Every since I read the book titled "The Rape of Nanjing", I have been interested to visit Nanjing which is only about 100 miles from Suzhou. Nanjing was the nationalist (pre-communist) capital of China and the ruling city of several emporers. I decided to take advantage of my solo existance this month to take a backpacking train trip to Nanjing. To spice it up even more, I booked a room at the International Youth Hostel in downtown Nanjing.
There are some interesting sights to see in Nanjing, and for some reason they all seem to involve long distance walks, steep climbs, or hundreds of steps. The weather in Nanjing was a sweltering 98 degrees, so the sightseeing involved a lot of sweating. Many of the historic sights are located on Zijin Mountain on the northeast side of the city. Above you can see pictures of the Linggu Pagoda, a mountainside budda, the restored ceiling of the Ming Xiaoling Tomb, and the Sun Yat Sen Mausoleum.
I had a lunch of cold noodles outside the Linggu Temple - this meal is the likely cause of some serious GI distress on Day 2. After a day of constant walking, climbing, and overheating, I felt like following the couple in the final picture's approach above to touring the Ming Tomb.
With all of the walking and hiking, this turned out to be a good solo outing. I kept thinking that the children (and Kathleen) would probably have mutineed after the climb to the first Pagoda.
There are some interesting sights to see in Nanjing, and for some reason they all seem to involve long distance walks, steep climbs, or hundreds of steps. The weather in Nanjing was a sweltering 98 degrees, so the sightseeing involved a lot of sweating. Many of the historic sights are located on Zijin Mountain on the northeast side of the city. Above you can see pictures of the Linggu Pagoda, a mountainside budda, the restored ceiling of the Ming Xiaoling Tomb, and the Sun Yat Sen Mausoleum.
I had a lunch of cold noodles outside the Linggu Temple - this meal is the likely cause of some serious GI distress on Day 2. After a day of constant walking, climbing, and overheating, I felt like following the couple in the final picture's approach above to touring the Ming Tomb.
With all of the walking and hiking, this turned out to be a good solo outing. I kept thinking that the children (and Kathleen) would probably have mutineed after the climb to the first Pagoda.
1 comment:
Tony, there's a Chinese movie on Nanjing that came out several months ago about Nanjing. I bought a copy at the local copy DVD joint and it includes English subtitles. You might want to pick it up as there was a lot of discussion with the Chinese that the movie portrayed the Japanese as somewhat compasionate.
Post a Comment