Yellow Mountain and Hongcun 27-30 March 2009

Yellow Mountain, also known as Huangshan (黄山）located on the southern part of the Anhui Province, is one of the great mountains in China.

We departed night of 27th March by the overnight train from Shanghai to Tunxi (屯溪). The train takes 11 hours, departing at 22:35 from the Shanghai Railway Station and arriving at 09:35 the day after. We bought the soft sleeper seat- meaning a seat consisting of a bed, a pillow and a decent blanket; and only four beds in a compartment... probably the most comfortable seat one can get on a overnight train. Inge- my travel partner had the lower bunk and I had the upper one! Lucky for us, we shared the compartment with another two Chinese, a youthful and nature enthusiast that have been to Huangshan and they were going for a hike at a city one stop before Tunxi.... they were also planning to walk from Lin An to Hangzhou (what I imagined to be quite a long long walk as car drive is about 1h 30 mins).


As this was my first time on an overnight train, I did not know what to expect and really... the train ride was amazingly nice. It was expectedly ackward in the beginning to share the compartment with two strangers but we met with the most interesting people- they are actually I think part of a group that meet once a month to go on a nature walk/ trip of some sort... cool huh! And these people are so knowledgable... and they have been everywhere too.... Inge in fact exchanged numbers with one of them... who knows where she is going next. Another interesting part of the train ride was also that the Train Office who checked our ticket was having his last day of work... by today he has started his retirement... :) How nice!

Anyway, we slept most of the trip and it was comfortable and only to wake up at the train officer's warning that we are going to stop soon. Well he woke us up 2 hours too early... anyway we woke up to have our breakkie- a simple bread slices and instant coffee while enjoying the view of the countryside from the train- rows and rows of fields covered with yellow flowers.... refreshing change from the rows and rows of skycrapers of Shanghai :)

28th morning of 9:35 am we arrived in Tunxi Railway Station. We were approached before hand by a travel agent asking us if we need a ride to Tangkou (汤口) the city at the bottom of Huangshan, and she was charging us 15 kuai for one person for the ride. So we agreed and bought the tickets to save some trouble and anyway she said the bus was going to leave at 10am.

We took our seat on the front row of the bus... enjoying the full view of the journey while listening to the tour leader of the rest of the group giving introduction about Huangshan... meanwhile the sky is pretty dark.

An hour later... we smelled something like a burnt smell, looks like the break of the bus is having problem. True enough... our bus stopped and they announced that two minutes later another bus is gonna pick us up (Chinese likes to say optimistic words) anyway about 15 minutes later we boarded into another smaller van and we were dropped off at the Bus Interchange (not Tangkou) that was full of 新国线车(blue bus with this writing meaning "New Country Line" Bus). So anyway at this point we were confused as we thought we were going to be dropped off at Tangkou and we were going to walk from there to the Mountain. But we were at a totally different place and the staff there told us we need to buy another ticket (15 kuai each) to take the Blue Bus to the Yungu Cablecar Station. So anyway that's what we did... we took the bus - a 15 minutes ride up to the Cablecar Station, then we tooke the Cable car, another 15 minutes ride to the White Goose Peak Cablecar Station on the North Sea (北海) part of the Huangshan National Park.

