More legoland

Some more pictures of our trip to Legoland in Windsor.

We all live in a yellow submarine...

That is a real shark in the top left of the picture

Ice Cream!

 In addition to the various rides, there were also a couple of shows which people can watch.  I have to admit that I was quite surprised by how good the shows were.  Very entertaining - even for adults!

Pirates - replete with cannons, explosions and lots of jumping into the water

 And what trip to Legoland would be complete without the chance to actually play with lego.

Not sure if that is a fire truck or Optimus Prime

Police helicopter!

Legoland - Windsor

In case it wasn't obvious, the pictures in the last post weren't actually taken from London.  They were actually taken from Legoland - Windsor.

We actually spent several days in Legoland which was a good idea as the place is pretty big and the first day was a little wet (it is the UK after all).

Can you spot which one is made of Lego?

Fighting fire - Lego style

By far the most popular attraction for the kids was the driving school which let the kids drive little go karts around a track.  They actually had 2 driving schools - one for younger kids where they just drove round in a big circle and one for older kids which was setup like a proper network of streets, stop signs and traffic lights.

Gordon leads the pack!

Gerry after shooting through a stop sign (without stopping)

Boats!

The kids second favourite attraction - shooting water at people!

Key London tourist attractions

Naturally, being in London, there are certain key tourist traps that you have to visit.

Tower Bridge

London Eye

Big Ben

Buckingham Palace - changing of the guard

Wembley!

:)

Lazing around London

As promised, some pictures of our recent adventure to the UK.  Huzzah!

Well, except for the fact that our first two days in the UK were spent in London recuperating from the long flight.  To be honest, we weren't actually that keen on spending time in London as we wanted to head into the countryside.  However, after a 13 hour flight, we thought that a couple of days in London to rest would be nice.

Turned out to be a good idea as on the second day, the kids fell asleep halfway through dinner and didn't wake up till the next morning!

The Monument, which if you are familiar with London, will tell you that...

... we were on our way to London Bridge

By the way, walking across London Bridge while singing "London Bridge is falling down" - totally did that!

Gerry managed to find a giant pearl

Ice cream!

Pro-tip - always take kids to London Bridge before Tower Bridge otherwise they will be completely underwhelmed by London Bridge.

And naturally, while in London, we had to go see the dinosaurs

Disneyland Parade

Woo!  Finally back in Hong Kong after an extended period of travel.  Will upload pictures of our holiday next week but for now, I quickly wanted to wrap up the Disneyland post with some pictures of the parade.

The last time we were in Disneyland, we actually managed to get a great spot to watch the parade.  We were basically right at the front so I decided to see how close up I could get with the zoom on my digital camera.  With that said, its a point and shoot so don't get too excited.
:)

Still, the close ups of the parade are interesting in that it gives a very different feel to looking at the pulled out shots which I have taken in the past.

Love the colours on Minnie's dress

I always feel a great deal of pity for the poor guy in the suit given HK is over 30 degrees and 90% humidity :)

Check out the size of that grin

Can't help but wonder how much their jaws ache after completing one parade

Disneyland! Again!

Summer has now officially arrived in HK.  I know this is true as our Disneyland season has started!

That's right - some more pictures of Disneyland!

As you can tell, it was sunny.

Gangsta!

Teatime

Ironmen

Get Bit!

I'm slowly (very very slowly) trying to get the kids to play more geek games.  My latest attempt at this is with the deluxe edition of Get Bit.

Get Bit is quite a fun game which involves each player in control of a pirate who has walked the plank and found himself in shark infested waters.  Hum - quite the pickle.  Luckily, being pirates, we are all good swimmers and immediately try to swim away.  Not so luckily, the shark, who isn't happy to see lunch swimming away, is a faster swimmer.

As in the old adage, you don't need to swim faster than the shark - you just need to swim faster than the other pirates!

In terms of gameplay, the game is basically a card game.  The higher the number on the card you play, the faster you swim.  However, if your number matches another number by another player, then neither of those players move that turn.  The player at the back gets bit and loses a limb.  Once all limbs are gone, that player is eliminated.  In order to avoid player downtime, we played a variant where the game ends as soon as one player is eliminated and the winner is the pirate at the front.

Group photo!

The shark, getting ready for lunch.

A common site - with the limbs of each pirate start slowly being eaten by the shark

Gordon got bit

I win!

Fergee - King of the Big Smelly

Time for some further adventures in my miniature painting.

I've finished up all of my Castle Ravenloft miniatures and have currently branched out into some sci fi.  With that said, you really wouldn't know it from the pictures below!

Anyway, the below mini is from Mongoose Publishing and is from their line of Judge Dredd miniatures.  As you probably guessed from the title, this is Fergee, King of the Big Smelly whom fans of old stony face will recognise as the dimwit who saved Mega City One during the reign of Judge Cal.

For comparison, the professionally painted version can be found here.

And yes, I just copied the colour scheme used by the professionals.  Don't have anywhere near the confidence necessary to start playing around with my own colour schemes yet!

No, he isn't playing baseball...

No, he isn't running away...

Hong Kong Science Museum

Can you believe that in all my time in Hong Kong, I have never actually been to the HK Science Museum?  Not sure why but I just never got round to it.

So it was with great glee that we set about to correct this grievous error a couple of weeks ago.  And naturally, we took the kids with us. 

Wow - the science museum is cool!

Cheese!

All tuckered out after a hard days play.

"But dad, wouldn't it be easier to just blow bubbles?"

Random picture of Gerry - just to prove he was there as well.

Easter in Wuhan - Part 2

Our adventure in Wuhan continues.

After visiting the local University, we headed out to a half completed waterwheel.  Not quite sure why a hal completed waterwheel is considered a tourist attraction but never mind.

The in-laws actually came with us

The following day, we went to one of the bigger local primary schools.  This was actually a real eye opener for me as it was amazing how big and well equipped the school was.  While we were there, the children actually got involved in a competition where they got into groups, together with local children, and built little cars made from recycled drinks containers.

Our team gets ready for action!

The finished car - ready to compete in the race and win! 

We didn't win.

After the school, we headed out to Chibi - location of the battle forever immortalized in Romance of the Three Kingdoms.

Getting ready to storm the Keep

Gordon helps in sending out the call to arms

Easter in Wuhan - Part 1

Over Easter, the school that Gerry goes to organised a trip up to Wuhan.  Seeing as it was a great opportunity for the kids to get to know China better, we coughed up the dough and turned it into our Easter family holiday.

The trip itself was amazing popular and we ended up with well over 200 people going split up over 6 different buses.  Wow!

Gerry taking a picture with some other kids just after we crossed the border into China

After a 5 hour train journey from the border, we finally ended up in Wuhan.  First stop - Yellow Crane Tower.  This was actually an old restaurant which had now been converted into a tourist site.  What was noticeable was that the building itself was massive and split over 6 floors.

En route to Yellow Crane Tower

Naturally, there is a mosaic of a yellow crane inside

After that, we headed out to Wuhan University.  Nothing particularly notable about the University as we didn't get to see much.  The big thing seemed to be seeing a bunch of pink flowers.

fyi - these flowers were fake and just there for an advert

These, on the other hand, are real

All that fuss for this