Unexpected Marvels

There’s a ying to every yang. While parts of China have really depressed me, Chengdu has been really lovely. I had no idea what to expect here so there was no living up to expectations. Truth is, I had no expectations at all.

For starters, we love our guide. May speaks fluent English, has a great personality, loves kids and knows her stuff. WOW. What a difference that makes!Plus, our hotel is really, really neat. It’s called the Buddha Zen Hotel and is a very old Chinese home with all three floors of rooms opening onto a central courtyard. The linens are lovely, the bathroom has beautiful tile and the AC works. Man, we’re in hog heaven. If I ever, ever do China again, I will be far pickier about the quality of hotels. We were trying to do it cheap because we figured we’d be spending very little time in our rooms which is true. Still, there’s something nice about a good bed and clean shower.

May says that while people in Beijing live to work, people live in Chengdu to be happy. There is definitely a different vibe here. The city is still incredibly busy, the air still thick with pollution. And like Shanghai and Beijing, much of Chengdu is new with top end stores from around the globe. There’s a brand new airport here and city square which sports one of the five remaining statues of Chairman Mao in the country.

We only came to Chengdu to see the pandas which we’ll see tomorrow. I had no idea anything else here was worth seeing. In fact, even though Chengdu is China’s fourth largest city, I’d never even heard of it. That’s like folks not kowing about Houston! 

We drove about two hours to Leshan see the largest Buddha carved into stone in the world. Think of Mount Rushmore only it was done 1800 years ago! It sits above the Min River so you can only see it by boat. The kids weren’t too impressed and I found myself thinking I might have preferred to skip the long drive and just wandered around Chengdu for a bit, but I’m glad we went if for no other reason than because everybody napped in the car. Amazingly, though the kids got about half their normal sleep last night, we had no big meltdowns today. In fact, I’d say both kids were in a great mood all day except Hudson didn’t want to go on the boat at first. I was in shock. I figured we’d just have a day of tears again. Maisie had her best travel day of all perhaps. Go figure.

Chengdu is in the Szechuan province, famous for it’s food - spicy food. Near the river, we had a yummy lunch and the most modern restaurant we’ve tried yet. I actually felt like maybe the place was even - oh I dunno - not a health risk. The bathroom only had holes in the floor, but they were CLEAN holes. So clean, in fact, that Maisie peed over one without even the tiniest complaint. Tom and I ate one spicy dish, a dish May told them to hold off the spice for us - ha! Maisie fell in love with some mild, beef dish and ate the entire thing by herself. 

After lunch, we drove again to maybe my favorite spot of the whole trip so far: Huanglongxi Ancient Town. The tour operator suggested this. I never even bothered to read up on it. Oh my gosh - it is really wonderful.

The town is built in two sections: new and old. The new section has some water from the local river running right through it in the summer. In the fall, the water is drained, but the part that holds the water is still charming with stone fish, turtles and the like. The town has cobbled, planted streets and gorgeous, old-style buildings and shops galore. It just has this beautiful, magical feel. It’s like the Chinese version of Giethorn, my favorite town in Holland that has beautiful homes built on canals. They call is the Venice of the North. Well, this would be the Venice of Asia if you ask me. There aren't canals for boats, but the "new" part is all built around a central river and is incredibly well landscaped. It’s not huge, but it’s big enough and quite special.

The old section was originally built 1700 years ago, but was refurbished 300 years ago. Ha! The movie“Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” has much of it’s scenery based on the areas here. There are also a lot of temples in town. I could have spent a couple of more hours here, but it was starting to sprinkle - the first rain of our entire trip. Plus, we had to get the kids to bed.

Maisie really liked this town, mostly because they sell flower wreaths to wear on your head. The guide bought her one right away and she was in hog heaven. While our kids have been tourist attractions in their own right at every location, nowhere has the mob been like it was here. There were easily 50 people gathered around our kids at different times just wanting to look at them, some even wanted to hold them. This town isn’t as big with Westerners so I think the blond head and blue eyes are even more of an attraction. When we first got to China, Hudson was scared by all the attention. Then, they both learned to ham it up. Now? They’re sick of it. Today I think we all got a little freaked by it. Maisie and Hudson were both screaming, “NO!” though laughing while they did it. 

Maisie has been such a good big sister on this trip. She really watches out for Hudson and even tries to help us carry the stroller. Ha!

We got back to our hotel after dark - yet again. The area around our hotel is really interesting - cobbled streets with no cars allowed. All the buildings are old-style and quite quaint with lots of shops it seems. We’ve had no time to walk around. I told May I’d like to do so and she said, “Oh no. Tomorrow we’ll visit another area even more charming.” I can’t even imagine.

We’re pretty much out of snacks at this point which is scaring me a bit. We bought a few at the grocery tonight, but I’m not even sure what they are. Luckily, we’ve found a lot of fresh bananas and the like so that’s helping. Maisie had a HUGE Asian pear this afternoon and thought it was sent from Heaven itself.

For dinner, we took the kids around the corner from our hotel to a place that seemed to be just for them. The joint sells hot dogs and is decorated with all these Western icons, Mickey Mouse, Thomas, Spiderman and the like. They gobbled down their food and we went to the room. I completely repacked our bag and sent Tom out to get us dinner. He came back with these four LONG skewers of meat and some muffins. I opted for the muffins since my stomach was not in good shape today at all. “Life ain’t worth living without Immodium” is my motto here in China.