We were super excited because we finally were reaching Huangshan but we were starving by then too!!! We knew that finding food was hard in Huangshan so we we came packed with small handy food- in the cable car we took quick bites of the bread... and then when we were gonna start peeling our hard boiled eggs, the cablecar stopped... we had to get down.
It was a whirling turn of events from now on. We got down quickly, it is raining, hard! We put our eggs inside our jackets... and started taking our our raincoats. Inge had a separate rain cover for her backpack so she just needed to put on her rain coat. Being the cheepo that I am, I did not want to spend on the separate rain cover for my backpack so I had none! Stupidly I thought my rain coat was huge enough to cover both me and my backpack but ooo noooo...
I had a disposable cheepo yellow (this colour is important to note) raincoat for myself and then I had to cover my backpack with another cheepo yellow raincoat. It was MESSY. Anyway we had to walk, first to our hotel in Beihai. We put on our backpack and started walking... boy was it difficult. Hahaha.... seriously did not think that it was going to be challenging carrying the backpack and climbing flights and flights of stairs when it was written only 0.5km to Beihai from the White Goose Cablecar St. So much for thinking that we were going to hike up from the bottom to the top with our backpack and in the rain! A big No No.
So we were walking in the rain, hands freezing, stomach starving, and peeling our eggs to eat. Really a moment to remember. Half hour later, we arrived in the hotel lobby. Checked in. Went to our lodge. And sorted ourselves out. It was around 1pm by then. We sat down and planned our hike for the day.
The rain was not stopping and fog was thick. The weather was really not on our side. So we stick to Beihai area for the hike as we did not expect the rain to stop.
We went to the Bright Summit Peak a 2.5km walk from the Hotel. We arrived there eventually after flights and flights of staircases, and to find sea of people. The fog was getting thicker and we could not see anything from there except that there was this tower with a huge ball on it- discovered later that it was the meteorigical tower. It was weird. And anyway everything was white, we could not take any photos nor see any views so we took the on the next peak which is the Flying Over Rock (飞来石). We saw this huge stone, trying to balance itself on top of another stone... cool! Then... we took our next stop which is the Purple Cloud Peak. This was a tough hike- 0.5km of non-stop small staircases up. And then to our "amusement" when we reached the top, we found a locked gate with a notice that said that due to safety reason this peak has been closed - since 1 July 2007. We both felt cheated and was "cursing" the map that still showed it there. The views on the way were nice though... the umbrella pine trees were everywhere. They stand really elegantly complementing the mountain... superb view. Especially in the cold.
It was getting dark, the fog was low now and feasibility was maybe just a few metres ahead. Inge and I decided to make our trip back to the Hotel... praying that the weather will get much better the day after.
It was cold. Even in the room. We had a simple dinner in the room- a glass of instant miso soup, with another hard-boiled egg (which we decided later to dunk it in into the miso so it becomes warm), slices of bread and macadamia nuts. Our TV was not working, so after planning our hike for the next day coming up with raining plan and not raining plan, and carrying backpack and not carrying backpack plan, we retired for the day. It has been a long day.
29th daybreak 4:45am. We woke up... so happy because we did not hear any rain drops at all at night. We were excited that our prayer for good weather was answered! Inge and I prepared ourselves to see the sunrise on the Refreshing Terrace... we dressed warmly and equipped ourselves with warm jackets, opened the door and... you can never guess why we did not hear rain drops... because it was snowing!!!
What!?!?!?!?!
Yes Huangshan was snowing. So went back into the room, got the umbrella and we had the torch flashing the surroundings to see that everything was covered in white blanket. For the rest of the day, needless to say, we were in for a treat!
Excited for the sunrise, we still made our way into the Refreshing Terrace a 10 minute walk from the Hotel. There wasn't any sunrise but at 5:20 ish the sky was getting lighter. We stood on the terrace enjoying the snow covered pine trees. With the sky lightening, the mountain was showing itself slowly as if shy to the new day. Breathtaking. By far the most enchanting view. Sadly our camera were not good enough to capture the moment. But somethings are better left as it is.
After the sunrise, we took a hike to the peak nearby... everything looks so clean with the white snow. Fun!
We then return to our room to have a quick breakkie and then started to hike around the Tian Hai (天海) area.
The highlights of the Tian Hai Area is the Jade Screen Peak, the Lotus Peak, the Turtle Cave Peak.
It was a 5km hike through the Bright Summit Peak to the Jade Screen Peak, passing the Turtle Cave Peak. It was a nice quiet walk in the morning. Again... flights and flights of stairs but the view compensates them all... I must also say that lucky we started early as the tourist groups from the bottom of the mountain started coming a few moments after. The winter panoramic view in Huangshan was enchating, if there were less people I could even describe it as romantically mysterious. The hike is not easy and I could even say dangerous for those who has weak knees and weak heart. The snow was stopping by then and the ice was melting, so it was a bit slippery on some parts.
We hiked up and down and then we went back to the hotel by 11am so we could be in time to check out.
What a morning exercise! But it was really refreshing. The air was just crispy clean if....
(I should hope that people has the decency to stop smoking in the Huangshan National Park)
We had no time for Xi hai and the fog was not dissappearing so we had to come back to Huangshan on a better weather. We checked out and carried our backpack to the cablecar station BUT before that we made our final stop at the Begin-to-Believe Peak, 0.5km before the White Goose Cablecar Station. With our backpack we climbed the thousands fleet of stairs... oh boy did we make a good decision not to hike with our big backpack in the morning! We made it in the end and it was worth the effort... beautiful winter sonata view. The peak somehow accumulated a lot more snow there... and all the tree branches were beautiful covered in snow and some in ice (will post photos). We were happy!!!!
Hungrier than ever, with no lunch, we had to much on our final two "Cliff" bars... yum even when they were quite hard to bite as it was cold!
We took our cablecar and the same way down as we were up.
Inge and I: "Huangshan, we are definitely coming back for you on a friendlier weather!"

hungry hungry hungry.... a hungry stomach makes one cannot think straight...

