A Full Day on the West Lake of Hangzhou

With only two nights and one full day in Hangzhou, we decided to skip all other sights and surrounded ourselves with Hangzhou's one genuine world class attraction. This was the playground of bureaucrats and literati in Imperial China, and heralded as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in modern times. Imitated everywhere in China but never surpassed, this is the one and only West Lake of Hangzhou.



If you have enough time for only one lake in China, this would be my pick. Some China experts may frown at my suggestion -- foreign tourists often do the obligatory cruise expecting a wildly scenic trip and come away slightly disappointed. But that's completely missing the point IMHO. The West Lake is simply so much more.



Yes the natural scenery isn't bad, but I've seen a lot of prettier places even within the borders of China. What propels the West Lake to the pantheon of China's tourist attractions is definitely not the lake itself, but 2000 years of high culture refined by the literati of the ancient region of Jiangnan, or South of the Yangtze. The West Lake is so entrenched into the Chinese culture that you'll see its influence everywhere, if you look closely.



Take out any crinkled One Yuan bill out of the pocket, and you'll see the famous image of the West Lake's Three-Pool-Mirroring-The-Moon on the back. Sit down at any teahouse from Hong Kong to Shanghai to Beijing, and you'll likely see West Lake's Longjing Tea featured prominently on the menu. Walk into any traditional opera performance and you may see the West Lake painted in the backdrop -- after all two of the Four Great Folk Legends of China are set on the West Lake. This isn't just some body of water -- it's interweaved into the heart and soul of Chinese culture.



Marco Polo arrived in the 13th Century and declared Hangzhou the most splendid city in the world, which was no small acclaim coming from a traveler from Venice at the height of its maritime power. It was during these medieval times when Hangzhou was China’s cultural capital, and the West Lake the muse of the literati in poetry and prose. In fact two of China’s great poets, Bai Juyi and Su Dongpo, built the two long causeways on the West Lake when each served as governor of Hangzhou, several hundred years apart.



So we booked ourselves into one of the closest hotels to the lake shore to maximize our time for evening walks, and diligently set out at 09:00 in the morning to discover our own favorite corners of the West Lake. For the sake of flexibility we simplified our itinerary to only two spots: the Xihu State Guesthouse for lunch, and the Guo's Villa, both being on the western shore of the lake. The route we took at the end of the days was:

Hotel - Yigongyuan Park (walk) - Three-Pools-Mirroring-the-Moon (boat) - Viewing-Fish-at-Flower-Pond (boat) - Lunch @ Xihu State Guesthouse (walk) - Guo’s Villa (walk) - Yuehu (walk) - Gushan Park (walk) - Dinner @ Lou Wai Lou - Broken Bridge - Wushan Night Market (taxi) - Hotel (walk)



We started the morning on the 25-minute boat ride to the Three-Pools-Mirroring-the-Moon, a historic island of classical gardens so carefully manicured that one could draw parallels with great Japanese gardens such as Kanazawa's Kenroku-en. But the winding paths, pine trees and fiery maples surrounding the inland lake are where the similarities end. IMHO this island is one of the best illustrations of the subtle differences between Chinese and Japanese gardens, or ... I would venture to say, Chinese vs. Japanese philosophy towards nature in general.



You see ... the 400-year-old island is entirely artificial. Within the ring-shaped island is another lake, and within the small lake lies another even smaller island. One can see the crazy amount of efforts taken by medieval engineers just to create this miniaturized version of the West Lake within the West Lake. There is this great desire to cultivate a scenery of harmonious existence between mankind and nature, not unlike in theory to the ancient engravings of calligraphy and pavilions at the precarious cliffs of Huashan Mountain. Now compare this to the the desire to cultivate nature in Japanese gardens such as Kenroku-en. Yes the Japanese also put a lot of effort to tame nature and achieve their picture-perfect gardens (see the Adachi Garden for instance), but not to the extent of deliberately integrating the mark of mankind into the landscape.



Our next stop was the southwestern shoreline of the lake known as Viewing-Fish-at-Flower-Pond. This large, rambling garden used to be extremely unpopular when the government charged RMB 40 for entrance, but has now become a mandatory stop for all tour buses after becoming free-of-charge. Don't believe the tranquility you see in the photo, as the whole place was full of rowdy domestic tour groups. That's okay though -- we're only passing through on our way to the real destination ...



