China Tour - September 2010

China was definitely a unique trip. Famous historical sites like the Great Wall, Forbidden City, Terracotta Army and significant modern places like Tiananmen Square as well. Absolutely a fantastic experience, and yet inexplicably a bit unsatisfying as well.

Before taking this trip, I think I was at least a little afraid that China might be one destination which was a bit too exotic and mysterious. Chinese language being seemed so intimidating and foreign I didn't know if I would be able to get along there and survive on my own at all. So, I hedged my bet by signing up for a formal tour, and then exorcised my fears by going on my own a few days early. Turns out China wasn't so scary after all!

Beijing -

It was late afternoon on a weekday when my flight arrived. By the time I got through customs, collected my checked luggage, and found a taxi to take me to the hotel it was clearly rush hour traffic. The taxi sped right along till we got off the airport grounds and onto the expressway whereupon we immediately ran into a traffic jam. The taxi driver pulled up to a stop behind the rest of the cars, shut off the motor, got out to stand beside the cab and light up a cigarette. Obviously we were going to be there a while...

I have been in a lot of large cities in the course of my travels, but Beijing has a sense of scale I don't recall experiencing anywhere else. For the days there on my own before the scheduled tour, I picked a hotel on Wangfujing Dajie where my room actually had a view of the Forbidden City. I walked to Baihai Park, Jingshan Park, Tiananmen Square, and the Forbidden City. Went shopping in the huge shopping area of Wangfujing street, loved the nightly street food from the fixed stalls on Dong'anmen Steet, and celebrated my birthday by having dinner with several co-workers from our team in China.

I got to learn and use a bit of mandarin language, try eating stir fried spicy noodles with chop sticks while walking on food street, and discovered hot pot thanks to my chinese friends. Even found my new favorite breakfast food; Ji Dan Guan Bing. Beijing felt friendly, comfortable and safe, in a very good way not what I expected at all!

On the official tour there was another three days in Beijing were we saw pandas at the Bejing Zoo, Olympic Stadium (Birds Nest), Temple of Heaven, the Summer Palace to the northwest of Beijing proper, visited Tiananmen Square with the Monument to the People's Heroes, Great Hall of the People, and Mao Zedong Memorial Hall. Then on the other side of the massive Chang'an Avenue we visited the Forbidden City commissioned by the third Emperor of the Ming Dynasty and built between 1406 and 1420, but later burned down, sacked, and rebuilt many times.

North of Bejing in the mountains we walked along China’s famed Great Wall at Mutianyu, in the old Hutong district of Beijing we took a rickshaw tour, and we even found time for group shopping at the Pearl market as well as a traditional Peking Duck Dinner.

Xi’an -

After arriving in Xi'an, we visited the six hundred year old City Wall along with the Bell and Drum Towers which mark the center of the ancient capital, expored the market streets and alleys of the muslim quarter. On the first night, my roommate and I missed joining the rest of our group for dinner so we went to a hot pot resturant about a half block from the hotel where I got the opportunity to pass on the hot pot knowledge I learned from Jing & Pei in Beijing

On our second day we rode by van out into the countryside to the archaeological site of the Terracotta Warriors. It was a large complex of four excavation pits covered by huge buildings, along with a museum and theater. One can't help but be impressed by the sheer magnitude of this army individually hand crafted to guard the tomb of China’s first emperor Qinshuang. Not just warriors, but archers,spearmen, infantry, generals, and even chariots pulled by terracotta horses. Just amazing!

Back in Xi’an we finished our stay by attending dinner and watching the Tang Dynasty stage show.

Chongqing -

Chongqing, which was once known as Chungking, was another major city. All of the destinations on this tour seemed to be large cities, but this was also the starting point for our scheduled Yangtzee Cruise so we only had a day spend here. Still, we did have time to visit the People's Assembly Hall & Chongqing People's Square, the Huguang Assembly Hall & Sichuan Immigration Museum, and have lunch at a beautiful roof top resturant before boarding the Victoria Katrina for the cruise down river.

After dark, from the water, the colorful city lights are beautifully animated.

Yangtzee Cruise -

Our Yangtze River segment was billed as a three day luxury cruise, from Chongqing to Yichang through the Three Gorges reservoir including transit through the locks at the famous Three Gorges Dam. The Victoria Katrina seemed like a nice enough river boat, but it had a strong chemical odor something like a cross between Lysol and mothballs. In spite of the chemical aura the boat had I got on board, our group had drinks at the bar before watching the night lights of Chongqing as we set sail down river.

The more enclosed the space, the stronger the chemical odor seemed to be. That first night in the stateroom (one of the smallest spaces onboard) I could not stop coughing, my throat felt like it was closing up, and ultimately I spent the night outside curled up on the little deck of our cabin trying to sleep because it was just unbearable inside. When we got to our first stop at Fengdu, as soon as reached the far side of the dock walking away from the boat for the shore excursion I felt much better. My throat finally relaxed, and the urge to cough went away.

Built over 1800 years ago, Fengdu is modelled after the Chinese Hell from Taoist mythology, and according to Chinese legend, the ghost city of Fengdu is where the devil lives. The town is overlooked by Ming Shan Hill, home of Tianzi, the King of the Dead. But for me, hell was going back to that boat. As soon as I got back within a couple of steps of the Victoria Katrina that chemical aura hit me, my throat immediately closed back up, and the hacking cough came back. I tried to get back onboard but by the time everyone else was back on the boat I had to get off that boat, there was just no way I could survive two more days on that cruise.

So I left the boat at Fengdu and took a 4 hour taxi ride back to Chongqing where I caught a flight directly to Shanghai. Regretably I had to miss seeing the Three Gorges Dam, but unfortunately I think that was a life and death decision and my life is worth more than any sightseeing trip.

Shanghai -

It was raining the first couple daysin Shanghai. The hotel was downtown and I explored the area in walking distance before my tour group caught up, even watched the show at the ampitheatre next door where there was live music on the nights. Then, back on the official itinerary we visited Yu Garden, the Shanghai World Financial Center Observatory Tower, and attended a world-class acrobatics show before wrapping it all up by spending our last full day at World Expo 2010.

World Expo 2010 Shanghai China was over 5.25 square kilometers so a single day was not really enough time to cover it all, but by the luck of the draw I was paired with a woman who had her arm in a cast so we were able to skip a lot of the long lines by using the handicapped entrances. So we actually managed to get through a surprising number of the exhibits.

Mostly this was a pretty great trip, we saw a lot of the must see places one has to visit in China. Yet other than the time I was in Beijing on my own I can't help but feel that somehow the organized tour was just a bit too sterile. We saw some of the history, but missed the culture. This was a good introduction, but there is probably too much China to ever see in one trip so now that I have my prerequisites done I think I will have to go back again for the advanced trip...