Merry Christmas everyone. Sha and I have just had a wonderful Christmas in Hangzhou. We even managed to throw some snow at each other! After "breakfast" at Sha's favourite restaurant, we headed off to "Hu Pao" (tiger running). It's amazing!! Hu Pao is a wonderful park on the mountainside where Longjin tea is grown. The tea, which we tried in a small tea-shop on the mountain, is made in water from the local well. Apparently the water "is very dense". They proved this by making a coin float on the water.
We then went to see some huge bamboo and a stone engraving of a monk dreaming of tigers.
Oh gosh, Sha is listening to Beijing opera on the TV.
I discovered today that the 500 buddhas we saw yesterday were actually Arhats (we saw another 500 today!). ----just not professional translate though, if in chinese, I definitely can explain very well!!!!!!---Sha.
We saw a wonderful sign: "Visit aprj incvilzation flrbld climbing". It makes sense, but how did they manage to get that translation?
We then went on our wonderful hike up to the top of the mountain. This involved thousands and thousands of steps, some snow and spectacular views of the tea plants! It was beautiful. It was wonderful! We met a very friendly man at the top who gave us some of his tea (from Yunnan), told us a bit about the area and gave us two oranges.
Then we continued on our way. The whole walk took about four hours. Did I mention that it was wonderful? We saw and heard lots of different types of birds. The most amazing thing about the hike is that we walked for ages without seeing anyone else ... that's rare in China!In the evening we queued for an hour or so to eat at "Grandma's". We ate heaps of traditional food from the area including Xi Hu Cu Yu - a fish from the West Lake cooked in something nice. We also ate half a bamboo forest.
An amazing Christmas!
(BTW ... the photos are in no order as Sha is trying to grab my computer to skype her mum)
3 comments:
I don't think I could ever become an Arhat while remaining so envious of other people's experiences. Wish we were there (although your father generally pulls a face when he looks at the food pictures). I hardly need to wish both of you a Happy Christmas, do I?
All of the history and culture is excellent, but those fishes are superb.
Those fish really were excellent! Don't worry dad, we spotted two Indian restaurants, a Thai restaurant, an "Irish potato cafe" and a Norwegian pub. I'm sure that you'll find something good to eat! We had cake in a "traditional English tea room" which served the traditional English tea, cucumber sandwiches and glutinous durian rice balls!! :)
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