|
|
Welcome to my travel log! You will find here a lot more than in the travel reports, stripped from political correctness. Enjoy! 
Jul 23, 2009 02:00 PM Chengdu (CN) - the Giant Panda
I had to get up quite early in the morning for the trip to the Giant Panda Breeding Centre. I wanted to make sure I was going to make it for the feeding time, and before it got too hot for the animals, who usually just hide away in their air-conditioned enclosures and sleep all day.
It was good. I saw three adult Giant Pandas just layzing on wooden platforms, five or six one-year-old Giant Panda cubs playing around, and six or seven Red Pandas. This is how the centre was split - three enclosures. By 2010, theentire centre will have been enlarged significantly to create almost an entertainment park that will surround the research centre. Today, I saw the nursing of the panda infants, an educational pavillion containing facts of the Giant Panda and its history and evolution, and a cinema showing a film about the pandas and the breeding programme.
The rest of the day I spent on walking. I visited a few temples and parks, and the former home of the poet DuFu. It was lovely! Had I lived in such beautiful garden and surroundings, which must have been even prettier in the 8th century, that even I would easily have written beautiful poetry, although I found DuFu's poems a little too patronising and perhaps pretentious. But that's me! I'm sure there are millions of people, who adore DuFu's work.
I did not intend to walk the entire city's length and width, but as it happened, it was impossible to decypher the bus network, I didn't learn enough Chinese to ask for directions, the Suchuanians didn't speak any foreign language, and taxis simply refused to stop for me. I stopped in a couple of parks, including the People's Park to relax over China's green teas (very expensive - from ¥10-¥30 (€1-€3), and promised myself that I would not stop enroute for dinner, but will eat at the Tibetan quarter to substitute for the lost trip to Lhasa. This meant that I had to walk during the hours of darkness in a humongous city without a decent map (I took a wrong turn twice!), until I got near my hostel. Strangely, all that adrenaline meant that I was not even tired, or perhaps it was the magical effects of tea!
Today has been a better day than the recent few! It wasn't perfect, and ought to have been better but the imperfections have been immaterial in the all schema of things.
|
Jul 22, 2009 02:00 PM No Tibet for me this year!
I still had a slight chance to go to Tibet but re-organising my itinerary, including changing internal flights, etc would cost me more than a 3 day visit to Lhasa would otherwise be worth it. Perhaps I made a few mistakes on the way while planning the trip, but an agent, who promised to get me organised at the beginning, and then asking three times as much money in the very last minute (I could not respond before I was actually on my way to China) basically ruined my itinerary.
Anyway, I guess I ought to go to Tibet properly, like Isabelle, instead of jamming it into my 16 day long holiday in the region. Next time, I will fly directly to Chengdu and get everything done from here. I think Lufthansa makes the route.
|
Jul 22, 2009 02:00 PM Quin's Terracotta Army
The Terracotta Army of the First Emperor was however why I and millions of other tourists, local or foreign, would come to Xi'an. It was located 40km from the ancient capital, connected by frequent coaches #306 (¥7 ow) and Higer minibuses #915, #914 (¥7 ow), leaving from the front of the train station. The ride was taking about 1h depending on traffic. There were three pits available for viewing, Pit 1 having the most interesting collection of warriors. One hour was enough to see everything.
I actually thought I would be more impressed with the Army. Reports said that there were thousands of warriers uncovered but one can only see a couple of hundreds or so. The site is massive and so over the top with so much space between the parking lot, the ticket office, and two ticket entry points, that after walking all that distance, I expected equally impressive Army. I think the authorities made a mistake. They blew the site out of proportion and decided to display a small portion of the Army, which is so disproportionate that it can really disappoint, after all that expectation built up from the gate.
Anyway, I was glad I saw it! That was the reason I went to the Shaanxi province! And Xi'an for that matter.
|
Jul 21, 2009 02:00 PM Xi'an (CN) - China's ancient capital
Much of Xi'an did not survive the aftermath of the Cultural Revolution and other aspects of China's and Shaanxi history. Yet, what remains, including the massive old city walls, is a clear evidence of the incredible grandeur of the city and importance it had enjoyed.