This is the most worthwhile of all attractions on the West Lake, IMHO, except it's arguably not an attraction at all. The Xihu State Guesthouse is a grand, state-owned hotel possessing one of the only stretches of private shoreline on the lake. There are no crowds to get in the way of pictures, no amplified megaphones to pierce the serenity, and most importantly, arguably some of the best food in Eastern China. This is such an awesome place that I'll need to dedicate the next article to it.



The best part of the Xihu State Guesthouse was its pristine gardens which, along with the excellent lunch, kept us for almost 3 hours. After this we continued north along a picturesque area of artificial causeways and wetland known as Yanggongdi towards our next destination -- the small but elegant Guo’s Villa with yet another rare stretch of private shorelines.



I can’t give Guo’s Villa enough praises as this is one of the true hidden gems on the West Lake IMHO. Organized tours are effectively deterred by the RMB 10 (CAD$1.6) entrance fee, leaving its immaculate garden and pavilions to the enjoyment of the few independent travelers stumbling in. Even on a clear Sunday afternoon the garden were relatively non-crowded, which definitely cannot be said of most other spots around the lake.



Like the Xihu State Guesthouse, Guo’s Villa started as the mansion and garden of a Qing Dynasty scholar-bureaucrat, and one who was powerful enough to acquire his own private section of the lakefront. Today the fish pond inside the garden still draws its water directly from the West Lake, though the resident white swans have recently been replaced by ugly plastic replicas. But that was the only speckle I could find in the otherwise perfectly manicured garden -- it could have rivaled the famous classical gardens of Suzhou, if only it was bigger in size.



But it was big enough to spend a leisurely hour between the pondful of orange Koi fish, zigzagging causeways with impeccable viewpoints framed strategically by window openings, two teahouses serving local Longjing Tea, and a pavilion atop a prototypical Suzhou-style artificial hill made of Taihu limestones. If you’re tired of doing the West Lake with the piercing loudspeakers of local tour guides constantly in the background, this would be a great place for a little quiet retreat.



The Quyuan Fenghe area just north of Guo’s Villa was also quite enjoyable, especially towards the later afternoon when large tour groups have move off. I haven’t seen an official English name for this place, though I would loosely translate it as Lotus in the Breeze at the Winery Courtyard. A modern replica of the old Imperial Winery has recently been erected with advertisements of wine tasting (though we didn’t indulge), and the lotus blossoms are still tousled by the breeze at the charming lakefront.



As the afternoon started to wind down we headed into the former realm of the Imperial Garden at Gushan. Facing the West Lake at the southwestern foot of the hill behind overgrown vegetation, is the Xiling Society of Seal Arts where the ancient arts of seal engraving and calligraphy are still practiced and refined to this date. This would be the best place if you ever want a genuine high quality seal made in your (transliterated Chinese) name. It was also our last rest stop before an early dinner, in the atmosphere of intellectual and artistic pursuits that has made Hangzhou famous for the past millennium.


Food Review: LOU WAI LOU (Hangzhou)
Address: Gushan Lu 30, Xihu District, Hangzhou
Hours: 11:00 – 21:00
Website/Map: Official Site
Directions: It's on the shoreline of the Gushan Park along the northern shore of the West Lake. This is THE most famous restaurant in Hangzhou, so any taxi driver should know the place.


Despite its well-documented fame, Lou Wai Lou was NOT our first choice due to mixed reviews from the locals. We originally planned to go to Bailu Canting (ie. "White Deer") at the Xinyuanhua Mall, but gave up on the idea remembering the previous night when we were handed the 200+th spot of the ridiculous queue. Lou Wai Lou's convenient location convinced us at the end, though we went in without much expectation to be honest.

To be fair though, this place is a true Hangzhou institution, established in the 28th Year of Emperor Daoguang, or Year 1848 in the Western world. So it’s been standing on the shore of West Lake pretty much since the Opium Wars, serving the rich and famous of China through Imperial, Republican and Communist eras.

Lou Wai Lou’s main draw is about traditions, and so we ordered traditional Hangzhou dishes, starting with the local favorite Mrs. Song’s Fish Soup (Songsao Yugeng) pictured above. Like anything in the Geng category this was a very heavy, substantial soup, but tasted unexpectedly mild without any of the fishiness one might associate with fish soups. While the flavor wasn’t anything spectacular, the display of great knifework was evident with the extremely thin shreds of delicate fish meat. I would put this in the category of Shougongcai (“dexterity-based dish” ... my translation) where the appreciation of the chef’s nimbleness with the transformation of ingredients is as important as, and perhaps even trumps, the taste. When this dawned on me, I started to see why this restaurant gets such polarized reviews.



