese aren’t as big into sunbathing as compared to Americans) away from the crowds.

There were sandy and rocky beaches that had more tourists than locals.  This beach is called the “end of the world” as it is the southern-most point in China.  It is a popular destination for weddings and honeymoons and for gathering photos for the wedding picture portfolio (a popular trend is for well-heeled couples to travel to many destinations with their photographer BEFORE they are married to have the most impressive array of photos to display at their weddings!

There were many gardens along the beach here is a large dragon sculpted into these flowering shrubs. There were elephants (full size) too.  I don't know if the dragon is full size or not....

There are pretty vistas for capturing the sunsets and for those so inclined, sunrises…Actually, I was always inclined to be asleep when the sun arose so the sunset was a better fit!

We could also see these alien pods on the spit of land out in one of the harbors.  They are actually condos that are being finished priced for the very well to do….and China have a lot of people that have plenty of money to spend.

 The city of Sanya is nestled in the hills on one side and the ocean on the other.  A pretty setting and the flavor of the city was different from the usual large Chinese city.

Looking toward the hills.

Looking from the hills out to the harbor at sunset.

More condos and hotels built on the rock cliffs that are also are part of the cityscape.