I went to Xi'an with one purpose only. I wanted to see the Terracotta Army ordered by the First Emperor of China, who united the country and initiated the construction of the Great Wall of China, and gave the start to the Quin Dynasty. So, I did not expect much from Xi'an as a city, despite its status of a former ancient capital. In fact, little if anything remain from the times of China unification, and the city offers few impressive sights. And yet what remains is very impressive indeed.
The sheer size of the wall surrounding the core of the city was overwhelming. It took me 45 minutes to briskly walk the length of one of its four sides. It would probably take about 3.5 hours to circumnavigate the Xi'an's core, without stopping for visits at the massive gates.
Weather was not great when I arrived. In the evening, it actually started to rain, making the sightseeing a bit less pleasant. Xi'an was really busy. It did not have flamboyant skyscrapers like Shanghai or even Hangzhou, but its shopping malls rivalled many I had seen before, and not only in China. It seriously looked like the citizens of Xi'an could afford a lot. But only on the surface. Some of the side streets, some of which ran close to the northern part of the wall, were lined by extremely poor households with people reliefing themselves on the pavement, and living in, what looked like, garages without windows.
Anyway, I spent some time around the Bell Tower, the Drum Tower, and the Great Mosque. I wandered about until it got completely dark and the prominent buildings and shopping malls were illuminated by night lighting, creating a new atmosphere.
|
Jul 21, 2009 02:00 PM Shanghai (CN) - no eclipse
Shanghai turned out to be a bad choice for eclipse watching. The sky was covered with grey heavy clouds all morning, and just before the totality, rain started to fall! It was a disaster. It got dark like at night for six minutes and that was it. I knew weather was going to be bad, already a few days back, and I knew I should have gone to Chrngdu, which apparently had only patchy clouds. Many long haul travellers, like me, were utterly gutted. Such a shame!
I am now sitting at the Pudong Imternational Airport waiting for my flight to Xi'an, which is late late late! At least they have free wifi Internet access throughout. The airport is very large, modern, lovely, clean and well organised. It has loos and drinking water dispensers every two gates! It felt empty, as I was the only passenger for about 20 gates as I walked down the terminal. Surely it was built with a view that passenger air traffic was going to increase franTically in China. This perhaps is a correct view. And yet, there is only one eatery serving noodles and ice-cream
|
Jul 20, 2009 02:00 PM Hangzhou (CN) - exploring the famous lake
A large, one million inhabitants city that grew around the shores of the West Lake, had much more appeal than the impersonal and hyper-commercialised Shanghai. It was cleaner, quieter, better organised and even the ladies appeared prettier.
The lake receives a reputation of a perfect one, but this is so exaggerated! There is not much to see around the lake and the islands on it, apart from a few moderately attractive temples and residences of former dignitaries. The boatsmen hunting for tourists asked standard prices ranging from ¥80 to ¥120 for one hour ride on the lake. So if you were a group of four, then it might made sense. Otherwise, the larger state-owned vessels charged ¥45 for the transfer to one of the islands and back. The price also included the alleged fee to the sights of the Idland, but I have not seen anyone checking any tickets.
However overadvertised Hangzhou was with regard to its sights, etc, the lake definitely had a cooling effect and light breeze was a bliss. So much better than the sticky hot Shanghai.
|
Jul 19, 2009 02:00 PM Shanghai (CN) - the second day
The entire morning I spent on conversing with rather incompetent staff in various locations trying to secure a trip to Lhasa. I had a terrible feeling that people deliberately did not want to help me, and tried a number of tricks to prevent me from going. I gave up at some point and declared that the Chinese regime had won the battle with me.
The rest of the day I spent mainly on walking with short breaks on tea and beer. I visited Shanghai's most famous tea house, had lunch in a local eatery (fried rice with shrimp for ¥11), and visited the saucer-shaped Sky Bar (beers ¥50) at the Radisson Hotel on the People's Park, where views over Shsnghai were nothing short of breathtaking, though through dirty window pane. And when the night fell, the panorama became very animated with lights and illuminations.