Inge remembered that in the town near the Bus Interchange there in Hui Food Restaurant that the Bus Guide mentioned to be good and cheap so we made our way there. It was 13:30 is and the restaurant was pretty empty by then. Good we can get our food faster. On the restaurant window, we saw the menu written on it and we were gleeful to find that prices were around 2-10 kuai! Ok so we ordered without really looking at the menu. We had the "yecai" - wild vegetables, egg omellete fried with some black wild mushroom and hongshao rou... a typical anhui dish. They were good, or were we just hungry? Throughout the whole lunch, we were both making guesses on lunch bill... and come to a conclusion that it was gonna be about 30-40 kuai... so after we finished everything and full... and Happy ofcourse... we asked for the bill. Inge went to the counter to pay and i heard the fuwuyuan said yi bai ling qi... i started laughing at myself... Inge asked how can it be 107kuai? Apparently all the things we ordered were the Anhui special dishes and they cost like 30-40 each! It was hilarious. We did not get angry as actually they were written on the menu (which we could not be bothered to see in the beginning) and made order straight from the waitress. The waitress was nice too, and i think in general Anhui people are really nice... she showed us the bus that will take us back to Tunxi.

In Tunxi, we checked ourselves into the International Youth Hostel near the Railway Station on 58 Beihai Rd. Nice clean and friendly place. We stayed there for the night. Tunxi at night: try exploring the old road "老街". We took the pedicab there from our hostel: a 10 minute ride for just 5 kuai. Taking a taxi will also cost 5 kuai. The lane is a shopping area but they still retained the old Anhui style houses. One can find all sorts of things there but mainly the calligraphy stuff (as Anhui is known for that), chinese fan, 薄饼 (round biscuit like thing filled with salted vegetables) - 5 mao each from the old lady at one of the corners...
Dinner was another interesting event. We weren't that hungry but we had to eat something. I was craving for noodle soup, so chose one of this restaurants there that outside on the menu they said they have noodle soup. But amongst other things I think they served Hui Food...
Inge ordered the Wonton, and I ordered the noodle soup. A few minutes later the waitress came back and said no more noodle soup. So she asked if we wanted hu juan mi fen (we have no idea what it means but we thought it would be mifen) so we said ok... one please. A few minutes later, the chef came out and came to our table and asked us if we wanted this "mifen" we ordered and we said yes and we've already told the waitress. Everything was quite confusing. 10 minutes later, food came out... huntun in a small bowl and it looks decent enough. Then a few minutes later, a large plate with brown coloured porridge like thingy was placed on our table. Right... what is this thing? Mi fen? I see... it is 米粉- rice powder, instead of rice. more like the yellow fine rice fried with some salty brown sauce and blended to form a porridge! Never seen something quite like this before. So with optimism, I tasted it... man... so salty... not bad but we could not finish it but at the same time we could not help laughing at ourselves and understood finally why the chef had to come out before to ask twice.

