Garage Sale

I have accumulated quite a bit of stuff in the past 17 years in the US. I decided I needed to start getting rid of the 'lee lee kok kok' (translation: miscellaneous) stuff before my move. Originally, I thought I could bring many of my electronic items over but Chris informed me that Australia was on a 240v power (vs. 110v in the US/Taiwan).....!!!! Argh...which means, most of the electronics that do not accommodate the dual voltage had to go. I dug around my kitchen and found quite a bit of electronic items like: rice cooker, electrical hotpot, George Foreman grill, food dehydrator, juicer, etc.... Hehe, luckily, I can offload some of those to Cynthia so she could make use of it. Others would have be to sold. I also rummaged around my storage and found an assortment of things to sell as well - first gen Playstation plus dancing pads, roller blades, extra chair/stools, etc.

My friends had a block sale (their entire block of neighbors coordinated to have garage sales) this past weekend and they were nice to set up a big long table on their lawn just for my things. The garage sale was scheduled for 8am but I was told that people start coming in super early around 7:30ish to scout out the best things. I got there around 6:45am to setup and before I could properly price my items, people started dropping by and asking how much this and that was. Since this was my first garage sale, I didn't have a clue how to properly price my things but luckily my friends were there to help me out. The most expensive item I priced was $20 for the food dehydrator which no one wanted to buy. (FYI: food dehydrator is for drying out food to make things like dried fruit.) Other things ranged from 25 cents to $5. Garage sale hunters are typically there for the bargains and bargain they did! Despite all the bargain prices, I still netted $130! I was quite happy with the outcome since if I hadn't sold those things, I would have eventually had to donate it. Glad to see at least some people can feel like they got a bargain and benefit from the stuff that's been in hiding for 2+ years and I get some extra cash! :)




The stuff on the lawn are all my stuff to be sold.

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Bay Area Adventures Video

Bay Area Adventures, California from Christopher Chan

This is a compilation video of all our activities in the Bay Area over three weeks while I was there visiting Yvonne. It has a lot of yet unseen footage of Yvonne's antics (ok and mine as well). :)

If you want to watch this video in full HD quality, you should watch the video directly on the Vimeo website. This does require a fast Internet connection.

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Chatswood Rainbow

It's been raining in Sydney all this week but we finally had some sun today and this brilliant rainbow appeared. This photo was taken from my balcony looking into the heart of Chatswood.
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Pinnacles National Monument Video

Pinnacles National Monument, California from Christopher Chan.

A video of our hike through the Pinnacles National Monument with two of Yvonne's friends.

If you want to watch this video in full HD quality, you should watch the video directly on the Vimeo website. This does require a fast Internet connection.

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The Improv

Yvonne and I attended a comedy show at San Jose's The Improv theatre. It was the first comedy show that both of us have been to. The star of the show was Steve Byrne, an Irish-Korean comedian.


As we were one of the first to arrive at the theatre, we were ushered to a very good table near the front of the stage. We started off the evening with dinner which was mediocre but we weren't there for the dinner. An hour later, the show started with a couple of warm up acts which were pretty good. Steve Byrne came on for the last hour of the show and he was quite funny.

The trouble started near the end of his show. Steve decided to call for "volunteers" to join him on stage for an act. Being seated near the front of the stage, I was the first "volunteer" he picked on and summoned on the stage. Luckily for me, there were another five or six guys that he picked. Whew !!


But just as I thought my worst fears were over, I found out what he wanted us to do on stage. Dance. Steve's idea was that he wanted to start a boy band and wanted to train us up with some moves. So we have to follow along and needless to say we generally made fools of ourselves.

But he had more in store for us than dancing as a group. Once that was over, he decided that he wanted each of us to do a solo dance. I nearly fainted at this stage. I was the second last person in line to do this. But as luck would have it, the guy in front of me was a accomplished dancer and he had a pretty amazing set of moves which he confidently displayed on stage. How do I follow up with that performance ?

When it came to my turn to do the solo, I scampered forward, did my jig as quickly as I could and dashed back in line. Steve was apparently unsatisfied with my meagre performance and demanded that I re-do it. As if I wasn't embarassed enough as it was, I had to go out and do it again !!

