Ghost City

Today's trip was to Fengdu 'Ghost City'. As you can see it was very wet - thank goodness for my borrowed rain coat, it kept me very dry and I didn't have to bother with an umbrella!


The town is a series of Buddhist temples and would have been flooded by the new dam but the government have built a wall to isolate the buildings. Once the water rises to its highest level the buildings will be on an island.


There were some very gruesome depictions of what will happen to you.


We had an interesting way of getting off the boat, over these planks to a beach of pebbles and then the bus took us to Fengdu.


After the visit we reembarked and started the final leg of the cruise, headed for Chongqing. Along the way we saw more graves decorated for Ancestor Day (5th April).


We managed to get in another practice of our song for Sarah and then off to get ready for the Captain's Farewell banquet and concert.

Good Friday

Good Friday and another birthday. Richard was the lucky person and, as well as the cake Sarah seems to organise no matter where we are, he received a card from the Captain that we all signed, a fantastic memento of the day.

This morning's trip took us up the Shennong Stream, first in a ferry then on a sampan.

While on the ferry we saw some coffins perched high in the cliffs. Apparently this is the custom of the local minority group, the Zhuang People.

When the sampan reaches the rapids the crew jump out and pull the boat by ropes. Our local guide sang a traditional song while we travelled up the river and then the captain sang. Our local guide told us that there are two captains for the boat one steering and the other at the front of the boat. The other poor guys had to paddle and pull. Here they all are getting ready to pull our sampan over the rapids.

The afternoon brought more fantastic scenery as we travelled closer to Chongqing, the destination of the cruise. We managed to fit in a rehearsal for the farewell concert on the last night, we chose to do a tribute song for Sarah and had to keep it from her.

I recorded a segment of the Captain's song - couldn't embed it here but you should be able to access by clicking the link.

Coal

This photo is for Nicole. Coal is mined in the mountains along the Yangtze and it is transported by barge. We went to the three gorges dam today before starting our cruise up the river.

The dam project is huge..and the engineers in our group were very excited. I enjoyed looking at the lock and also the elevator that has been built to lift small boats. Useless statistics:

• finish in 2009


• 185 metres high


• 1.4 miles long


• largest hydroelectric river dam in the world


• 32 generators


• total capacity will reach 18,200 MW

In the afternoon we started up the Yangtze River. The scenery was fantastic, farms carved into the side of mountains, misty hills and of course the famous Yangtze itself.

The evening finished with the Captain's welcome drinks, dinner and a caberet.

Wuhan and the Yangtze

Visited the muslim area first this morning, we finished last night with a quick city lights tour and it was good to see the drum tower and the bell tower in the daytime. The muslim area is accessed through the bell tower and of course surrounded by markets. The mosque is constructed as a series of small pavilions and buildings, with courtyards between them. It was a lovely peaceful place full of trees and sculptured plants. There are areas of the mosque that are cordoned off from non-Islamic visitors however it was an oasis of calm in the midst of the bustling markets and we enjoyed the stroll through the courtyards.

Then off to the airport where we flew to Wuhan and then we took a long trip (four hours) by bus to our cruise boat on the Yangtze. I really enjoyed the bus trip and wish we could have stopped and taken photos. The countryside was fabulous, so fertile. There were plenty of crops and fish ponds, I had never seen them before and I actually saw a farmer plowing his field with an old wooden plough pulled by a water buffalo.

After dinner at Moaping(?) we boarded our home for the next 4 nights, the Sunshine China.

Terracotta warriors

Today was so exciting, devoted to looking at the terracotta warriors, and no I didn't jump into the pit.

We actually started off looking at the Xi'an city wall. This was constructed in the early Ming Dynasty and has been preserved intact. Around the outside a garden walk has been constructed and we saw a lot of the older people walking around and exercising. A really beautiful area and the local Chinese use it well. Some useless statistics I wrote down:

• 112 ramparts.
  


• one arrow shot away from each other.
  


• originally 4 city gates - now there are more.
  

We then went to a factory that churn out souvenir warriors, as I already have one at home I resisted the temptation but bought myself a lovely shawl for night, thanks to Jo who managed to reduce the price significantly. I am starting to learn how to bargain. Came across a very interesting warrior at the factory who had a distinct family resemblance.

The pits where the Terracotta Warriors were found is our next stop and it was awesome. Apparently they were all smashed soon after the death of the emperor that they were made for - they were part of his burial tomb. They have been pieced together by archaeologists. A group of peasants uncovered some pottery while digging a well in 1974 and it was established beyond doubt that these artifacts were associated with the Qin Dynasty (211-206 BC). It has certainly been made into a significant tourist destination and there is a lot of building going on around it to house shops and tourist accommodation.

