Yueyang....China


I left my hotel in Hengshan, China and was so happy to be moving on from a small city that had an array of pollution problems. The temperature was very high and while walking to the very dirty train station I had to side step slicks of restaurant waste and oil, while holding my breathe so I did not inhale the smoke from garbage burning. I had a one hour wait until the train I was to board left for Yueyang, Hunan, I did not know what to expect from this new city. The scenery from the train window was for the most part farms; every so often we crossed a river, they all seemed to be used for industrial use.

                      

                      

 My luck changed with the new city, my hotel was exceptional...actually beautiful; the staff was very friendly, with good English skills. After breakfast on the next morning I went up on the hotel roof for some photo's before I walked to the Yueyang Tower. The Yueyang Tower is one of 4 famous towers in China; it was originally built around 1,700 years ago and was rebuilt during the Song Dynasty (960-1127)

                      

   There is a temple up by the tower which is the norm for China

                      

The Tower is the highest point for this city of Hunan province and from up there I could see many boats and cargo ships using Dongting Lake, which is China's 3rd largest inland lake.

                      

                      

The visibility was just okay since the heat haze hampered the view. Although the temperature was about 40 degrees, I walked and walked on this day; I think I was in search of something that I never found. There was a real barrier with language, most everyone I tried to converse with did not know English.......friendly enough though. One humorous site was a sign that had English and Chinese, it said, "caution men at work", and here they were.

                     

  I got back to my nice hotel room and the air conditioner, the next day I planned to check out Dongting Lake. In the morning I ate so much food for breakfast so that I did not have worry about energy and I headed to the lake. I had to walk a lot further than it looked to be from my hotel roof but I made it; there was about a 4 metre wide walkway for as far as the eye could see. This was a huge undertaking and I could tell that when it was new it was very extravagant; unfortunately the walkway was showing it's age. Motorcycles were driving on the path and where there were 6 guys fishing there was garbage strewn all around. There was an old chairlift crossing the lake, the cars were all rusty and it looked like it had not operated in about 20 years. There was a public washroom where the excrement goes directly into the lake.

                   

  There were kids swimming across the lake so it must be popular with the locals.

                   

  I boarded a non-smoking bus, where the driver was smoking, and headed to the fast train station; my next destination was to be Wuhan, Hubei.

 

                 

 Guilin....China

  My last blog had me arriving back in Nanning after my train trip to Behai. I had posted a blog earlier about my bus ride to Sanya from Nanning (itoddmac.blogspot.com) and what an ordeal it was. I also posted a blog on this site (itoddmac1.blogspot.com) about my experience with climbing up a military mountain and the details that followed. Both of these previous blogs go together with this blog; I had decided after the reckless driving and the smoking on the bus from Nanning to Sanya that I would fly to Guilin. I was fortunate to have my friend Star in Sanya, despite the crazy scene with the military I had a great time with her and her family.

                     

    My flight to Guilin was 1 one hour and 20 minutes. The airport was 26 kms from the city so I caught a bus; the scenery was nice, there were many small limestone hills across the horizon and surrounding the city.

                     

 Once I was in the city I walked around and eventually found appropriate lodging. I went out and bought a map so I could familiarize myself with the city; and took a few photo's.

                    

 The Li River is a focal point for the city, many locals either fish in the river or use it to travel.

                                   

I found out quickly that the locals were very friendly, there were many foreigners in comparison to other places and these friendly locals seemed to be very genuine. The first park I walked past was Elephant Hill and it was 230 RMB to get in so I just kept walking. I arrived at a small lake connected to the Li River and there were 2 pagoda's for which I paid 30 RMB to enter them.

                      

The tallest pagoda was 1,000 years old and just amazing as far as pagoda's go. This pagoda, at 350 tonnes, is the largest structure made of copper in the world. There is a tunnel under the water that joins this old pagoda with the other more recent structure; in the tunnel there were 1400 year old stone statues and other artifacts.

                                   

After taking photo's from all angles of the pagoda's I went up to the top which give me good views of the surrounding area; too bad there was so much haze. All the tourist brochures have clear blue skies, maybe in the winter there are days with such a view, OR...the photo's are altered.

                      

    I waited around for the sun set when the pagoda's were lit up; they were very beautiful.


                       


I walked through the large street market that locals set up every night on the way back to the hotel,

  In the morning I was out early walking the streets, this city is very clean by Chinese standards; rarely did I see motorcycles on the sidewalk or hear drivers honking their horn. There were some men taking their morning swim in the Li River until the tourist boats approached from the distance. I could see 11 of them rounding the bend, who knows just how many in total. Guilin also has some rice terraces close by for the tourist to view, along with the jutted limestone cliffs.

