Heading out on some travels- First stop Valencia where I will catch a train to Zaragoza. Un recorrido corto. Primer tramo: de Xàtiva a la Estación del Norte de Valencia. Desde allí, tomo el tren a Zaragoza.
Estacio del Nord (Valencia’s main train station- “North Station”)
My preferred way to get to Zaragoza is the slooooow train that leaves from Valencia heading north along the coast to Sagunt/Sagunto, from which it heads northwest to Teruel and then arcs northward until it arrives in Zaragoza. It is a long ride, taking more than 5 1/2 hours. But for me the travel through the interior is relaxing, even soothing.
Mi forma preferida de llegar a Zaragoza es el tren muuuy lento que sale de Valencia rumbo al norte por la costa hasta Sagunto, desde donde se dirige al noroeste hasta Teruel y luego describe una curva hacia el norte hasta llegar a Zaragoza. Es un viaje largo, de más de cinco horas y media. Pero para mí, el viaje por el interior es relajante, incluso reconfortante.
The scenery along the route is quite varied. This is Spain, not America, so you see lots of modern wind turbines generating electricity*. Also you pass through picturesque small towns and rural landscapes. * OK, OK, there are some areas in America where wind turbines are being deployed. But sadly the current mentality here is “Drill baby, drill”, extract more oil and burn more coal. Especially now with Trump in office we seem to delight in the idea of generating dirty air.
El paisaje a lo largo de la ruta es bastante variado. Estamos en España, no en Estados Unidos, así que se ven muchos aerogeneradores modernos generando electricidad*. También se pasa por pintorescos pueblos y paisajes rurales. *Vale, vale, hay algunas zonas en Estados Unidos donde se están instalando aerogeneradores. Pero lamentablemente la mentalidad actual aquí es: «Perfora, perfora», extrae más petróleo y quema más carbón. Sobre todo ahora, con Trump en el cargo, parece que nos encanta la idea de contaminar el aire.
The city of Zaragoza has many stories to tell. As I expand the “Pere-X” site with its collection of video beyond China, I will focus on Spain. One of the first destinations I will feature is Zaragoza.
La ciudad de Zaragoza tiene muchas historias que contar. A medida que amplíe la web “Pere-X” con su colección de vídeos más allá de China, me centraré en España. Uno de los primeros destinos que presentaré es Zaragoza.
OK, if you know me- you are already aware that I am a bit crazy.
I had existing plans to go spend a few months in Spain. But then I saw some attractive airfares to China FROM SPAIN!
So, the insane itinerary that evolved was this: * Fly from Colorado to Madrid by way of Dallas/Fort Worth. * Hang out FOREVER at and near the Barajas Airport in Madrid. * Fly from Madrid to Xi’an’s Xianyang airport where I would catch a cat nap before taking the train to Yinchuan. * Spend almost three weeks in China! * Fly back from the Xianyang airport to Madrid * Train to Xàtiva and fun in Spain!
These house shoes have super flexible soles that are NOT gummy black.I fell in love with them, and they had that abstract red/black pair in my size. I sent photos to my wife from the store and she selected a pair too.
My hotel reservation in Guiyang was at a hotel I had stayed at on several previous visits. In the past it had been a great place with fantastic, friendly, helpful staff.
But on this trip, right away it was clear the place had really deteriorated. The new staff at the reception desk were nowhere near as helpful as before, my room was shabby, and to top it off, street repairs with noisy jackhammers made it difficult to sleep. I decided to find a different hotel for the rest of my stay in Guiyang.
Searching available rooms I focused on the general area of my original hotel. in the general area of the first one. I made a (cancel-able) reservation at a hotel two blocks away. The nightly cost was a bit more, but it was presented as a room with a (city) view.
I left my luggage at the original hotel, and walked over to this “possible” new place to scope it out. A lady showed me a room on the 7th floor that was head and shoulders above the first hotel. But when I looked out the window? Meh. Pretty much no view. So I said to the woman “city view? I don’t think so!” So she suggested we look at a room on the 12th floor. Well, a nice view! (sometimes you need to make a point of asking!) See photo.
So I switched hotels.
Later in the afternoon I asked the desk clerk if there was a guest laundry room. Yep, a self service one. She said that detergent was available at the front desk.
So latter I brought down a bunch of clothes in a bag. A desk clerk led me to the laundry room. Self service? Perhaps I just seemed too stupid to figure out how to do it. Or maybe she was just being respectful of an old man. She loaded the clothes. She added the detergent, she set the control dials. I was confused by the last setting screen. “How long will it run?” I asked. “Shall I come back in an hour?” “No. When the washer is done, we will move the clothes to the dryer and handle that. Come back to the front desk around 8:30 and we’ll have it all ready for you.” Wow… I really got spoiled!
The desk clerks were all smiles after that. And indeed very friendly any time I was coming or going!
Howie’s wished me goodbye with a smiling sincere bear hug before I disappeared into the secured area of the train station . I thought about how fortunate I was to have met him by chance years ago when I was visiting Suzhou. 🙂
I boarded the train- destination Guiyang. The route began by heading toward Chongqing .
Along the way we passed by some nice rural scenery.
After a bit, daylight gave way to dusk, and then the dark of night.
well, I suppose it is appropriate that it was raining yesterday when we visited Dujiangyan. After all, that ancient engineering masterpiece was built to control flooding and also distribute water for irrigation!
Since I had neglected to bring s raincoat to China, I bought a cheap plastic on there at the site. Howie sort of bragged about his jacket. But about 20 minutes later sought out a vendor to buy his own rain suit.
