Trip to China 2010

 As some of you may know I spent a month of this summer in China. I went with my girlfriend's family and our entire travelling party was 12 people. Although it was incredibly hot I had a blast the entire time. Here are some shots from the trip.

We had a layover in Vancouver on the way so we hopped on the skytrain to get some dimsum in Richmond

The Beijing airport

Leftover peppers from the soup we had the first night we arrived

At Tiananmen Square and The Forbidden City

Group of kids dressed up in miltary clothes at the Great Wall

Army surplus flea market

At the Summer Palace

Pomegranete trees were everywhere

Our Beijing tourguide Rocky

Street vendor making a stamp for Andrea

Our Tai Chi instructer

Drum performance at the bell tower

Olympic grounds

The CCTV building on the right and the burnt Madarin Oriental hotel on the left. Apparently the CCTV building had a party of top of their roof and some fireworks hit the Madarin shortly before it was supposed to open and now it uninhabitable

City wall of Xian

Terra cotta warriors

Plane ride above Guilin

Our Guilin tourguide Charlie

We spent a few hours cruising down the Li River near Guilin

Snake wine

We were advised not to join the locals in swimming in the river in town

Panda at the zoo in Chongqing

View of Chongqing. Our Yangtze River cruise took off from here.

On one of the excursions we got to go on some little boats up a nice side stream.

In the shallower sections the rowers got out and pulled.

Shanghai

The men of the trip

Acrobatic show

One of the mornings in Shanghai I took the train to visit my cousin and his wife who've been living in Suzhou for 8 years.

Taste of home at the Canadian pavillion at the Shanghai World Expo

The whole building was made of cedar and as such smelled beautifully. It was a nice reprise from all the Chinese food to eat a burger, poutine and draft beer inside.

I was a Digimon fan as a kid so I had to take a picture of this

A tea farm in Hangzhou we visited and stocked up on longjing at

View from our hotel in Hong Kong. Andrea's family is from Hong Kong so we stayed here for a week, which was much longer than we stayed in any other city.

The total for this entire meal was around $3.50 Canadian

There was a typhoon while we were there

Gondola ride up to see the giant Buddha

Frog on a lilypad

Pickup: L.L. Bean Signature Featherweight Hunting Jacket

A few weeks ago I was thinking about some fall essentials that I needed. One of them was a fall jacket. I thought about getting a Barbour but then decided I'd rather save my money so I can go back to Japan next summer. When I saw that this jacket was on sale I was pretty much set. I emailed LL Bean to ask for measurement differences in the 2 sizes I was deciding between and they emailed back within 5 minutes. I was quite impressed. The jacket features 2 flap pockets, a small chest pocket and a back game pocket. I'm not really sure what to do with the game pocket but I've already used to it haul my clothes to the tennis center.

Back pocket entrance to game pocket

Arm pit ventilation

Inside entrance to game pocket and waist draw string

Wings + Horns Spring/Summer 2011

I recently noticed that Wings + Horns updated their website with some pictures of both this upcoming season's gear along with next spring/summer's. Of all the seasons that I've followed Wings + Horns this may be my favourite yet. All the pieces look very wearable with standouts having to be the rust coloured trench and the various styles of pants. Despite them being a Canadian brand with production taking place in Canada I still have yet to own any of their pieces. This spring, that will hopefully change.

Chemise Nationale Wabash Workshirt

Another great item from the National Anthem camp is this wabash workshirt. I've mentioned before that wabash is a nice alternative to chambray and not as common. This one is more affordable than the ones I posted before and it's made in Canada to boot. Now that the weather is starting to cool this would be a great addition to any wardrobe. Available through Rakuten.

Pocket design

A semi-floating pocket. Apparently originally designed to stop your money and tobacco from getting wet.

Triple-stitching

A close up shot of the wabash fabric

The reverse side of the fabric

Watches from Inception

I just finished watching Inception. One of the things I noticed right away were the classy looking timepieces the characters were wearing. Now, I'll admit I pretty much know nothing about watches but these models look pretty close to me. The first shot for each watch is a screenshot from the movie. Please feel free to correct me as, mentioned earlier, I am no watch expert.

Tag Heuer - Carrera Automatic WV211B.BA0787

Issey Miyake - Trapezoid (Designed by Naoto Fukasawa)

Oris - BC3