This entire time, Yvonne was sitting in the front row enjoying my obvious embarassment on stage. Not only that, she even broke the rules of the theatre and filmed the entire segment.


I have to say it was a memorable evening but one important lesson learned is to never sit in the front row when it comes to comedy shows. Best to hide somewhere dark near the back.
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Bay Area Day Trip

On April 17, 2009, we visited the historical country estate built around 1915 called Filoli, which is renowned for its beautiful 16 acres of gardens. Filoli was also featured on tv shows like Dynasty and in some movies. The name Filoli was derived from the first two letters of the owner's credo:"“Fight for a just cause; Love your fellow man; Live a good life.”

It was a great time to visit Filoli as a wide assortment of flowers were in bloom at this time of the year. We saw colorful tulips and other flowers that I could not name. :P There was even a rose garden but roses were not scheduled to bloom until May. Chris took a lot of nice photos of flowers and portrait shots of me. :)



After Filoli, we headed up to San Francisco to Golden Gate Park where we took a leisurely walk in the park and around the lake within GG Park. We were originally planning to go to the Academy of Sciences which houses an aquarium and planetarium, but did not have time since we were scheduled to catch a baseball game that night.



On the far end of GG Park was Ocean Beach where Cynthia used to live. We ventured onto the beach to take some photos and it brought back nice memories of when I was staying with Cyn in San Francisco. :) As you can tell, we didn't want to get our pants wet or full of sand so we rolled up our pants like farmers and took a nice jump shot. As always, the wind was blustery so we quickly packed up and set off to catch the 1 hour Muni train ride into the city for the baseball game.


AT&T Park is one of the nicest ballparks I've been in. It was built in 2000 and is right next to the San Francisco Bay. It's the park where the SF Giants play and houses a big Coca Cola bottle slide and a big glove sculpture. My first ball game here was when Cynthia got free tickets from her boss who had 3rd or 4th row seats behind the Giants dugout. Chris and my seats this time weren't as close but we also had a great view, staring down first base. It was Chris' first baseball game and he quickly picked up the rules of the game and was clapping and cheering for the Giants in no time. We left around the 8th inning as we wanted to avoid the crowd. We finally got back to our car parked near Ocean Beach and drove back down to San Jose. It was a fun-filled day! :)

Click to view Photo Gallery
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Golden State Warriors vs. Houston Rockets

I am a fan of the NBA and one of the things I wanted to go and see during my recent trip to San Jose was an NBA match. Luckily the regular season was drawing to a close and we managed to get some good tickets to watch the Golden State Warriors play the Houston Rockets.



The game was played at the Oracle Arena in Oakland, near San Francisco and it was scheduled for the same night as when I arrived in San Jose - Friday, April 10th. Luckily, I arrived earlier in the day and had time to get some sleep at home before heading out to watch the game. Unfortunately, we did not know that, that same night, in another arena right next to the Oracle Arena, was a baseball game. The traffic going in that area was terrible and we were very late for the game. In the end, we decided to park somewhere and walk to the arena rather than be stuck in the jam. Even then, we missed the first quarter of the game entirely and got there in the second half of the second quarter.

Though the Warriors is the home team of the Bay Area, we weren't there to watch the Warriors as unfortunately they are quite a lowly ranked team in the league. We were there to watch the Houston Rockets and in particular, Yao Ming. But to our disappointment, Yao Ming didn't play at all, due to an injury. Even without its star centre, the Rockets had full control of the game and defeated the Warriors.

It was a great experience to be able to watch a live NBA game and we thoroughly enjoyed and it was great to see the Warriors fanbase out in force even though the Warriors weren't going to make it into the playoffs.
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Yosemite Video : Part 3

Yosemite National Park - Waterfalls & Mirror Lake from Christopher Chan.

Just when you thought you've seen the last of our Yosemite trip, here's the final part of our video series. This video features Yosemite Fall, Bridalveil Fall and Ribbon Fall.

