but before we head there we've got a few more places to visit in 大理. 1st up is the filming site of tai long ba bu (天龙八部). and this later also became a filming sites for other 武俠片剧. this filming site was situated on a hill and this hill was in front of the cang shan. quite a picturesqure sight. in the filming site, we took a horse carriage and went round a small portion of the filming site.
Entrance of 天龙八部
Cang Shan at the back
hmmmm... u can say tat this is the chinese version of US's universal studios... only thing is... there are no thrilling rides in sight. anyway we snap some photos... and my dad and me talked to the owner of the horses... he told us how to differentiate the mongolian horse from the 大理 horse... hahaha... its in the horse fur. Mongolian horses are very much more expensive as compared to the 大理 horses as the Mongolian horse is of a better breed. and when the horse start to shake his/her tail up and down... this means that he/she is going to eject horse droppings... hahahaha.... interesting!
in the carriage drawn by the Mongolian horses
Over at the filming site we also got to watch a rather interesting performance of '丟绣球花'. anyway its something like the father wants to marry the daughter off becoz of a '命令' from the king. hence to choose the bridegroom of his daughter, she will throw a 绣球 from the balcony. whichevery guy who managed to grab it will be her husband. then all the china tourists, juz kept pushing and shouting. coz they want to b the ones to grab the ball. i managed to touch the ball, but a big sized guy in front of me juz snatched the ball when it was thrown down. urgh... these china pple... really scary and rude.
anyway this guy went up, put on some traditional clothings and played the role of the bridegoom.
after this performance we walked along the streets to look at the shops and buy some stuffs. after that we headed to a center that was selling all marble products. another item that 大理 is very famous for is her 大理石. u must be wondering what is 大理石 in english. i also din know until i asked my mum. it is marble in english. YES! 大理 is very famous for her marble. and i must say when u enter the shop u see all the different colours of marble stones and large ones with carvings are juz amazing. and the marble are all very cool to the touch! hahaha... a very nice feeling of putting ur hands on the marble and touching it... coz its smooth and cool when the weather is blistering hot. as we walked around the shop, the sales pple juz keep following us around (quite like the shadow following the person). it can b really irritating... coz we may not be buying items...we juz want to talk a look at the stuffs.
Some death anniversary talking place in a district in Dali
anyway after walking 1 round, my family and the uncles exited. we juz wait under the hot sun for the rest to finish up with their shopping. as our itinary did not include visit the 大理 icon, that is the 3 pagodas, 崇圣寺三塔, we requested to take a few pictures. our tour guide was really nice... she asked our driver, 周师傅 if we can make a detour to the 三塔 to take a few pictures. he readily agreed. the 三塔 in 大理 an ensemble of three independent pagodas arranged on the corners of a equilaterial triangle.
Dali's famous icon: 三塔
The Three Pagodas are made of brick and covered with white mud. As its name implies, the Three Pagodas comprise three independent pagodas forming a symmetric triangle. The elegant, balanced and stately style is unique in China’s ancient Buddhist architectures, which makes it a must-see in the tour of Dali. The Three Pagodas, visible from miles away, has been a landmark of Dali City and selected as a national treasure meriting preservation in China. it built during 824-840 AD by king Quan Fengyou (劝丰佑) 69.6 meters (227 feet) high and is one of the tallest pagodas in China’s history. central pagoda is square shaped and composed of sixteen stories; each story has multiple tiers of upturned eaves. There is a carved shrine containing a white marble sitting Buddha statue at the center of each façade of every story. The body of the pagoda is hollow from the first to the eighth story, surrounded with 3.3 meters (10 feet) thick walls. In 1978, more than 700 Buddhist antiques, including sculptures made of gold, silver, wood or crystal and documents, were found in the body during a major repairing work. The Three Pagodas are well known for their resilience; they have endured several man-made and natural catastrophes over more than one thousand years.
after snapping the photos we headed to take our lunch and also to visit a batik making factory. u must be surprised how come there is batik making in china?? isn't this susposed to be found in indonesia or south-east asia countries?? but apparently in yunnan, the Bai community makes their own blue cloth. they like to dye their white cloth with blue dye and have intricate designs on the cloth. in fact the so-called factory tat we visited is not much of a factory...
Dali's blue white batik cloths
instead its make up of a few 1 level houses and in 1 of the houses is where 2 old ladies were doing the sewing of the patterns. i took a picture of the old lady who was in her eighties!!! and she was still doing batik patterning for a living.
old lady doing batik patterning
Once we finished viewing the Batik patterning, we had to head up to Lijiang, where we will meet our next tour guide, Xiao Deng. Anyway that will be a few hours of ride on the bus again... hiaz... most of us let our eyes rested.