We also ordered the Fish Soup with Crab Caviar, which turned out to be a Mrs. Song’s Fish Soup plus a good dollop of crab meat and caviar. Now THIS was an EXCELLENT soup, infused with the richness of the umami flavors given by the crab caviar. The fact that we arrived during crab caviar season (usually late September to late November) probably helped. This bowl cost 50% more than the already expensive Mrs. Song’s Fish Soup, but it was worth every single Yuan.



For appetizers we started with the Drunken Chicken in Huadiao Wine (Huadiao Zuiji). While the chicken did have the typical texture and taste of a free-range bird, the depth of flavor in the rice wine marinate completely let us down. It actually didn’t taste bad ... but think about it ... When the mom-and-pop Shanghainese restaurant in my neighborhood can do this simple dish better than the most famous restaurant in all of Hangzhou, why should travelers waste their valuable time and money here? This is inexcusable.



Then we moved onto another cold dish, the syrupy sweet, glutinous-rice-stuffed lotus roots known as Guihua Tang’ou. This completely reversed the impression from the previous mess up, and turned out to be a very good dish. The lotus roots were crispy, the rice filling was chewy as expected, and the distinct flavor of Osmanthus flowers (ie. Guihua) provided good depth to the honey. While not everyone likes sweets before the entree, we really enjoyed this dish.

So far we had one unremarkable dish, one excellent dish, one poor dish, and one good dish. Now you can see the rollercoaster ride we’ve been taken by Lou Wai Lou as we await our final dish, a grand, classy dish in the culinary traditions of this Jiangnan region.



The Braised Cured-Ham in Honey Sauce (Mizhi Huofang). This is a classic dish that I’d previously only seen on TV and, due to the exclusivity of the main ingredient, typically served only in restaurants serving more posh clientele. I was expecting a price of RMB 200-300 for a dish of this level of prestige, and jumped to order when it was listed on the menu for RMB 108.

The soul of this dish should be a square of the best cut of Dry-Cured Ham, the Chinese equivalence of Jamon Iberico or Prosciutto di Parma, sourced from the black-headed, black-tailed pigs from the city of Jinhua just southwest of here. Pardon the messy appearance of the dish, but I failed to stop our server in time while she clumsily sliced our perfectly squared ham. The flavor was complex and savory as expected of quality cured ham of any nationality, and the indigenous saltiness had been perfectly countered by the Osmanthus-flavored honey sauce. If I’m allowed to nitpick, the texture of the meat was a little tough, meaning that they didn’t invest enough time into steaming the ham, and that the cut of ham was still not the best quality compared to Jinhua Hams I’ve had in the past. I did enjoy the way they meticulously softened the skin though, and how the little layer of fat remaining from the steaming process was well-balanced by the acidity of green plums in the sauce.

This dish was definitely above average, though not entirely spectacular. But at the relatively cheap price of RMB 108 for a generous square of Jinhua Ham (which went for RMB 48 per 500g at traditional delicatessen shops we visited), I’ve got no complaints.

My final verdict for Lou Wai Lou? In one word, inconsistency. I can completely understand how this place can simultaneously generate positive and negative reviews, possibly from diners sitting at the same table in fact, if their quality can oscillate from dish to dish like what we experienced. Would I recommend this place? Yes, but only if you’re staying for several days and have been to the Xihu State Guesthouse already. If you have time for only one dining experience in Hangzhou though, forget this place and just stick with Xihu State Guesthouse.

Bill for Two Persons

Drunken Chicken in Huadiao Wine	RMB 32
West Lake Honey-Stuffed Lotus Roots	RMB 22
Mrs. Song's Fish Soup	RMB 19.6
Fish Soup with Crab Caviar	RMB 28
Slow-Braised Cured Ham in Honey Sauce	RMB 108
Rice	RMB 1
Large Beer	RMB 12
TOTAL	RMB 222.6 (CAD$35.3)

It was already dark outside after our long dinner. We had a night view of the lit-up Broken Bridge, then hopped on a taxi to the Wushan Night Market (located at Renhe Road and Yuewang Road, about a 10 minute way east of the Longxiangqiao metro station). We didn’t end up buying anything, but it was authentic, rowdy, and a perfectly Hangzhou way to wrap up a Sunday evening and work off that huge chunk of ham.