I just wanted to stand and look, it is unbelievable. How could anyone order such a huge undertaking, the life work of many people.

We returned to our hotel for dinner and then to another highlight, a Chinese foot massage. Probably the best 140 yuan I spent! Feet soaked in an extremely hot herbal bath then massaged and pummelled, exquisite pain. Then moved up the legs, arms and finally flipped over the knee of the masseuse, they were very strong and the girls seemed to have no problem in lifting the men in our group.

Small Goose Pagoda

We spent the day in Xi'an, first with a visit to the Shaanxi museum. Not as good as the Shanghai museum and a bit dark but very interesting. There were a lot of very interesting relics that told the history of Xi'an. Xi'an is the beginning of the famous 'Silk road', the most well-known trading route of ancient Chinese civilisation. Trade in silk grew under the Han Dynasty ( 202 BC - AD 220). After an hour or so there we went to a session on Chinese painting where I admit I bought a couple, hope I still like them when I get home! One is of horses - symbol of success in Chinese culture and the other of the 'ghost catcher'. Very different so I hope I can find places to hang them.

A bunch of us climbed the small Flying Goose Pagoda, there are two pagodas, one big and one small. Our local guide, Jimmy told us a legend as to why they are called flying goose pagodas. According to ancient stories of Buddhists, there were two branches of Buddhism, one ate meat and for the other it was taboo. One day, they couldn't find meat to buy. Upon seeing a group of big wild geese flying by, a monk said to himself: 'Today we have no meat. I hope the merciful Bodhisattva will give us some.' The leading wild goose broke its wings and fell to the ground. All the monks were startled and believed that Bodhisattva showed his spirit to order them to be more pious. They established a pagoda where the wild goose fell and stopped eating meat.

For dinner we had a meal of dumplings, there were about 18 different varieties and they are a speciality of the region. The varieties included duck, pork, fish, vegetable and even walnut and each dumpling had a different shape. The fish shape was so clever but included the duck here. Quite a feat and a feast!

After dinner we went to the Tang Dynasty Show. Loved every minute of it. The sets were fantastic, the music, singing and dancing were something I had never seen before. There was even humour, I have a lot of photos here and don't know which one I want to put up but have to choose one. Sorry about the heads in the foreground.

Xi'an

Xi'an is a really friendly place and has beautiful wide streets with lots of trees. We went to the Tang Show Spectacular!

Gin

Rocks are big in China, this one is considered very beautiful because of its wrinkly surface, hope the same applies to women.

On a train in the corridor drinking gin! Of course we weren't noisy.

Off to Xi'an

Busy day today, we went first to the Summer Palace, no time for too much here but the man made lake is beautiful, the long walk spectacular! The blossoms were just emerging, all the plants are so well looked after.

So many beautiful paintings on the wooden long walk, too many to look at. It certainly is a beautiful place. I think I liked it better than the Forbidden City. The initial construction of the Summer Palace began in 1750, commissioned by Emperor Qinglong as a gift for his mother's birthday. The construction took 15 years to complete. The plundering of foreign troops in 1860 destroyed most of the buildings, but they were renovated in 1888 by Empress Dowager Cixi. The marble boat was beautiful, I wouldn't mind relaxing there on a lovely summer day.

In the afternoon we went to the Hutong, the old area of Beijing where there are the original courtyard dwellings, I went in a rickshaw and will never do that again. I felt very uncomfortable about having someone pull me along, not my type of thing at all. Our Hutong guide explained about the door decorations and how you could tell who lived behind the door. This one is a very important military person - the four knobs across the door describe the importance of the person and the drums indicate that they belonged to the military.

We went into one of the houses where I saw this cat resting on the roof.

Then off to the train to go to Xi'an about 1200k from Beijing. The train trip was mainly at night, we were four to a sleeper. Anne, Chris and I shared our sleeper with a lady lecturer in Mathematics who was going to Xi'an to the University. Our group had a corridor party, then adjourned to the dining car where we rocked till about midnight. Sarah our Chinese guide joined us (as did Kevin from the other group) and thinks we are the happiest group she has had. She is such a hard worker, lovely girl. Met up with some French tourists led by a Belgian girl who had been in China for two years.

The Great Wall

We had a very early start this morning. We drove out to the Great Wall and I actually walked on it. Never thought I would get to see it let alone walk on it. Ann, Richard and I made it to the top, I was so glad my fitness level was up. You climbed steep stairs and thought you were there but once at the top there was another lot of stairs in front of you. It was so windy at the top, I thought I would be blown over. Here is a photo of Ann and me on the wall, just look at my hair!

We visited a jade factory and the tour was quite fascinating. Some of the jade carvings were spectacular. One piece the size of the wall was over 2,ooo,000 yuan.

We travelled past the 'Bird's Nest' stadium where the Olympics are to be held on the way home. Quite an unusual design.