If you want to watch this video in full HD quality, you should watch the video directly on the Vimeo website. This does require a fast Internet connection.

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Monterey Bay Aquarium Video

Monterey Bay Aquarium, California from Christopher Chan

Here is a video created by Chris of the Monterey Bay Aquarium.

If you want to watch this video in full HD quality, you should watch the video directly on the Vimeo website. This does require a fast Internet connection.

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Monterey Bay & 17-Mile Drive

It's time for a new blog post, on something other than Yosemite! :) Today's post will be on our visit to Monterey Bay & the scenic 17-mile drive in Carmel.

On April 11, the second day after Chris' arrival, we drove down to Monterey Bay, which is about 1.5 hour drive from San Jose. Our plan for the day was to visit the Monterey bay Aquarium and take photos of the sunset at The Lone Cypress along the 17-mile drive.


Photo Gallery | Chris' Monterey Photos

At the Monterey Bay Aquarium, we thoroughly enjoyed watching the sea otters, jellyfish, seahorses and penguins swimming around. I thought the most interesting thing we saw was the seahorses that looked like kelp/seaweed - they're called Sea Dragons. After our tour of the Aquarium, we treated ourselves to some yummy ice-cream at the Ghirardelli Chocolate Ice-Cream Shop where we both ordered a big scoop of ice-cream.



We then headed on over to the scenic 17-mile drive and slowly made our way along the beautiful Pacific coast-line. The 17-mile drive passes along the famous Pebble Beach golf course and large mansions. We stopped at several scenic spots to take photos and even climbed on some rocks to take photos of the waves crashing against the rocks. As you can see from the photo slideshow, the waves were not small.

GPS map of our 17 Mile drive :




We finally made it to our last stop - The Lone Cypress and set up the camera to take the beautiful shot of the famous tree at sunset. Although it was getting chillier as the sun set, we were glad we were able to witness and capture that beautiful moment together. :)


P.S. Happy Mother's Day!!! :)
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Yosemite Video : Part 2

Yosemite National Park - Yosemite Valley from Christopher Chan.

Part 2 of a series of videos shot during our recent trip to the Yosemite National Park using Yvonne's fancy digital camera that takes HD video. This part features various scenes around Yosemite Valley including El Capitan, Half Dome, Sentinel Rock and Cathedral Rocks.

If you want to watch this video in full HD quality, you should watch the video directly on the Vimeo website. This does require a fast Internet connection.

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Yosemite Weekend Part 3

On the third and last day of our weekend in Yosemite, we decided to have an early start in the Valley so that we can leave earlier and beat the exit traffic. Our kind hosts packed a nice breakfast for us to take on the road and we left our comfortable B&B inn behind and to head, once again, back in Yosemite Valley on a cold -7C morning.

We weren't planning on any strenuous hikes this morning, instead we drove around the Valley again and stopping at every possible lookout point. We've seen the valley on a cloudy day and a sunny day but yet again, the valley looked different today under different light as we were here a few hours earlier than yesterday.

One of the most amazing views, if not the best view of the entire trip, that we came across this morning was Valley View (see below). The panoramic view included the famous El Capitan (on the left) and Bridalveil Falls (on the right). Surprisingly, it wasn't at all crowded when we got there though a tour bus did show up about 15 minutes after we got there.



Very reluctantly, we left the Valley after visiting all the lookout spots and headed towards Mariposa Grove, near the entrance of the park. Mariposa Grove contains the largest grove of Giant Sequoia trees, including two of the largest sequoias in the world. We didn't spend too long there though the trees were very impressive. Strangely, many parts of the grove appear to be have been burnt out, not sure if this was a planned burning or a wildfire.


From Mariposa Grove, we said our final goodbyes to the wonderful Yosemite National Park and headed back to San Jose.
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Yosemite Weekend Part 2

We had originally planned on getting up early and making an early start to go back to Yosemite. But after the long and tiring first day, we decided to sleep in a bit on our second day and to only venture into Yosemite after enjoying a nice breakfast that came with our stay at the Big Creek Inn.