Being a serious (and hopefully well-rounded) foodie I can't limit myself to just formal restaurants. If the Xihu State Guesthouse is Hangzhou’s finest, Lou Wai Lou is the most famous, then the following place must be Hangzhou’s most popular eatery. Beware of this popularity though, as we had to WAIT 2.5 HOURS (!!!) just to get in.

Food Review: THE GRANDMA'S (Hubin Branch)
Address: Hubin Lu 3, Shangcheng District, Hangzhou
Hours: 10:00-24:00
Website/Map: Official Site
Directions: It's right at the corner of Hubin Road and Jiefang Road, facing one of the most popular sections of the West Lake. The closest metro station is Longxiangqiao, three blocks to the north.

The Grandma’s is undoubtedly among Hangzhou’s most recognized brand names. Synonymous for famously cheap food at consistently good quality, this local joint has now expanded as far north as Beijing and Shenyang, which tells you they’re doing something right. So right in fact, that when we arrived at their flagship branch on Hubin Road on a Saturday night, we were handed queue ticket #562 with more than 200 tickets in front of us! After heading to Bailu Canting, the main rival of The Grandma’s across the street in the Xinyuanhua Mall, only to find an even longer queue, we had no choice but to wander the nearby shops while waiting for The Grandma’s to call my cell phone. And close to 2.5 hours we waited, before finally getting seated. That had never happened to me before in China, Hong Kong or Japan.



If you’re asking what’s so attractive about this place, look no further than this Tofu with Sesame Oil (Maxiang Doufu). The tofu itself wasn't too sensational: slightly grainy mouth-feel, rich soybean flavors, and really nothing that would either wow or offend your tastebuds. But the price was ... get this ... an astonishing RMB 3 (CAD$0.5).

What else can you buy with RMB 3 these days, when a 500 mL bottle of juice costs RMB 4? It's no fluke that we had 561 tables ahead of us, and probably 700 in total, on the evening on our visit.



The Red-Braised Chinese Radish wasn't quite as miraculously cheap, but still a bargain at RMB 10. Again the flavor was just above average, but the radishes were quite well-simmered to thoroughly absorb the marinate. Who can complain about a RMB 10 dish at a sit-down restaurant next to the West Lake?



We did splurge ... well, for a relatively cheap RMB 45 ... on one of the more expensive dishes on the menu: an entire chicken slow-roasted inside an earthen pot and smoked with tea leaves (Chaxiangji). While I didn't really taste any tea in the chicken, the flesh was so tenderly roasted it practically fell off the bones. With a whole bird staring at the two of us, I was starting to think we ordered a little too much food.



We finished with an unconventional but delectable dessert. Our Green Pea Puree with Cream (Naixiang Qingdouni) arrived as a large tub of pureed pea, with the skin meticulously removed, mixed with the sweetness of honey and fresh cream. For a large enough portion for three to share, the price was an amazing RMB 10.

So our entire meal with two appetizers, one entree, a dessert and a large beer cost RMB 78 (CAD$12.4) in total. I'm sure I'm among thousands others who vouch for this place. As long as you're not expecting an exceptional dining experience, The Grandma's should be a pretty safe bet at a backpacker-friendly price. But one last word of caution ... remember to drop by a couple hours early to get your queue ticket!

Bill for Two Persons

Tofu with Sesame Oil	RMB 3
Red-Braised Chinese Radish	RMB 10
Tea-Smoked Chicken	RMB 45
Green Pea Puree with Cream	RMB 10
Large Beer	RMB 10
TOTAL	RMB 78 (CAD$12.4)

Finally, a short review of our choice of hotel:
Hotel Review: NEW DONGPO HOTEL (Hangzhou)
Address: Xihai Scenic Area, Huangshan, Anhui
Price: RMB 278, including breakfast
Website/Map: Here's the Official Site, but we chose to book thru Ctrip.com.
Directions: Exit the Longxiangqiao metro station and walk south for a block to Renhe Road. The hotel is almost at the corner of Renhe Road and Yan'an Road.


This is the cheapest 3-star hotel we found within a block of the West Lake. While there were a few other cheaper 1- or 2-stars (eg.Elan Inn) nearby, none seemed as convenient and well-rounded especially considering the free (and quite decent) Chinese-style buffet breakfast here. The location just can't be beat -- 1 block from the West Lake, 1 block from the metro station, and a 15 minute walk to the Wushan Night Market. I wouldn't hesitate to return should I visit Hangzhou again in the future.

