Blog 1 - First few days

First day spent in Shanghai waiting for evening flight to Huangshan. The architecture at The Bund was very interesting - 'a touch of Palladian among the Art Deco in China'. Late night flight to Huangshan City. Early start for 1 and/2 hour drive to base of mountain. After passing through flat terraced fields blooming with canola, later to be planted with rice, we were on a toll road to rival anything in Europe, with numerous tunnels. This took us quickly into steep lower maountain slopes with every piece of usable land terraced for tea bushes. Higher up was bamboo forest and above 800 m pine forest. Large bamboo being harvested.

Very new modern cable cars carrying six people took us up, over breathtakingly steep terrain, jagged granite peaks rising sharply from the many valleys, with the cable almost scraping these as we rose. Out of the car and our first climb up to Beginning to Believe peak - up, up!! Each
peak has its own name and many have traditional stories or meanings. Then it was on up and down many times to our hotel - didn't count the steps! For the two days we climbed up and down many peaks - the steps and pathways well designed and maintained to cope with 1.8 million visitors a year. The staffing on the mountain is amazing with people constantly sweeping leaves, etc. Very clean, lots of litter bins and staff constantly picking up any litter and cleaning out bins. People really care for this place. After climbing several other peaks another trip took us down and back up on a different cable car that held 100 people. 

Day 2 we were up and out at 5:15am to see sunrise at Refreshing Terrace - more than 3000 steps up from our hotel!! and before breakfast! Absolutely fabulous sunrise behind incredible foreground of multiple peaks. Many people there but we managed a front row position by climbing onto a rocky ledge. The area is just unbelievable and a must for anyone visiting China.

Everything to build and maintain buildings and all infrastructure, as well as all consumables and rubbish is carried up and down by porters. Incredible endurance and strength these men have. One example was porters carrying two 50kg bags of cement up steps for hundreds of metres. Had opportunity to explore many peaks - of course many steps up and down for each one. Our highest was 1820m. John unable to climb highest peak there (Lotus Peak) as the path does not open till April 1st for safety reasons.

After we came down from the mountain we visited two Ancient Villages dating back to 12th century- Hongcun and Xidi. Hongcun built in the shape of a buffalo. They gave a fascinating insight into feudal system. The villages are still occupied with just certain parts open for viewing, these being the original dwellings of officials and merchants. Many students were there from colleges, they come to paint the scenery.

Overnight sleeper to Suzhou which is famous for its gardens. We visited two beautiful tradional walled house and garden complexes featuring many courtyard rooms. The structure of the grounds was built in C12th. Each corridor or path turned and you would find yourself in yet another garden or courtyard. Corridors contained open window frames through which one glimpsed some garden vista . These gardens and houses were home to officials and merchants. The largest one we saw was 2.33 hectares. They each contained mountains (rock) and water (ponds), both important elements in cultural tradition.

A canal ride took us to China's 'Venice" - an old part of the city dating back to C15th - very narrow in some parts - tight squeeze and manoeuvre to pass other boats.

Back to Shanghai on uninspiring drive through continuous industrial development with accompanying new housing for the workers. A night's stay before going on to Guilin to begin our next adventure. Dinner in local Shanghai restuarant was good despite the menu having several dishes with dog meat!

Traffic in China is organised chaos! with bicycles, motorbikes, cars, buses, trucks sharing the roads and weaving around one another. The centre yellow line is a vague suggestion there may be a left hand or right hand side of the road. Pedestrian crossings are very wide and may be just hint that people may want to cross the road. Where there are traffic lights,  pedestrian crossings have a large countdown showing from 30 seconds so you know you need to evade moving traffic as you cross in your short time! Well next time we will fill you in on the last couple of days her in Guilin/Yangshuo area.