Ghost City and Chinese Hell

Today we started off with a safety meeting in the lounge of the ship. It turned into a sales presentation for massage therapy and acupuncture. Actually, John and I both went for acupuncture as did most of our fellow travelers. You had to everyone was wearing those smelly camphor patches so you need to wear one just for defense.

As we traveled down the river, we noticed ALL the bridge building.




We stopped at the "Ghost City" a city devoted to the "King of Hell". Our guide told us that the Chinese believe that all spirits go here after death, even western spirits. It was sort of a carnival ghost town inspired by Dante. Or maybe Dante was inspired by the Chinese view of hell.

Guild Hall and Concubine Lives

A lack luster day for the tours. Chongqing is a commercial / industrial center with it's location on the Yangtze. Our day was mainly the transfer from Beijing to Chongqing to get on our Yangtze River cruise.
We started the day with our hotel breakfast buffet, including yes, silk pupa.

Then we boarded the bus for our flight to Chongqing.

Once in Chongqing, I think the tour company had to wrack its brain to come up with a tour. So today was a tour of Concubine Beds and a Guild Hall.


Yep, I know more than I really wanted to know about Concubines and their beds. The first wife apparently had a bed with "6 tiers" to signify status, concubines had beds of different number of tiers from one to five. The wife and concubines basically lived within the "bedrooms", played mah jongg to pass the time. Remember, these were also times when they bound women's feet for beauty, not a good life. Of course it was better than being the wife of a peasant and working in the fields.

The Guild Hall tour was like a "concrete" wax museum of local merchants who set up farmers in the local area. This is the front of the Guild hall here.
Then onto the ship via a cable car system to lower us down to the ship.
More tomorrow.Leticia

Observatory and people scenes of interest

7/22/2008

In the morning we visited an observatory built in the 1600's. The Chinese were great astronomers. In these pictures are an eclipse viewing device and they recorded over 1000 occurrences of eclipses.

Also, just some other items that caught my eye. 4 boys fixing a bicycle, why upside down, I don't know, but they were so cute.


Tai Ball in the park. A take off of Tai Chi using a ball and paddle. The objective is not to bat the ball back and forth, but to catch it, keep it on the paddle with centrifugal forces and toss back gently, almost a dance.

In the afternoon, after touring, I went for a trip on the Beijing Subway alone to pick up some blouses at a tailor shop. The subway was clean, safe and well marked, so I had no trouble getting to the Silk Market and back.



Afterwards, I and other tour group members got together for dinner. We wanted something 'authentic' chinese and were recommended to a nearby restaurant, with a speciality in "hot pot". Sort of a Mongolian style soup, where you select items to drop into the very hot soup to cook.

More tomorrow.
TMBWitW

Summer Palace, Forbidden City, driveways

Busy day today. The Forbidden City and the Summer Palace. BTW, it's very hot and humid in Beijing this time of year. Definitely the off-season, except for the Olympics soon.
We visited the Forbidden City. A place denied to proles like us in the last century, now a tourist spot. I love revolutions.

I'm just fascinated by the intricate bas-relief work for a "ramp". So I got several pictures of them. I kept thinking, it might sell to have 'concrete' forms made of this as "drive ways" for up end home. I think it would sell.

Here a bas-relief Dragon Wall at Forbidden City.

A 24 arm Buddha for sale by the "government" at the Gov't Store. I need to research this when I get back to internet access. Part of the museum tour at the Forbidden was to sell these "treasures" to tourists. I want to research if this is for real.


We took this Dragon Boat to the Summer Palace. The Summer Palace grounds were cooler, with at several of these 'cool spots' within the long corridor. On the Grounds of the Summer Palace is the longest corridor in the world. A long covered porch mainly for traveling from place to place on the Summer Palace grounds.




TMBWitW

Touring the Great Wall, the Hutong District and Panda

Today we visited the Great Wall of China near Beijing. I climbed up to the 3rd Fortress Tower and nearly passed out from the heat. John sensibly stayed below.







After the visit to the Great Wall, we tour the Hutong Area, an area built/inhabited by conquering Mongols, in a pedi-cab.



This building fascinated John and I as it is totally incased in glass. The heat generation must be amazing.

A visit to the zoo allowed us to see the pandas in action, yes, action.. um action?

A Clearer Day in Beijing

Nothing exciting today. Just changed hotels from the Crowne Plaza to the Oriental Bay Hotel. We join the Champion Holiday Bejing / Yangtze River Tour tomorrow.

The OBH is on the 2nd Ring Road, right next to the Moat. That's right, the moat. The hotel sits on the outer wall of the old Beijing. I went for a walk along the moat, found a "serenity spa" where I got a 60 yuan ($10) 30 minute massage. A bit inexpert, but nice nonetheless. Also, note, the government policies are starting to work. See the blue sky over Beijing. The Chinese government shutdown factories for 2 months before the Olympics on 8/8/2008. Tomorrow, there will be an even/odd rule of cars. Only cars with even license plates will be allowed to drive, then the next day odd license plate. This is the clearest day I've seen yet.
In the 2-3 miles of my walk, I noticed at least 10 people involved in either cleaning the moat or the street.
I love the esthetics of the moat, the retaining wall around the moat is made of concrete formed to look like wood.
I stopped for water at a small convenience store and found Pabst Blue Ribbon Water?? (In Texas, it's Pabst Blue Ribbon Beer.
The hotel is well located near a subway station.

More later,

TMBWitW

Continuing my tour of Beijing

Continuing my tour of Beijing, a busy day today. Here are some of the day's pictures.

Went over to the Olympic grounds to see what we could. Security is tight, so we could not get very close. This is John and I in front of the Bird's Nest Stadium.

We walked into this battalion Olympic volunteers running by. A battalion of very handsome fit young men.

This picture is of, you guessed it, WALMART in China. Same Walmart, just a bit different. For example, this Walmart has a fresh fish market (see fish swimming), and a butcher standing in the middle of the aisles cutting short ribs, dragon fruit, a favorite, and "taste samplers" hawking... and I do mean hawking their samples, loudly with enthusiasm.

More later,

TMBWitW

Beijing China

So, the first full day in China, and of course I go shopping. I'm getting a couple of custom suits made for me while I'm here. We went to the Silk Factory to get them. Here you can also see how silk is made.

This picture is of the silk being pulled off the cocoon of the silk worm pupa. The cocoon is boiled in water allowed to cool, then you pull the one strand off the cocoon match with 7 others to make an 8 strand thread. The thread around a single cocoon is a mile long.
Also, nothing is wasted, after pulling the silk off the cocoon, the pupas are considered food.. ewww. But if you like to experiment, you can buy a can of silk worm pupas for consumption at the Super H Mart in Carrollton TX. No? I didn't think so. However, my Chinese guide Nancy, says they are full of protein and very healthy for you.

Nancy and I got to the Silk Factory via the Beijing Subway system. The subway's signs are in both Chinese and English. The subway was an easy walk from the hotel and the shop we went too.

Start of my 2008 Solar Eclipse Trip

7/15/2008

Today I started my 2008 Solar Eclipse Trip. Some quick background, I've chased every total solar eclipse since my 2nd one in the Carribbean in 1998. During this trip I'll view my 9th eclipse and visit my 6th continent.

On this trip I'll visit Beijing, from Chongqing, travel down the Yangtze river to Wuhan, fly to Urumqi, travel through the Gobi Desert to our eclipse site near Yiwu, and take the Orient Express to Xi'an.

TMBWITW