Hiking Huangshan’s West Sea Canyon

For a short three hours this was my best hike. Ever.

If you’ve ever seen classical images of pine-clad Chinese mountains shrouded in mist, you’re probably thinking of this place. It was some of the most jaw-dropping mountain scenery I’ve ever seen -- and I’ve seen my share of mountains living in Western Canada.



Sadly this was also one of the last clear photos I took at Huangshan. My window of opportunity lasted exactly 3 hours 9 minutes, before heavy fog rolled in and took away everyone’s chances.



That morning we diligently woke up at Hongcun at 05:30, took the 06:40 bus to Huangshan Mountain, left our large baggage at the Bus Station and took the Yungusi cable car up the back side of the mountain. It was already shrouded in heavy fog from mid-mountain up as we arrived, and the visibility was barely 200m as we made the hour-long hike from the cable car station to our hotel at Paiyunlou. After checking in and shedding unnecessary weight off our back, we started our descent into the West Sea Canyon.



The West Sea Canyon was in fact one of the reasons we picked China for our vacation this year. This landscape within is widely rumored to be most impressive in Huangshan, if not all of China. The time was 11:15 when we started to enter the canyon on the Paiyunlou side. All of a sudden a few rays of the sun shone through, and the heavy curtain was miraculously lifted from the front of our eyes in a matter of minutes. The entire canyon was now visible, right down to the bottom of this impossibly steep valley.



With every movement of the rising streams of misty air the landscape kept shrouding and revealing itself, and with every few steps the viewing angle changed enough to offer a different perspective of the jagged peaks and the pine trees clinging fearlessly to the vertical cliffs. Every hiker stopped in their tracks for photos, or simply to exhale. Any short 50m walk would easily take 10 minutes.



At the time of our visit the National Park was building its funicular at the bottom of the canyon, meaning that the bottommost section of the canyon, from the bottom of the Second Ring road on the north side to the Buxian Bridge on the south side, was closed for constructions. For us it meant that we could only hike down as far as the Second Ring, before climbing all the way back up to Paiyunlou.



While the trail's condition and cleanliness was among the best I've seen in China, or any country for that matter, the terrain itself presented a moderate challenge halfway between Paiyunlou and the First Ring. The elevation dropped abruptly with flights after flights of long winding stairs wrapped around the cliff side. The time was already 12:45 by the time we reached the First Ring.



The further we descended down the mysterious valley, the more intimately beautiful the landscape became until everything resembled scenes out of traditional Chinese ink paintings. Most astounding was how the indigenous Huangshan Pine carved out its niche from the most inconceivable of places, often growing straight out of seemingly bare vertical crags.



Equally impressive was the way the footpath was impossibly constructed, suspending in mid-air by a cantilever system of horizontal beams driven into sheer granite cliffs. Tourist pamphlets would never divulge, but these trails were constructed at the great cost of human lives, and no responsible hiker should take these heart-stopping views for granted.

As we reached the top of the Second Ring road it was time to make the decision of taking the left or right branch down. Our map showed a down-arrow on the left branch with the word Zhuangguan (Spectacular), and so we followed ...



And it was way too Zhuangguan for us … the ridiculously steep stairs became a 60-plus-degree drop, and the only thing that would prevent us from free-falling 500m to our deaths were the thigh-height railings. My wife had enough of this craziness, and we decided to meet up again at the top of the Second Ring. With the utmost degree of caution I would venture down to the bottom, and she would have to call for help should I not return.



The Chinese map didn’t lie -- it truly was some of the most spectacular scenery anywhere. By the time I went down the Second Ring it was already 13:06, nearly 2 hours since we started out from Paiyunlou.



As soon as I made it past the section that turned back my wife, the slope returned to a more reasonable slope ... if you consider 45-degree reasonable that is. I still had to be careful as scores of hikers are known to fall to gruesome deaths every year, though no official numbers ever get published.



At 13:15, exactly 2 hours from the start, I finally reached the very bottom of the Second Ring, the end point of my hike down the canyon on this day. It was probably the slowest 2.5 km of downhill hiking I've ever done, and I only had my camera to blame.



The only path to bottom was locked as expected, less than 100m in elevation from the very floor of the canyon. I quickly took a couple of pictures before hurrying back up the thigh-burning climb. I certainly didn't want my wife to think I was missing!