Later I noticed some people with cheap rubber galoshes. My shoes were in great danger of becoming soaked, so I said to Howie – hey, let’s see if that pocket vendor stand has booties. Yep, they did. Howie and I both bought some. The lady there saw me struggling to get mine on. So she sat me on a stool and insisted on stretching them over my clown shoes herself. 🙂 Such a sweetie.
While wandering on my last day in Nanyang, I encountered a friendly group of musicians who were setting up to practice.
My request to photograph them led to them insisting I join in. But I have no musical talent! No problem they said, and this was the result. (no part of the conversation was in English and most of the communication involved one of them saying something in Chinese, me insisting I don’t know any Chinese and couldn’t understand, then communication occurred through gestures and smiles.)
During this wide ranging spring trim to China I was aided by many friends. Some of you looking at these posts may remember “Jim”, who I had met in Tunxi when I was visiting Anhui a few years ago. (If you watch my video on Pere-X.net about that Anhui trip you will see a photo of Jim. Well, Jim was kind enough to take more than a week off work to spend about 9 days traveling along with me in China. He was a great pal to help me and he also enjoyed the travels. Together we visited: Hangzhou, Tongling, Zhengzhou, Anyang, Kaifeng, Datong, and Taiyuan. Jim also has channels on both WeChat and YouTube. He has posted some nice videos there showing some of the things we saw during our travels. So, here are links to some of his videos that I hope you will enjoy! (I apologize for inserting some of my own commentary. Feel free to ignore it and just enjoy Jim’s videos and let his narrative speak for itself!)
Hangzhou
(I will mention that I always hate to see photos or videos of myself. But since Jim’s videos were not just telling about the places we went, but also talking about our journey… it is unavoidable!)
Tongling- heading to our picnic
Tongling- Picnic on island in the middle of the Yangtze River
Zhengzhou: Shang Dynasty City Walls
The Shang Dynasty? What you should know- The Shang Dynasty is the oldest Chinese dynasty for which there is solid archaeological evidence. Although human presence and the beginnings of Chinese civilization certainly predate the Shang… there just isn’t a lot of evidence.
The Shang dynasty was in power in what is now central China from about 1600 to 1000 BCE. Good lord! That was even longer ago then my high school days! (By the way: “BCE” is the same as BC for any “old school” folks reading this!)
Predating the Shang was the “Xia” dynasty. DON’T confuse that with the “Western Xia” which was much, much later! (And which is mentioned in my own videos when I talk about Ningxia.)
The Chinese have a long history of invention and should certainly be looked at as over-achievers! To help you get a handle on the Shang Dynasty, let’s talk about something you all have probably heard about: The ”Oracle Bones”. As a part of the Shang culture among the elite, soothsayers used a rather unique method to predict the future. They would inscribe questions on the bones of oxen or on the underside of a turtle shell, and then put these items into a fire. Based on how the fire would crack the bone/shell, the soothsayer would interpret the answer to the inscribed question.
Well, guessing the future has a long long history… but what is really interesting about this is that they “inscribed questions”. This is the evidence of the earliest form of written Chinese!
Yep, more than three thousand years ago they were writing with an early form of the written Chinese still used today! Now that is sustainability!
In an early part of this video of our visit to the Iron Pagoda, Jim shows a crazy scene where numerous classes of young students pass by enthusiastically waving. Chinese people, on the whole, are very friendly. And the kids seem really curious to see a tall westerner. Although many westerners including western tourists, can be found in Beijing, Shanghai, and Xi’an… there are many other areas where “Westerners” are a very rare site. Early in this trip for example, when I was in Wuxi (between Nanjing and Shanghai) a few kids latched onto me, and one boy in particular wouldn’t leave. Finally he apologized and told me that it was just that he had never met a westerner before.
Kaifeng: Dragon Pagoda
Datong: Hanging Temple
This video shows the “Hanging Temple” (悬空寺) in Shanxi Province (Note: Shanxi, NOT Shaanxi) near the city of Datong.
In the video Jim does an excellent job of explaining background details and cultural significance of this site.
I first saw a photo of the hanging temple many years ago in a magazine while riding a high-speed train in China. At first glance the photo was nothing more than a photo-shopped adaptation of a picture of the cliff dwellings in “Mesa Verde” (located in southwestern Colorado), to convert the adobe/brick structures into Chinese type buildings. But then I realized the amazing reality of Datong’s “Hanging Temple”, and swore that I had to go visit it one day! Well, the opportunity came this April! It is “way cool” to say the least!
Datong: Yungang Grottoes
This collection of Buddhist artwork within a series of “caves” is considered one of the three most important such sites in China. (The other two are Longmen Grottoes, near Luoyang in Henan Province, which I visited with my colleagues Alexandria, Megan, and Kristen from the XJTU Summer English Program, and Magao Grottoes near Dunhuang in Gansu province which I visited with another colleague- my good friend Marlene)
Take a look at Jim’s video to get an idea of how impressive this artwork is!
After Datong we had another smooth ride on the Chinese high-speed rail network. Destination- Taiyuan, capital of Shanxi province.
Taiyuan’s “Twin Pagodas”
There is a lot to see in Taiyuan, but unfortunately my time was short, so I really only was able to squeeze in a visit to the twin pagodas. My friend Jim had even less time because he was flying to Nanjing in order to get back to his hometown of Tongling in time for work.
Lion statuebinary commentStairs to the top
The inside of one of the pair of pagodas was open and one could (theoretically!) climb a dark slick staircase up to the top of that pagoda. From that location there is a view over the city.
I soon began to question my judgement and my decision to ascend. Fine for younger, more nimble bodies. But this slow, tired old man of 69 decided that about halfway up was plenty far enough! Well, as is often the case going down can seem more dangerous than ascending!
Did I mention that the staircase was dark? That it was narrow? That the ancient stone stairs were slick?The view of the pagodas from the ground was perfect!
