Pandas

Thursday, 15 May 2014

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G'day Mate!

Chongqing Zoo

Red pandas

At last, a panda

What we came to see

We awoke to the grey skies of Chongqing – evidently this city is treated to 300 HOURS of sunshine annually! – and we were assured it was a good day, weatherwise, as we were able to see across the river through the mist.  Once again, disembarkation was across a large number of pontoon bridges before a long climb to the roadway.  While we were having breakfast, we were able to watch the ship’s supplies being carried on board – one man would carry five slabs of 1 litre bottles of coca cola (60 kg) suspended on a bamboo pool across his shoulders.  There were also a large number of porters available to help us disembark and climb the 649 steps (it seemed that many, anyway).  For a fee, they would either carry our hand luggage of hold our arms, with the going rate being $2 per arm!  We managed without assistance.

We really needed to sit on the bus to recover from the cardio-vascular workout and were really overcome by the number of skyscrapers, all apartment accommodation, as we drove to the zoo.  This huge city contains thousands upon thousands of skyscraper buildings – they just go on and on.  With a noon flight, our visit to the Chongqing Zoo was a fairly quick affair, past the tai chi and ballroom dancing participants, an avenue of animal statues (including a kangaroo) and the red panda before viewing the pandas – our reason for the visit.

Then it was to the airport, with a pretty impressive traffic jam on the way.  Some cars were just stuck in the middle of a large junction, unable to move, with the drivers giving up and playing computer games!  While we were waiting at the airport for our guide to check us in, a well-dressed lady kept asking to take our photos, also wanting her photo taken with us, and then wanted our phone number to email her photos.  Despite her not speaking English and none of us speaking Chinese, we didn’t have much trouble working out what she wanted.  After accepting a business card, we walked away, wondering if she was Chinese Secret Service, but our guide told us she was a local guide looking for customers.  Our China Southern flight to Guilin was smooth and we actually saw some blue sky for a while after we climbed through the cloud cover.

 

Guilin's karsts

Market at the Reed Flute Cave

Decorated tree in park grounds

Colourful caves

Swan Lake underground

Punts for hire

Comfortable!

 

Lunch today was at a restaurant at Guilin Airport, due to our arrival time of 1.15 pm.  Quite a few of us gave KFC a long look as we were led upstairs to the restaurant.  For the first time on this trip, after looking at the food offered, I decided a Haagen Daz ice cream from an airport shop would be preferable.  After lunch, we drove through the rain and mist of this tropical city, with glimpses of the limestone karsts, to the Reed Flute Cave.  To enter the cave, it was necessary to climb up 833 steps to the top of the mountain, knowing what does us must come down, entered through a rather nice gift shop and immediately started to descent into the very wet cave.  OH&S standards left a little to be desired, as there were no handrails on the many, many slippery steps.  However, the cave was amazing, with the limestone features highlighted with coloured lights.  A large cavern at the bottom of the complex was used for a screening on the roof of a video showing how the cave had been formed – very impressive.  Having reached the bottom of the cave system, we then had to climb back up again, to exit through another gift shop before climbing back down all the steps to the Lotus Lake – being followed by some very determined ladies attempting to see postcards and booklets.  There were some bamboo punts on the lake, which looked to be available for hire – I think I preferred the punts at Cambridge.

Our hotel in Guilin is the Shangri-la, most aptly named.  I think we will be very comfortable here.  Dinner tonight was in the hotel buffet – an international buffet with dishes not only from China, but also Japan, Italy and India.  We could even select live crabs and prawns from tanks and watch them being cooked.  We both balked at the frog bits and salmon heads!