By 13:27 I puffed my way back to the top of Second Ring and rejoined my wife, who was just finished with helping a bunch of elderly Taiwanese hikers with her trusty map. The rest of the hike was a pure cardio and stair-climbing workout. Ominously thick clouds rolled in as we made our way up and the temperature dropped noticeably, condensing the air into an increasingly dense fog again. By the time we reached Paiyunlou again at 14:30, we couldn't even see our hotel from 100m away. This spelled the end of sightseeing for every visitor, and we had no choice but retreating to our hotel room for the rest of the day.



Just when we thought the weather couldn’t get any worse the next day, it did. We woke up at 05:30 and climbed to the top of Danxia (Purple Cloud) Peak for the sunrise, only to be stymied again by a horrid visibility of about 20 m! The heavy fog and drizzles would persist for the rest of our morning on Huangshan, forcing our attention to the dangerously slippery trail in the absence of any visible scenery. Even against the flow of a standing queue of domestic tourists at the narrow and infamously precarious 100-Step-Scaling-Ladder, the expected 3.5 hour-long hike from Paiyunlou Hotel to the Yuping Cable Car took us only 2.5 hours to complete in the absence of any picture-taking.



I couldn’t help feeling somewhat bittersweet as we descended by cable car from what would likely be our once-in-a-lifetime visit to Huangshan. The weather was crappy; the trails were packed to the edges with rowdy domestic tour groups; and I ended with 3 hours’ worth of photos out of 26 hours on the mountain.



But those 3 hours also presented the most magical and breathtaking mountain scenery I have ever seen, and I would never trade these 3 hours for 2 sunny, fogless days in retrospect. Yes it would be a nice secondary bonus to witness a completely cloudless panorama, but that’s not what Huangshan is most famous for. I’ve already seen the best of Huangshan, the moment that thin, misty white veil started to rise out of the West Sea Canyon’s valley floor.


Hotel Review: PAIYUNLOU (Huangshan)
Address: Xihai Scenic Area, Huangshan, Anhui
Price: RMB 790
Website/Map: Check prices from Agoda or Ctrip, whichever is cheaper at the time
Directions: The easiest approach to the hotel involves taking the Yungusi Cable Car up and follow the signs towards Xihai (West Sea). You'll first pass the Beihai Hotel, then the Xihai Hotel, and finally reaching Paiyunlou in about an hour's hike.


This was by far the most expensive hotel of our entire trip. The price of RMB 790 (CAD$125) was actually considered a bargain considering foreigners are always charged RMB 100 to 200 extra per room, depending on where you book. In comparison the average price of the rest of our stays cost RMB 260 (CAD$41), and the hotels at the foot of Huangshan probably averaged around RMB 200 -- this tells you how lucrative the hotel monopoly is at the mountain top, and why the management company is profitable enough to be traded on Chinese stock exchanges.

But if you’re planning to hike both the West Sea Canyon and the front and back sides of the mountain top like we did, you probably have no choice but to take a deep breath and prepare to be gouged. The only options cheaper would involve renting tents (RMB 200) from the hotel in warmer seasons, or crashing into dorm-style bunk beds (RMB 120 per bed) in rowdy 16-people rooms. We were actually very happy with our 3-star room -- very clean, quiet and comfortable -- except for its attempt to charge another RMB 25 for the usage of a set of toothbrush and toiletries. Good thing we came prepared.



Booking a room was only the start of the price-gouging. Charging RMB 80 each way for the cable car was at least acceptable, but a further RMB 19 for the 20-minute shuttle bus between the cable car station and the gate was getting ridiculous. Every item for sale at the mountain top was at least two to three times the price at the bottom, but that’s somewhat justifiable after seeing how porters climbed all the way from the bottom carrying 96 kg (yes, I counted … 48 bottles of 2 litre Pepsi) on their scrawny shoulders.



Dinner at the hotel was overpriced and mediocre in taste. We watched our wallet and ordered some of the cheaper dishes -- an appetizer of Marinated Duck (Jiangya) for RMB 40, Red Braised Eggplants (Hongshao Qiezi) for RMB 50, and a casserole of Tofu with Three Delicacies (Sanxian Doufubao) for a whopping RMB 80 -- with hardly any meat, and still ended up paying around RMB 180. I estimated that the same dishes at the bottom of the mountain would only cost about RMB 80, but then I remembered the porters.