The meal tonight is Beijing Duck - of course we all know it as Peking Duck but no longer! The duck, once cooked, was brought out on a tray and expertly dissected by the Chinese chef.

Can't say that it was my favourite meal.....but was followed by a very skillful acrobat show.

Seaweed Soup

Today we had seaweed soup for lunch.

I went for a walk early this morning and met a little old Chinese man jogging along. He said hello and I replied, he then broke out into a torrent of Chinese, which I couldn't understand, all the time pointing to my feet. It finally hit me that he was amused by my bare toes, everyone else was wearing covered shoes, I did say it was cold.

First stop today was Tiananmen Square. It was very welcome as it is very cold here. Vicki was very kind and lent me her coat as I had come without mine, well when I went ealking with bare toes it wasn't too bad. I wasn't sure how I would feel here but it was OK. We had some time to walk around and then met to have a group photo taken. I am happy to be able to have a photo of the whole group to remember them by. I also got Anne from Western Australia to take my picture in the pose that all the Chinese were having theirs taken!


The Forbidden City was incredible although we didn't see much inside the buildings. Our guide Richard told us many stories from ancient times, and believe me I wouldn't last long as a concubine, I would become very badly behaved. Everything here is being done up ready for the Beijing Olympics so the Forbidden City had scaffolding and "photos" of some of the buildings. There is such a lot of building going on, I wonder if it will all be finished by next year. The traffic is pretty horrendous as well. I think there will be restrictions on residents when the Olympics are staged otherwise it will be impossible to get around.

After lunch we went to the Temple of Heaven, the Temple was built in 1420 A.D. during the Ming Dynasty to offer sacrifice to Heaven. As the Emperor of China was regarded as the "Son of Heaven", sacrifices to heaven was extremely important. The temple was built for these ceremonies, mostly comprised of prayers for good harvests.

Beijing

Today we are to experience our first internal flight as we go to Beijing the capital of China and the host to the next Olympic games. We had to say goodbye to Peggy, our local guide, who told us so many stories of Shanghai life. I particularly liked the quilt story, I do hope she gets her 88 quilts! I also think the stories of Shanghai men and their hardworking life are great, I think all men should be like the ones in Shanghai and do all the house work and willingly provide their credit cards for our shopping! Peggy was so full of fun, she provided a great introduction to China for us!

Arrived in Beijing today at about 4pm after leaving at 10am. The flight 2 hours, the rest of the time was spent in queues! Our Beijing Hotel is *****. Most places seem to have these lions outside.




I know this will come as a surprise to all my old friends when they see this pic of me drinking beer, won't be a surprise for the tour group...... All I can say is that we get a free beer with each meal, how could I refuse.
We are starting to get to know each other and it looks like a it is going to be a great trip. Dinner tonight was at an Irish pub in Beijing, don't ask me why there is an Irish pub in Beijing but I suppose no different to one in Hobart! The name of the pub was Durty (sic) Nellies.

Maglev Train

Busy day today. The first stop was at the Shanghai Museum. It is superb and I could have spent hours there. I started on the fourth floor but all too soon the time was nearly up and I had to speed look to finish in time. The costumes were superb, the embroidery breathtaking.




I was very surprised to find that a plant I have at home is all over this city
(note: later on found it all over China)

Next off to the Silk Factory. With the exception of those selected for reproduction of eggs, the cocoons are treated to preserve them intact. The silk worm spins the cocoon with one continuous thread forming a figure eight so the chrysalis must be killed without damaging the cocoon. The end of the cocoon is found and then several are threaded onto a machine to collect the silk. A single thread of silk can measure up to 4,000 feet in length. The quilts made from the cocoons are fabulously light and warm.

Hmmm I think we may have visited the Yu Garden after lunch. Very beautiful, and took 28 years to create then the guy lost it all in one night at a card game. It was built with Feng Shui in mind, man created mountain behind and water in front with some beautiful pavillions.

A bit of a change of plan here as we all wanted to have a ride on the Maglev train. This train travels at 431 K/H for 1 minute, the rest is speeding up and slowing down! It goes from Shanghai to the international airport (approx 30k) and it takes 7 minutes and 20 seconds. A train passed us going the other way and all we knew of it was a whoosh and a bit of a buffeting of air!

We went across the Nangpu bridge (our local guide, Peggy, told us that this bridge was designed by a 7 year old girl who is now an architect student) and up the tallest building (Jin Mao Building) in Shanghai.

Can we keep up this pace!

There was more to come because it was also the birthday of one of our group, Mick. Many happy returns and the cake was shared by all!

Oh and guess what even more as we had a night cruise on the river to see the night lights of Shanghai, the power bill must be horrendous, thank goodness I don't have to pay it!!