Paddy fields of Dali. Farewell Dali.....
along the way to Lijiang, the scenery changed. it became more of like entering the mountains and u can see the dressing of the people also changed. hahaha... not to say that their clothings were weird or the scenery was weird... juz that u do not see so many plantations nor paddy fields as compared to Dali. Most probably because Lijiang is in the higer altitudes and its harder to plant crops.
Taken along the way to Lijiang
In Lijiang, u'll be able to see more old folks especially the ladies wearing their traditional costumes. Hmmm... perhaps they are still not used to wearing t-shirts, jeans etc.
Old ladies at tete a tete
The town has a history going back more than 800 years and was once a confluence for trade along the old tea horse road. The Lijiang old town is famous for its orderly system of waterways and bridges. The old town of Lijiang differs from other ancient Chinese cities in architecture, history and the culture of its traditional residents the Nakhi people, therefore people there are called 胖金哥 and 胖金妹 (pàng jīn gē, pàng jīn mèi, male and female respectively). Which means to say that the fatter and darker you are, the more beautiful or handsome you are. Pretty weird concept huh... but that's what's the thinking of the Lijiang people is. as for people like me & my sis, we're of course at the bottom of the lot. hahahaha.... =P
anyway the weather in Lijiang is really much cooler as compared to Dali. And by the time we reached Lijiang met our tour guide, it was close to around 3pm. So we had time to visit the Hei Long Tan (黑龙潭) (Black Dragon Pool).
Entrance of Hei Long Tan (黑龙潭)
As all places are, there is a history to this place. The water is as green and lucid as jade, the pond is also entitled "Yuquan" or Jade Fountain. On the bank of the pond willows hang their withes like silk thread. One can see arbours and pavilions beside the pond, temples hidden in the trees and variegated flowers found everywhere. "A tree of cherry blossom accompanies a tree of willow, while a rose climbs to the tip of one of a tree's twigs." That is how the calm and exquisite view of the place is described. Longshen Pavilion on the east side of the park was built in the second year of the Qianglong era of the Qing Dynasty. In its five compounds are grown over 500 kinds of flowers, their grace and beauty all defy description. It is therefore praised thus: "At Yuchuan the flowers of the four seasons are like embroidered brocade". Emperor Jiaqing and Emperor Guanxu conferred on it royal honours for its famed excellence.
Old folks playing chinese chess
Majong tree. hahaha... coz the bark appears like majong tiles
Deyue Pavilion was rebuilt in 1963. The poet Guo Moruo dedicated two couplets to it. One reads: 'The vernal breeze caresses thousands of willow withes, the view is splendid only in this part. Three million jade dragons fly in the heaven, so ravishing is nature's charm." The other reads: "Thirteen peaks are reflected in the Dragon Pond with diving dragons up in heaven and flying dragons down on earth. Jade waters flow half a li, with jet the body and turquoise the soul."
Clear and calm waters of the 黑龙潭
In fact if the skies are clear, we should be able to see the yu long xue shan (玉龙雪山) at the back when u're taking a picture in front of the pond. But a pity that the weather that day was not really nice... in fact it was cloudy.... so we were not able to see the yu long xue shan.
Mum on 1 of the bridges in 黑龙潭 park
One thing interesting about this 黑龙潭 is the waters are super super clear. yeah... the waters are spring water... and u can see the natives heading to the 黑龙潭 with big empty water bottles to collect the spring water from there. its pretty common over here... coz this was one of the places, where u can get clean, drinkable water.
Natives collecting spring water in 黑龙潭
after strolling around the park, seeing that we had quite a bit of time, our tour guide brought us to one of the gu cheng. this particular gu cheng is nice... and its pretty surprising that there are not many tourists in that area. But our tour guide that this gu cheng is not as famous as another gu cheng which we will visit on another day because, sometime ago, a fire broke out, and quite a number of the buildings in this gu cheng were destroyed. However, the Chinese government spent some money to reconstruct the building... but for people who love architeature and histroy lovers will feel it a pity.
following that, we headed to our hotel... which is very nice and unique hotel to call it a night.
Lots of honeysuckle grown at the hotel. Dad posing with the honeysuckle (jin yin hua)
i said unique coz we stay in a bunglow sort of hotel... and each bunglow has a housekeeper who will cook for us. Tomorrow we'll be heading to Shangrila!!! =D
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