                       

   I made my way to the Seven Star Cave Park and it was a great destination. There are many wild monkey's living in the park, they are always so entertaining; it was hard not to take too many photo's.

                                         

 I climbed to the top of one of the peaks, it was difficult enough to ensure there were no tourists up there. Although there was a lot of heat haze the view was nice; there were so many different colourful butterflies; sitting up top was very tranquil. Once back down from the peak I checked out the rock galleries, there were several buildings that housed these spectacular rocks.

                         

  In this park there is also the Camel Rock, it is hard to tell from this photo but the formation really does look like a camel; one can search on-line (camel rock guilin) to see a better shot.

                         

  The next day I left the hotel early to try to escape the heat. I went to the Kings Castle which is part of a small city surrounded by an old wall. I then went to Jingjiang Prince City which was pretty nice, this is the Chengyun Gate.

                          

The rest of the day I walked around to take in the scenery, the atmosphere in this city is excellent for tourists; with clear visibility the scenery could be very nice. My experience in Guilin was very positive and it was no surprise why tourist come to this area.

 There was no day train heading north from Guilin so I booked the 10 hour journey to Hengshan with a 12:45 am departure time......more hard seat hell and a sleepless night BUT, moving on and discovering new territory i

  Shanghai to Nanning and Behai.......China

  After saying goodbye to my wife and daughter at Pudong Airport, Shanghai, I booked a dumpy hotel room; after carrying my backpack to several establishments that were full. In the morning I ventured to the #7 subway line and rode the train to the South Train Station.

                      

I had already booked my train ticket to Nanning, Guangxi which was 1,900 kms to the south/west and realized that the 17 hour trip would be hell; there were no sleepers. I arrived at the huge South Train Station at about noon, I did not know how long it would take me to get there; the train was not to leave until 4pm. I talked to a few English speakers, it was very hard to hear since the crowds of people, and the voice over the PA, were so loud. A young lady told me that the train to Nanning was 29 hours, I said that the ticket agent told me 17, I could not believe who was right.......a train passenger.

   In China there is no option to the consumer for trains, the government runs the entity. The time was 6:30 and the train was still not boarding; a full 2.5 hours past the scheduled departure time and 6.5 hours since arriving at the train station. Finally I joined the running race down the stairs to the platform as the crowds pushed to be first on the cars; many of these people didn't have a seat; I would have no idea which of these people would be staring at me as I sat in my seat. The cattle trains (K), although unbearable at times, are actually a great way to mingle with common Chinese people. There were some views of farms before dark.

                   

with farmers planting rice, mostly all from the older generation.

                   

     The night was very long, sleepless and very stuffy; the crowds of people supplied an array of stench. The most frustrating aspect of the night was the smoking, there is supposed to be no smoking but the men stand in between the cars....usually about 6 or 7, and that smoke wafts into the train car. I managed to get a few photo's in, once there was daylight, and trees were not in the way;

                   

most quick sights were only for the naked eye. I logged in my journal about the hell that the trip was, very uncomfortable, but I managed to make many friends on "the train of one foreigner", most foreigners fly or take the fast train.

  At 2am I checked into a hotel, after being awake for 44 hours, it was a bit of a struggle; especially with no English speakers. The people at the restaurant, the taxi driver, and front desk workers at the hotel had no clue what I was talking about. Anyway, I managed 6 hours sleep and then I was back at the train station boarding a 3 hour train for the 225 kms south to Beihai. I checked into a nice hotel and then went for a walk; eventually finding the Beibu Gulf; I was just in time to find the sand, and a good sunset.

                          


 I got familiar with the buses that past me on the 6km return walk; and had a great seafood dinner of: a plate of shrimp, bowl of clams, and rice. I walked back to the hotel and knew where my destination for the next day would be.

   The next morning started with a great complimentary breakfast at the hotel, and then an argument with a rare fluent English speaker who lit a cigarette in the restaurant. After leaving the hotel in this small city of 600,000 I walked to familiarize myself with the area, there were some interesting vehicles on the road.

                        

      I took the #3 bus to the beach and then walked back to a harbour to get some great photo's of the local fishing fleet

                        

and the people who live on their boats.

                       

A few minutes later I caught an image that is still with me today; there was a man and a girl who appeared to be about 9 years old repairing a fishing net; I approached them to get a photo but when the girl looked up her expression was of deep sadness and hardship. This girls face told a long story of the apparent poor life that she was leading, so very sad; needless to say I could not bare to take the photo. I headed back to the one end of the beach close to the restaurants, this is where the Chinese tourists go. There was a lot of garbage on the beach; guys were renting ATV's for people to ride up and down the sand on.....maybe one of the worst activities for a nice beach.