Bill for Two Persons

Marinated Duck	RMB 40
Red Braised Eggplants	RMB 50
Tofu with Three Delicacies	RMB 80
Rice x 2	RMB 10
TOTAL	RMB 180 (CAD$28.6)

At least we didn’t need to spend extra on breakfast the next day. We followed the advice of Chinese travelers and brought a backpack full of snack food, bottles of juice, a small bottle of rice wine, and these two bowls of Jinmailang "premium" instant noodles that came with a whole marinated egg inside. Dropping in some pre-packaged braised chicken gizzards (I know it sounds dodgy, but the locals bought them by the kilogram and they turned out quite tasty) into the soup and it became the warmest breakfast for a cold morning on a 1700 m mountain top.

By 12:00 we came down the mountain and found a decent and reasonably priced lunch spot, just outside the bus station on the next side street to the right.



It was the restaurant with NO NAME, seriously. We did asked the owner’s wife and she did try to tell us the story ... in her local Huangshan dialect which was entirely unintelligible to me. I did get the impression that they ran into some sort of bureaucracy trouble with the local officials and had to tear down the original name they chose.



Our eyes lit up when we saw the words Tujidan (free-range eggs) on the menu, after our wonderful experience with scrambled eggs at Hongcun. The eggs here weren’t quite as incredibly flavorful as those we had previously, but the eggs did taste of a mildly free-range quality and were still tastier than the Canadian eggs that I typically get at home. And since I didn’t know if I’ll ever set foot in Anhui Province for a taste of these farm-raised eggs again in my lifetime, I actually ordered two dishes of scrambled eggs, the pictured dish with Wood Ear Mushrooms (Muer), and another with Chinese leek flowers.




Bill for Two Persons

Scrambled Eggs with Wood Ear Mushrooms	RMB 22
Scrambled Eggs with Chinese Leak Flowers	RMB 26
Stir-Fried Spinach	RMB 16
Rice x 2	RMB 4
Plate Set x 2	RMB 4
TOTAL	RMB 72 (CAD$11.4)

This was the end of our adventure in the landlocked, rural villages and towns of Jiangxi and Anhui, and the start of our next adventure in the sleepy waterside towns and glitzy metropolises of Zhejiang and Jiangsu. At 14:15 we took a 3.5-hour bus ride back into the realm of bright city lights, to the picturesque West Lake and congested traffic of Hangzhou. We would spend our next 8 nights adapting to the tradition of waterfront-living synonymous with historic Eastern China.

Xidi - Anhui's Other World Heritage Village

When I initially planned our trip I debated whether to schedule our 3-night stay at Xidi, or Hongcun, or perhaps splitting time between the two. We picked Hongcun at the end for all 3 nights, mainly for its famous reflections of Huizhou-style mansions on the South Lake and the Moon Pond. While it turned out to be a good choice IMHO, it made me even more curious about what we potentially missed by not staying overnight at Xidi.



I imagine most independent travelers face the same choice, and likely end up shunning Xidi for similar reasons. That's probably a little unfair as Xidi shares its UNESCO World Heritage Site status with Hongcun and even boasts a larger ancient town compared to Hongcun. In fact one could argue that while Hongcun excels in photogenic qualities (or at least before the arrival of the daily hordes of invaders on tour buses), Xidi offers a more impressive range of architectural examples befitting a town of its size.



This used to be one of the region's wealthiest towns after all, back in the Ming Dynasty when the indigenous Huizhou merchants controlled much of the trade routes along the lower Yangtze River. Even after the widespread devastation of more than half of the heritage mansions during the Cultural Revolution, more than a hundred remains to this date for visitors to gain an appreciation for the glorious heydays of this ancient town on a once-important trade route.



Impressing all visitors ancient and modern would be the towering stone Pailou gateway guarding the village entrance, exuding an air of grandiose with engravings of appreciative idioms endorsed by Emperor Wanli back in Year 1578, or one year after Francis Drake set sail on his circumnavigation journey in the Western World. Impressive ... except this is only one-thirteenth of the whole story.



Most tour guides, especially domestic Chinese ones, may not tell the full story of how there used to be not just one, but thirteen Pailou gates standing inside the village. Or more importantly ... how they were vehemently destroyed, one by one, by the Red Guards at the height of the Cultural Revolution to "Eradicate the Four Olds." It is a painful chapter of history to learn about, but it's also partially why I travel.