And the breakfast spread certainly did not disappoint. Our hosts, John and Pamela, provided a nice breakfast buffet that consisted of fresh fruits, bread, bagels and cereal. They also chatted with us throughout breakfast. The inn had three rooms and was fully booked that weekend that we were there. But we were the first couple to up for breakfast (and we were also the last couple to return to the inn the night before) so it looked like we were making the most of our visit.

After breakfast, we drove back to Yosemite Valley. While the inn was only a very short distance to the southern entrance of the National Park, it was still a 30 minute drive from the park entrance to the valley itself. This drive was a marked contrast to our first drive to the valley yesterday. Instead of a overcast, rainy and cold day, we had a beautiful sunny and cloudless blue sky day. Everything seemed so different under these much more favourable conditions.

We noticed that the snow fall from the previous night was still on the ground at certain parts of the drive into the valley. We drove around the valley and stopped at various photo and look out points to take photos of the neverending beauty of this valley. The valley itself is not very big but there were many stops.

Some of the landmarks we stopped by to admire and photograph on this morning were Cathedral Rocks, El Capitan, Bridalveil Falls and Yosemite Falls. There are thousands of waterfalls in the national park and you cannot get enough of the magnificence of the display of seeing gallons of water cascading off rocky cliffs.

After photographing the falls from a distance, we eventually parked the car near Sentinel Bridge which was a central location to many of the attractions in the valley and we decided to walk around for the rest of the day. We stopped for a brief lunch at the Yosemite Village (burgers) before exploring the valley on foot.

From Yosemite Village, we walked to the Lower Yosemite Falls (see below). As we entered the region near the falls, it was noticeably colder and there were a lot of unmelted snow lining the various creeks that flowed from the falls. The Lower Falls were flowing at full volume and we decided to put on our ponchos for some weather protection after the soaking we received the previous day when we visited the Bridalveil Falls. But of the hundreds of people at the falls, we were the only ones wearing ponchos. After a while, we decided to take ours off so as not to stick out like sore thumbs.



Photographing around the Lower Falls (see below) was challenging because of the strong spray coming from the falls and from the crowd that was at the falls. Yvonne remembered her previous to the same falls five years ago during summer and the falls were all but a small trickle. What a huge difference a different season makes !



From the Lower Falls, we walked back out towards the valley and we walked across the Sentinel Meadows where we were treated to a beautiful view of Half Dome. On the other side of the meadows were the Cathedral Rocks with a picturesque chapel in their shadow. We finished our walk around the valley at Sentinel Bridge where photographers typically gathered to photograph the Half Dome during sunset.

Unfortunately, by late afternoon, a lot of clouds rolled in and our blue sky day was no more. After waiting for half an hour at Sentinel Bridge, we decided that today's sunset was not going to much of a sunset after all and we packed up and headed by to the car. As we drove towards Curry Village for dinner, we passed by a meadow with a beautiful panoramic view of Half Dome and North Dome and we pulled over for another photo opportunity (see below).



After the last shots of the day, we had dinner at Curry Village. The buffet dinner was surprisingly cheap and it wasn't too bad. After dinner, we drove back to the inn. At the inn, we decided to layer up on warm clothing and we headed out to see the stars from the balcony. And what an amazing sight it was. We stayed out there for 20 minutes or so but we had to retreat to our room as it was getting way too cold outside despite our many layers of clothing. Thus, ended another amazing day at Yosemite.
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Yosemite Video : Part 1

Yosemite National Park - Tunnel View & Bridalveil Falls from Christopher Chan.

This short video is part of a series of videos shot during our recent trip to the Yosemite National Park using Yvonne's fancy digital camera that takes HD video. Part 1 features scenes of the famous Tunnel View and Bridalveil Falls. El Capitan and Half Dome make cameo appearances.

If you want to watch this video in full HD quality, you should watch the video directly on the Vimeo website.

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Three Weeks Through the Eyes of Facebook and Twitter

I am a big fan of social networking websites such as Facebook, Twitter and Flickr. So, what better way to keep a journal of my three week visit to San Jose than with these websites. Click on the picture below to view a reflection of my visit as captured through my updates on Facebook, Twitter and Flickr. Once the image load, you can click on the "Next" link near the bottom right hand corner to move from page to page.

