Huize Ancient city was the pick, and it was one of the very rare kind of Ancient city that I have seen in China where it has yet to white wash for mass tourism so the buildings were dirty, the shops were a mix matched of new and old trades still working side by side. The authenticity was the real thing, and it was really refreshing to find.
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| Huize Ancient City |
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| Huize Ancient City |
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| Huize Ancient City |
The best part of the day I would say was when we found some locals just doing local practice of their traditional folk songs at park. We could sit there and listen to the songs they were singing and they were not bothered at all with Tsevtan filming everything so I decided to get in a few shots as well.
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| Huize Ancient City |
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| Locals Practicing Folksongs at Huize Ancient City |
From the lunch stop it was another detour through national road G248 to go up higher until nearly 3300m based on Tsevtan altitude meter where we thought we could go through the Dahai Grass Mountain Scenic Area which was around 4000m elevation.
At the turn off the weather was bad and cloudy so we just continue on with G248 but the roads became bad downhill. Twisty roads up were perfect tarmac but twisty road down was construction roads filled with gravel and potholes.
The view however was amazing, and I made my way down very slowly not risking anything. The small detour through G248 took so much time that once I was out of the twisty road, I found the nearest entry to the highway and blasted the throttle to reach Xundian.
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| G248 from Huize to Xundian |
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| G248 from Huize to Xundian |
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| G248 from Huize to Xundian |
Xundian became another China city that we just arrived, checked in the hotel and walk out for dinner before crashing into bed and leaving immediately the next day without really exploring the place.
The next day would be the day that I won’t remember in China. It was bound to happen eventually, so I was quite happy that after 24 days in China, this was the first day with bad weather.
We woke up in Xundian with light rain and decided to grab some heavy breakfast hoping that the rain would break but it looked like a full day rain type of day.
Highway was the easy choice with bad weather as national road would just be too slow and worst roads, so it was that kind of day where I don’t really remember much.
Highway was the easy choice with bad weather as national road would just be too slow and worst roads, so it was that kind of day where I don’t really remember much.
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| Wet weather day - Highway Stop |
Rain and more rain throughout the day making me do so many stops at almost every rest stop the highway provide. All the initial plans of detours out of the highway to find food and lunch was washed down the drain.
I reached Jianshui at around late afternoon and then it was off to dinner with the campers celebrating one of the kids 10th birthdays. It was the first time visiting a China campsite and I was really surprised at the amount of local Chinese campers. I had no idea it was a thing.
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| City of Jianshui |
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| Campervan Park in China |
Our last free day in China. Initially the original plan was to have the free day in Kunming but after meeting up with drivechina.com and gathering feedback from most of the participants, they all decided to tweak the plan a little and changed the free day to be in Jianshui.
The principle was that the free days in large cities can be sometimes overwhelming as there is not enough time to really do the sightseeing proper since it was only a day. Also, the expectation of full exploration and having sufficient time to recuperate was not really there with big cities.
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| Jianshui |
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| Local Tribe Singing Practice at Jianshui |
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| Playing Cards in Jianshui |
Hence for our last free day it was shifted to Jianshui a semi large Ancient City which was great for a half day relax compact walkabout yet also scenic enough that we could just chill sipping coffee watching the local crowd and time goes by.
In the morning after breakfast, it was a walk to find coffee with Tsevtan and then it was a random walk around the Ancient city and by chance met Yassine as well. The stroll was random but at one point we started hunting for a massage place.
More walks around and after giving up hope of finding a massage place by chance, I used the maps to search for the concentrated spot for massages.
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| Blind Massage in Jianshui |
A little far walk slightly outside the Ancient City and we found multiple massage parlours that were actually blind massage. The massage was good and one of the best cheap values for money I had ever found in the whole of China.
Lunch was simple and then it was more random walking around. The second largest Confucius Temple was also in Jianshui but upon entering, it felt more like a Zen Temple instead with gardens and pond being the theme.
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| Confucius Temple in Jianshui |
It was a slow day for once in China and in the evening after a short break back in the Hotel, I headed out with John to get dinner. We found the insect delicacy and John was braved enough to try a centipede and spider.
A quick post on the group message board immediately pull all the youtubers away from their comfort to join us. Youtuber would do anything for a reel that could hit a few thousand views. Little excitement and just another day in China.
Travelled on: Nov 2024
Travelled on: Nov 2024
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