                       

 It is my experience that the Chinese do not often do much walking and prefer to stay close together where the crowds are. I walked about 4 kms down the fine sand beach and it was a whole new world, about 500 metres down from the Chinese tourists there was only myself ,

                       

 and a lone local clam digger.

                       


There was a stilted shack on the beach that local fishermen use, so I stopped there to have my snack and get out of the sun, the temperature was about 35 degrees.

                      

 After recent tropical storms there were several spots where shells, sponge, and this sea turtle were washed ashore; I wished this critter would have survived.

                      

   I finished the length of the beach and felt a bit foolish that I did not protect myself from the sun better, my legs, nose and feet were so burn't; I just had sandals on. Once back to my starting spot I went again to the same seafood restaurant for a delicious meal.

  On the city map one can see that the 8km return trip on the beach was actually 3 differently named beaches. My stay in Behai was well worth the 6 hour return trip from Nanning, the next day I was to leave Behai for Nanning and then move on to Sanya, China's most southern city. I knew that I was sunburn't but I had no idea of the problem I would have with my feet for the next week; they ended up swelling severely and the skin peeled 3 times. The blogs from my trip to Sanya and my experiences while there were composed earlier and can be found at the top of the China blog page.

Shanghai Expo

  I had just left the city of Xian with my family on a plane for Shanghai and was reflecting on our time in the ancient city. There were so many accidents on the roads daily and we seemed to have to run for our lives at intersections, when we had the signal to walk. Our 1,000 km China Eastern flight from Xian to Shanghai was 2 hours long and I was pleasantly surprised with the visibility over one of China's largest cities......last time I could not see past the wing of the plane.

                          

    Since Expo was on in Shanghai rooms for accommodation were limited; my wife wanted to just stay at the airport hotel for 500 RMB ($84) instead of lugging all our bags around. I did not want to stay at the airport; she agreed that we could take the free shuttle to a hotel recommended by the service desk. The shuttle bus ended up traveling to a village that was about 20 minutes from the airport; the village was very dirty, as was the hotel room. I walked around the community, leaving the girls in the room, and noticed that there were a lot of car repair shops and Chinese canteens; we wouldn't be staying long. We went back to the airport, managed to get a refund, and checked into the airport hotel where we had a view of the planes landing, as well as the ships on the yellow sea.

                          

      The next morning we loaded the train at the airport and eventually made it to the Huangpu River region which was hosting the 2010 World Expo on over 5 sq. kms of land.

     For a "developing country", of which the Chinese leaders are fond of classifying themselves; on the days they are not claiming to be world leaders, to be hosting Expo just 2 years after spending a record amount of money on the Beijing Olympics gives hint to the priorities of  the government. It was said that the 190 plus nations that were present at Expo were their to stay on the good side of the Chinese government, for partnerships in trade. The Expo's that I have attended and been familiar with in the past were hosted by countries that intended to draw tourists and business strategists from around the globe who would want to either visit again or invest. Mt take on the Shanghai Expo was that it was for Chinese citizens.

    Expo passports were issued to Chinese Nationals to encourage them to come many times to the exhibition, hence the huge crowds. Just for the Chinese Pavilion there was a 6-8 hour line up at times just to get into that one exhibit. There were a total of about 2.8 million visitors, we went on a low attendance day....some 530,000 people on this particular day; the national advertising with slogans like "come see the world" seemed to work. Many people stood in lines just to run to the back of the pavilion, get their passport stamped and then rush to the next line-up. The photo's below are from when the gates first opened, hence very few people.
 
                                                      Chinese Pavilion at the main gate

                           


  The sights around Expo were quite good, most of the pavilions were very unique in architecture. The atmosphere was good until the crowds came. There were signs at each queue reminding locals not to bud in line, not to push, and not to smoke....many did not adhere to their government plea and we were not so happy about it. The temperature was very high so when we stood in line, watched some people jump over the railing ahead and then had the attendance regulator stop us because the venue was full; and we had to wait 30 minutes for the next batch of people to be allowed in, the frustration mounted quickly.

                            

   We managed to see 9 pavilions on the first day by determining that no way were we standing in that line up, for popular pavilions. For the Indonesian Pavilion we sat in some seats to watch a performance before the doors opened. A woman come on stage and talked for 10 minutes in Chinese, then the Indonesian representative followed her, speaking his native tongue.......we really felt that many aspects were geared around the Chinese. The performance was entertaining; people danced and sang to traditional songs.