You can click on any photos that you see to see a larger version and there are also a couple of videos which you can click on to view.


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Yosemite Weekend

Chris and I spent 3 days and 2 nights at Yosemite on April 24 ~ 26. The weather was predicted to be rainy the whole weekend so we were a bit disappointed as we had planned on taking lots of photos and doing lots of hikes. Luckily, as our trip neared, the forecast predicted it to be sunny on Saturday and Sunday so we were ecstatic! Chris' plans of capturing sunset photos in Yosemite were possible again! :) But it was going to be -7C to 12C over the weekend. Brrrr. We made sure we brought many layers of clothing, scarves and our mittens.

We left early Friday morning around 8am and arrived at our Bed & Breakfast around 11:30am. Unfortunately, the B&B wasn't available for check-in until 3pm so we drove directly into the Yosemite Valley, which was another 30 minutes from the Yosemite National Park gates. We encountered a dreary, drizzling, colorless day but we made the most of it. We stopped at the Tunnel View which had a magnificent view of the Valley, and then onto Bridalveil Falls, which was at its fullest at this time of the year, because of all the snow that's melted. The path to the bottom of Bridalveil Fall was very wet and you could see streams of water flowing down the walkway. Needless to say, we didn't want to get ourselves any wetter, especially with our camera equipment, so we took pictures of the flowing rapids and of the fall from a distance.

We continued our leisurely drive along the Yosemite Valley and was greeted with the grandeur of El Capitan, one of the world's largest granite rock formations. We could see trickles of waterfalls all along the granite walls and as we drove along, we saw the picturesque view of the Yosemite Falls, which is the sixth largest waterfall in the world. We felt compelled to stop at every stop to take photos, as you can see from our photo slideshow below.



Photo Gallery | Chris' Yosemite Photos

Chris had wanted to take sunrise photos of Mirror Lake so we decided that we check out the moderate hike so we would know the way the next day. So we walked on the path towards Mirror Lake, stopped to take photos of the river rapids, walked, stop, photos, walk, etc...you get the picture. ;) As we walked along, we saw a sign that clearly indicated 1 mile to Mirror Lake but after a long while, we felt we had walked an awfully long 1 mile, so we started to wonder if we were going the wrong way. Luckily, we saw some people walking towards us and we asked them where Mirror Lake was. They told us it was 20 minutes back! So we double backed and felt foolish to have completely missed the scenery we had set out to see. (Must have been all that walk, stop, photo taking routine...;P) Oh, and we also experienced some tiny pellets of hail on the way - very unpredictable weather that day. When we got to the Lake, we realized the sky was clearing and there were finally blue skies peaking out from underneath the clouds! You can imagine our excitement as we discovered we were able to see what Mirror Lake was named for. We saw an exact mirror image of the granite rocks, the fog, blue skies and trees against the lake. It was beautiful! Although we walked for an additional mile or two, we felt that it was such great timing. If we hadn't missed Mirror Lake the first time, we would have taken a few disappointing shots of the Lake and probably gone elsewhere. We would not have been able to capture the beauty of Mirror Lake. From Mirror Lake, we then raced to the Tunnel View again so that we could capture the sunset against the Yosemite Valley. We used my old camera to do a timelapse of the sunset and it was truly an amazing sight to see the sun slowing lighting up the meadow and the Bridalveil Fall and then slowly darkening the valley.

Wow, what a long blog post already and it's only the first day. Okay, I'll just end this post by saying that we tired ourselves out that first day. While driving out of the park, we realized there was snow on the side of the road which we had not seen earlier that day! Which meant, we experienced all the weather elements of fog, rain, hail, snow and sunshine, all in one day! We finally got to the B&B and was met with a very friendly inn keeper. The B&B was full of amenities and our room was also newly renovated! We really enjoyed the cozy accommodation after a long tiring day out. We realized we could see a gazillion stars outside but we were too cold and tired to gaze at them that night so we called it a night. Zzzzzzzz
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