30th morning 5:30 am.... Inge woke up in the morning with a jump oh no we are late!!! We were supposed to leave at 6am for the bus station to go to Hongcun (宏村)- a village 1h 30 mins away from Tunxi. We had to leave very early because we had to come back by 12pm to catch the 1pm bus back to Shanghai.
Anyway we took the cab to the Bus Station only 6.50 kuai. Then from there we asked for a bus to go to Hongcun, we were pointed to a small van that was due to leave for Yi Xian (黟县) at 7am, we had to go to Yixian first and then transfer to Hongcun. We were early so we went it to take our seat while waiting for the rest of the bus to be filled up. All kinds of people were heading to that direction apart from us tourists there were another two girls who seemed like tourists too. The journey was long and was quite interesting. 15 minutes into the ride, the van stopped because a man from behind was saying that somebody wanted to throw out (puke!). Oooh so the bus conductor (a lady by the way) hurried to get a plastic bag and rushed to give it to him. The driver stopped and asked him to get out of his bus (poor sick fellow!)... after telling him that he better not think about himself and puke in his van... he continued driving and the want to puke man continued to hold on to his puke I suppose and stayed inside the van. 20 minutes later the bus stopped and then some passengers got out. The lady conductor went to the window beside me ( i was seating right in front row on the left) and was talking loudly to someone outside while i heard a thud on my left shoe- a pink gum from her mouth dropped on my shoe! A I opened my mouth while she bent down to pick it up and said bu hao yi si, gave me a big grin with her red painted lips and blinked with her black painted mascaraed eyes... and threw the gum away out of the window! The van ride was very memorable indeed. About half hour later, we were dropped on the road and the bus conductor told us that behind there was a bus going to Hongcun... we went it... it was a smaller van than before and only fits 5- 6 people. 2 kuai and 10 km later we reached Hongcun after almost getting intoxicated with overdose of carbonmonoxide in the van. We were glad we reached Hongcun. We paid a hefty 80 kuai ticket and went in to the village. It is a Unesco listed village and the movie Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon was shot there. The village was unique... and surprisingly well-preserved indeed. They had a very good water-system and the water is clean eventhough we could see people washing their clother in the waterways. Eventhough that the houses have almost been turned to a commercial place, i.e. selling souveniers, etc. I think the village still retains its own charm... and uniqueness- definitely worth having a look around just to have a feel of how the villagers lead their life there.
We spent an hour there. And after buying our shou zhua bing and sticky black tofu we head back using a better bus this time, just 12 kuai all the way back to Tunxi.
We made it on time back to the Hostel and then we departed back to Shanghai using the 1pm bus back to Shanghai. Reached Shanghai finally at 6.45pm.

The past three days have been a trip full of surprises. But really God is a wonderful God and His creation is just another testimony to us all.

DaMingShan's Winter Sonata 14-15 March 2009

大明山 Da Ming Shan (direct translation Famous Mountain), is apparently not as famous as the other mountain in China, nevertheless it still exudes its own charm... has a 4-star rating in China, a high one considering that 5-star rating goes to Huangshan.

It is located in Zhejiang, a nice four hour drive from Shanghai through Linan.

Damingshan is said to be the mini-version of Huangshan. I understood why after... it has the same stone like structure mountain, only in Huangshan is much more and bigger in scale. However for those who is just looking for a relaxing weekend at the top of the mountain, Damingshan is worth the trip. Moreover, if you come early enough before the other tourists start coming, the mountain is very peaceful and serene.

Five of us rented a car from Shanghai. We've got a good deal for 2 days 1 night car rent with a driver. Our route was Shanghai - Damingshan - Hangzhou (we spent the night there) and then back Shanghai. I remembered it was a cold 13th March in Shanghai, in fact it was raining. Spring was abound and rain... were pouring day in day out then. We left nevertheless for Damingshan on the 14th morning. We reached the park just before 11pm. Very early indeed. Ticket to enter the mountain was 80 RMB per person. There is additional charge if one wishes to take the cable car. There is also the additional bus ride (10 RMB one way per person)from the entrance to either the cable car station or the entrance where one can start walking. We walked.

Flights and flights of man-made stairs... but nothing in scale as compared to Huangshan. It was enjoyable as there were mini-waterfalls and stream of water that has not dried up along the way. Half way up the mountain... we discovered that it was snowing the night before. So... we were in for a nice white winter scenery treat! Everything is just beautiful when it is white. However it could be a little slippery on the steps. The tree leaves had ice molded on it- super cool! Throwing snow balls on each other (not highly recommended) but that's what we did... as breaks for our way up. The few so-called scenic spots in Damingshan would the waterfall. There is one huge one on top. The hanging bridge - between two mountain tops... surely not for the faint of heart. However not to be missed as the view is fantastic from the top. You would feel like you were on top of the world! There is a man-made lake too, clean but average looking. On the way up to the hanging bridge and if you take the cable car up, you will pass through a cave- which I think is an old abandoned mine. It is called the ten thousand metre cave. This is a must when you go there but in winter it is freezing cold!

Damingshan also has a lodge on top of the mountain near the lake... would be a nice resting place for those who are just wanting to chill out.

We took 3 hours walking up and down... all in all it is definitely a recommended place. Less commercialised hence less tourists but very nice!

Nanjing Historical Charm - 28 Feb 2009 -

Upon landing from the "动车" (high-speed train) in Nanjing Train Station, she presented herself as any other Chinese city... an old station full of people carrying all sorts of things and everyone walking towards the same direction but never in an organized manner...