                           

   Since the temperature was hovering around 30 degrees shade was desired by many people in the crowd. It seemed that most benches in the shade had Chinese people laying down sleeping; I guess there should have been a sign, "others may want to sit down".  We only saw about 100 foreigners in the crowd on this day so perhaps in total there were 1,000 or so; it was hard to tell since the place was so big.

                          

                          

   My favourite pavilion that we entered was the one from Turkey. The antiquities department brought many ancient artifacts for the display, I found the exhibit very interesting.

  All in all the Expo experience was well worth the 160 RMB ($23) entrance fee. After spending 12 hours on this first day we decided that we had seen enough. Like I had mentioned above, I did not catch the crowds in the photo's because my preference was to capture photo's of pavilions. Our determining deterrents for not returning were the crowds and the heat. To capture every pavilion one would have needed a week at the exhibition grounds.

  It was time for some more typical China travel.

Xian.....China

  We left Hulunbuir, Inner Mongolia on a 2 hour flight to Xian, the capital of Shaanxi. Xian is one of China's oldest cities and has a population of about 9 million (14 million including the surrounding area). We were met at the Xi'an Xianyang airport by my friends Star and David....they had hired a taxi that took us the 40 kms to the city center, and our pre-booked hotel. At least 30 construction cranes dotted the skyline and that was only the one's we could see; it is a busy place, thank goodness we had our friends to make our stay smooth. We had a nice dinner and got settled into our new, and reasonably priced hotel.

  The next morning we left the hotel with our friends and headed to the Lintong District and the world famous Terra Cotta Warriors. Lying about 40 kms from the city center, the warriors are at the base of these hills.

                        

   Young emperor Qin Shi Huang who reigned from 247-220 BC is said to have had an army of life-size pottery sculptures made up to protect his tomb and serve him in his after life. Farmers discovered some pieces of pottery in 1974; now tourists from around the world come to view the 7,000 soldiers; emperors, horses, and chariots in the 3 pits that are open to the public. Turned out that the warriors were hidden under ground in pits that were covered with wood roofs with matting, and a bit of dirt to hide them. There is a lot of history to be uncovered involving the young emperor, his unopened tomb and the Terra Cotta Warriors; I find it very interesting.

  Pit #1 was the highlight of this day and perhaps one of the best experiences in China; at least in the top 5 for me.

                                      

                                      

  It is hard to explain the sensation I had when I walked into this #1 pit.....excitement was paramount. The other 2 pits were incredible also but because they were not showcased as the #1 pit is, AND they are works in progress, they may not be viewed as equal. One can see how long the slow, tedious dig can be as experts unearth and tag segments of the artifacts....many parts are glued together.

                                      

  The next day was great, although no match for the warriors. We walked to the Xiaoyan Pagoda (small wild goose pagoda) which was built between 707-709. This pagoda, that sits across from the Dajianfu Temple, has stairs inside where one can climb up and get a good view of the park and different temples in the compound.

                                       

  There is also a tower here at the Dajianfu Temple.

                                      


  Since our walk was pretty long we decided to take a taxi, through the rat race of traffic, to the Dayan Pagoda (Big Wild Goose Pagoda).

                                       

This larger pagoda was built in 652 at the Da Ci'en temple site...some 4 years after the temple was completed. The large complex that houses the pagoda is similar to others that have temples surrounded by a park. What made this area unique was the large water fountains that were out front. At 12 noon every day there is a show where the water flows from all the different fountains in unison with music, it was very enjoyable and the crowd loved it.

                            


  After the 2 pagoda's we boarded a crowded bus, all taxi's were full, and we headed to a site that was supposed to have many ancient buildings, but there were only mounds of rubble. Like in many cities the government is making replica's of what used to stand. We boarded another bus and rode about an hour, only to witness the same demolition; the travel guide noted this area as if these old buildings were still standing.

    The next day we spent around the old city; the city wall's, built during the Tang Dynasty (618-907) and then enlarged during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) were in very good shape. The main gates of this most complete city wall are enormous and really a spectacle to see.

                        

  If one would walk the 13.7 km on top of the wall she/he would see that within the walls the apartments are rather old.

                       

 Often around China you can see streets loaded with older people playing the board game mahjong.

                       

  Other attractions for this ancient city are the bell tower that was built in 1384 and the drum tower which was built in 1380. My daughter and I listened to a live drumming performance in the drum tower, it was a good experience.

                      

                     

  For the most part the Xian experience was exceptional, could have been a little better if we were not looking for what was not there; and having to watch out for our lives constantly (inconsiderate drivers) . For the tourist there is plenty to see......some artifacts like the Terra Cotta Warriors cannot be found very often in this world. I returned again to this ancient city about one year later, it was good to be familiar with my surroundings.