Uh, I also visited a Buddhist temple, which was still being restored, which was probably related to a high entry price at ¥20.
|
Jul 18, 2009 02:00 PM Shanghai (CN) - in preparation for Expo 2010...
Shanghai is huge! Frighteningly vast! And excruciatingly hot and humid. Had it not been dug out and covered in scaffolding, construction material and machinery, and ugly fences, including the one at The Bund, which completely blocked the view of the Pudong from one side and The Bund from the other, it might have been an enjoyable city to visit with impressive sights. Utterly disappointing! The only way of admiring the view of Pudong was from a tourist boat, touts of which cruised the riverside streets inviting tourists for the ¥100 ride. As I had that in my itinerary, I decided to go on one but only in the afternoon.
The Yuyuan Garden and the area nearby made the best impression on me. My guess was that the traditional Chinese architecture was a reconstruction but I did not care. It was cute. I did not care for the über commercialism materialised with shops selling souvenirs and a range of useless things. It was great to see so many locals there frequenting the teahouses and foodcourts offering dim sum and deep fried insects, among animal intestins and things I could not recognise. In fact, I saw few individual, and in couples, tourists in this attractive part of the city. Reconstructed or not, I liked the brown wooden buildings and the narrow alleys between them and the central pond full of colourful carp and turtles. It all looked in its right place and the Pudong skyline with the World Financial Centre Observatory (bottle openner)and the Jingmao towers looming ever so slightly in the distance.
Interestingly, many Chinese girls approached me just wanting to chat (I think). One of them really suprised me by saying "you would have really been very handsome if you had smaller belly". I was not quite sure how to react to this sweet form of an usult, so I just laughed it off. All of them asked many direct questions and I felt like being interrogated, having to explain why I'd come to China and why I was travelling alone. I guess they did not realise that working in an office of 11,000 people actually means that on holiday one really, really wants some time for oneself. Full stop (am. period).
|
Jul 17, 2009 02:00 PM Shanghai (CN) - no first impression yet
I arrived safely in Shanghai. On time! It was a bumpy ride of over 10 hours from Munich, and I did not catch much sleep. I watched three films, 'Pink Panther 2', 'Duplicity', 'I Love You, Man' but the seat did not recline well enough for a sleeping position...
Shanghai... Well, the Pudong International Airport seemed well organised and from the time of landing, it took me about 20 minutes to reach arrival hall, pass through the immigration and customs and get to the Maglev train station. It took further 30 minutes to get to the Blue Mountain Hostel in town. I used metro, which was mega clean and easy to navigate with announcements in both Mandarin and English. The magnetic levitation (maglev) train travelled at 431 km/h and made the 30km distance in 8 minutes. It cost ¥50 for a single ride or ¥80 for a 7 day return. Metro was ¥4 for a single ticket.
So, for now, I have been positively impressed by Shanghai. I have not seen much of it yet, as the hazy weather and smog prevented any landscape admiration from Maglev, and after arrival at the hostel, I dropped in bed for five hours! I was speculating of going to Pudong by night. Eventually, I dropped the idea. For I was staying three more nights, so there were going to be more opportunities to see the city's signature night skyline...
|
Jul 16, 2009 02:00 PM Departing to China
Now, wouldn't it be great if all airports were as efficient as the London City?! I'm sitting in the lounge still debating whether I should be going at all. I have no permit to enter Tibet as the travel agent stuffed me! I have been so unhappy because of this that I really considered to give it a miss altogether.
But I have not been on proper holiday for a year, so cancelling this China trip was not particularly thrilling. And so very disappointed and breathing heavily I disembark the Great Britain. I don't think I have ever been so unexcited about leaving on holiday! Oh well, hopefully there might be a way to get a permit whilst already in China. I am somewhat counting on Shanghai, as I don't expect I will have enough time in Chengdu, although two of the four days I will be in Shanghai fall on weekend.
|
Page:
35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45
|
|
|