We finally got into a cab after managing to squezze really squezze our way into a non-existent queue for the cab... and found the four of us seating in the cab riding towards our first destination - "南京大屠杀博物馆" (Nanjing Massacre Museum). We've got a friendly cab driver, looking so happy to meet chinese immigrants... and was endlessly talking about the rich history of Nanjing and at the same time trying to find out if my poor (or I should say lucky) male friend of mine already had a girlfriend because he had a daughter available for hand of marriage... while I, seating at the back enjoying the city of view of Nanjing.

Nanjing is an interesting city as it was once a capital city of China during the Ming Dynasty. She still has her city walls enveloping those modern high-rise buildings. They have managed to thankfully keep them pretty nicely and incorporated them into the modern structure of the city.

The Nanjing Masaccre Museum was unexpectedly impressive. It was really something that I did not expect- architecture wise and "content" wise. The black marble wall on the entrance was quite similar to the World War 2 Memorial in Washington... all black and engraved with names. It did cross my mind if all memorials are built like this or... anyway they served its purpose pretty well. The museum was totally comprehensive covering the war, how the Japanese entered into China, the Sino-China relationships then, the people who were in the Army, the people who survived, the weapons they used, and lots and lots of pictures of what happened then. I could feel myself having mixed emotions.... angry but sad, a sense of helplessness that the people were feeling... but also a sense of spirit that there were people still fought and there were people that risked their life to save people and hide them fro safety... wonder what I would have done if I was there...

After the trip to the memorial, we hurried to lunch. We heard that Nanjing is famous for its 粉丝汤 (soup with vermicelli and duck inerds) - didn't think it was appropriate to eat this though after seeing all the gory pictures at the Memorial. But hey we only have one day in Nanjing so we took some laughter and swallowed our lunch.

With full stomach... we scurried our way to 中山公园 - Sun Yat Sen Park. It is a really huge park with the 种山 (Purple Mountain) as our backdrop. We are in search for the UNESCO listed Ming's Tomb that our friend who has been to Nanjing three times but unable to find... (poor her, you will understand why later...). We bought our 80RMB 门票 and looked at the map for our destination. The park is so huge that I think one won't be able to walk through it in one day... so we had to pick where we want to go this time... and fortunately we discovered that the Peach Blossom Festival was also going on at the same time... (yeah finally Spring is here!).

The path leading to the Ming's Tomb was lined out nicely with statues of horses, elephants, camels, lion like thing... and they all come in a pair, there will be a pair standing first and then a pair sitting down. The animals represent something each (and I obviously can't remember what they stand for... )
After walking through this path, we came across this huge stone in a shape of turtle carrying on his back a tablet. Turtle has always been a symbol of longevity, so perhaps that is the reason that it was there. It was a really huge tablet on his back (could be tablt of wisdow or something).... with writings but they have faded away with age... Centuries of rains and wind and erosion... nice to feel it though with your hand, only to realise later that some parts have been vandalised by irresponsible tourists.
Anyway it was pretty weird, the road to the Ming Tomb kinda ended there. We thought we would find the Ming's Tomb after this turtle tablet... but it wasn't there and we could see that the other visitors were confused like us. So we turned back, made a possible speculation that we had missed a sign. Somehow through talking and playing a fool along the way, we found a slope lined with lots of trees and from a distance we could see a hint of yellow and red... we were sure then that it was the Ming's Tomb. Serene and enclosed by the trees, I could imagine that there is a stream of water running through it centuries ago..., sadly now they have dried up... We walked about 10 minutes from the entrance and then found ourselves facing a blockade... with "construction in progress" sign. Apparently the Ming's Tomb has been going re-touching for the past few months and the back part is still not done. I had a peek through the holes... and it was something quiet magnificent and it felt grand and holy. Just one problem though, I think the Chinese has re-touched it too well... that it looked like brand new. The yellow paint just looked too glossy and I am sure in Ming's time they did not have Dulux like paint. Somebody should write to the UNESCO about this because I found in quite disturbing. So... my poor friend, looks like we will be back again to see the re'touched Ming's Tomb.

The Ming's Tomb was built while he lives on earth. That thought I found quite disturbing... moreover he was very auspicious in looking for the perfect place to build his Tomb. Such a contradiction to the modern life of "Seize the Day!" attitude. However it could have been that he knew there is life after death and this is how he "expressed" that idea.

Well I believe anyway that life goes on beyond life on Earth... and to those who prepares it... Life is Eternal