Through the lone Pailou today's visitor would enter the town's sprawling network of cobblestone paths and become surrounded by the tall, angular Matouqiang firewalls, originally whitewashed in powdered lime but turned into various shades of grey by centuries of erosion. And just like its neighboring towns in this traditional land of Huizhou, Xidi ornaments its intricate roofline with swerving dark curves pointing at the heavens.



While Hongcun is encircled by riverbanks and lakesides often bustling with photographers and easel-staking art students, Xidi's town walls is surrounded immediately by its acres upon acres of ancestral farmlands, still owned and tended by the original descendents. In this sense Xidi seemed more of a complete and authentic farming community, small enough to retain its rural character and yet less prone to overcrowding by the onslaught of day-tripping domestic Chinese tour groups.



It's so easy to lose oneself inside the town's strangely claustrophobic labyrinth of interconnected paths. In the midst of squeezing myself between these medieval skyscrapers I started to really appreciate the importance of the massive firewalls , especially with these half-brick half-timber building being barely a metre apart. Any little fire would spell the end of the village if not for this ingenious system of Matouqiang.



A sophisticated system of medieval canals flow past everyone's front door, providing running water for each family even after 900 years of fortunes and turmoils. One can get an idea of the town's affluence from the scale of such infrastructures -- Xidi's canals are much grander and better engineered than Hongcun's. I actually dropped my glasses into Hongcun's canal and was able to fish them out on my knees; if it happened at Xidi I would have no choice but to let them go.



On this day a light drizzle kept most casual tourists at bay, leaving the mostly deserted streets to odd independent travelers like us and the ever-present art students with their scrapbooks. As the air smelled of wet decay and nostalgia, it would be impossible for artists not to find inspiration.



While the ginormous Ancestral Temple from the Qing Dynasty still dominates the village centre, its centuries-old ritual of communal worship had ceased materially since the 1940's due to a depletion of participants during the wars. Reenactments are held occasionally by the tourism board according to tourist demand, sadly with actors rather than the genuine heirs of this cultural heritage. For the actual descendents of the Hu Clan, respect to the ancestors is now paid at a little alcove at home, much like the Chinese of anywhere else.



But perpetuation of traditions may not always be a good thing. Statuettes of various deities destroyed during the 1960's have been refashioned in bright colors and placed back into their original niche in some of the smaller Ancestral Temples, though skeptical visitors may question the motive behind all this zealous restoration. Most of these temples now serves a more practical purpose as a tourist draw rather than its original purpose of ancestral worship, and it is sad to see unsuspecting tourists being scammed at the side table for a bunch of grossly overpriced amulets.



Much more charming are the unpretentious dwellings of the locals, passed down through a millennium to the n-th generation descendents. An unwritten rule within the clan still binds the modern day Hu's from selling ancestral property to outsiders, thus preserving the integrity of village ownership within the kinship. Otherwise I actually wouldn't mind spending a couple of lazy sabbath years in this remote corner of East Asia.



PRACTICAL PLANNING

Getting from Hongcun to Xidi is straight forward -- direct local buses depart Hongcun's Main Parking Lot towards Xidi sharply at the top of the hour, from 08:00 to 16:00. The ticket cost a cheap RMB 2 for a 30 minute ride.

The return leg isn't so sharply scheduled however as the same bus returns from the local transportation hub of Tunxi an hour away. Buses to Hongcun and to Yixian are scheduled to arrive every hour, though even the receptionists at the Tourist Info Centre couldn't tell me when. There is also no official "bus stop." We had to wait on the road side, which attracted the solicitation of a taxi driver quoting a cool RMB 30 just to get to Yixian (and probably around RMB 50 to Hongcun). Luckily we caught a bus to our planned lunch stop at Yixian after 20 minutes or so.



In terms of food choices, my searches on the Chinese side of the Internet didn't yield any restaurants with enough positive reviews to warrant a longer stay for us. We tried one Shaobing (roasted pastry) vendor next to the Ancestral Temple, which was nowhere as good as the ones in Hongcun. In the end we took the Yixian bus and went to lunch at the excellent Mingqing Huizhou restaurant.



In terms of accommodation, the following are some of the guesthouses that we considered, before we decided to stay in Hongcun instead:

Xidi Travel Lodge
Xidi Gengletang (in Chinese)
Xidi Yanggaotang (in Chinese)