Walk With Me

Originally I had planned on visiting Dandong this weekend. It's the closest one can get to North Korea. You can pay boat drivers to get you within 3 meters of the border. North of Dandong is the easternmost section of the Great Wall, which runs along the border with North Korea. There's a creek you can run across, if you're brave (and stupid). In the end, I didn't feel like paying nearly $500 just for the weekend.

So then I had planned on visiting Kaiping today, but an extremely stiff and sore neck kept me in bed for a few extra hours, shortening any possible time I would have. Kaiping is a 2 hour bus ride away, and the last bus back is at 6pm. Basically I would've had 2 hours in the city. Not worth it.

Wanting to stay closer to home (or, what qualifies as home in China), I decided to visit Baiyun Shan, which is a mountain that overlooks Guangzhou. I see it everyday from my office, and have wondered about it. Well, wonder no more. At the foot of Baiyun Mountain is Luhu park, home to one of the very few golf courses in Guangzhou. I haven't golfed there, mostly because it's well over US$100 a round.

Also at the foot of the mountain, is Yuntai park, which features a large amount of shrubbery. All in interesting shapes! I think that makes it a topiary garden, but I could be mistaken. Much of the park was being tidied up, so that's why you'll see scaffolding in some of the pictures.
It's a regular zoo in this place. Of course, a zoo of greenery.
My first panda in China!
This fish is crying because he's not swimming in the lake.

The making of a topiary.
A giant teapot, courtesy of Frankfurt, Germany.
If you were curious to know how far I am from LA, here it is. I know, it was killing you.
After hanging out at the park, I took the cable car up the mountain, then walked down. Baiyun Mountain is also known as White Cloud Mountain. Why is that? Possibly because all you can actually see of Guangzhou from there is a white cloud of pollution and haze. I took a couple of pictures, and tried to make some panoramic views. As of 2000, Guangzhou was a city of 12.5 million people, with an additional 6.5 million in the urban area. So you can imagine that it's somewhat immense. Hopefully these two work out. In the first picture, notice the large tower on the left. That's the CITIC Plaza, and is the tallest building in Guangzhou. It's also on the far right in the lower picture. Maybe this will give a sense of scale to the city.
Well, the panoramic views won't upload via Blogger for some reason. Probably because they're huge. So they're hosted somewhere else. Let's hope it works for a while.

Let's continue on. Some Chinglish on the walk here. I really don't know what they mean by Stress The Civilization. And Improve The Greenery? Isn't that their job, not that of the visitors who pay to get in?
Another intersting picture. I actually took the picture before I realized what it meant. When I saw keep fit road, I thought, "yeah, this is a steep hill if you're climbing up!" The take off shoe part confused me, until I actually looked at where you were supposed to walk.
Yeah, those are stones, on edge. You're supposed to walk barefoot on these. They go on for a long time, too.
Yes, those are my feet, and I made it 104 steps before giving in. It fucking hurt!! Those don't look sharp, but they might as well be razors. I saw people walking up these stairs without a single flinch. I, on the other hand, was sweating (it was hot) and gimacing the whole way. When I saw they went on for another 500 feet or so, I was out.

While walking down the mountain, there are lots of little sights and scenic outlooks. And let me tell you, capitalism is alive and well in China. They charge you for every little thing. Granted, it's usually 5 or 10RMB, which is about $1, but that's 10RMB! I'm even cheaper in China than back home. 10RMB is a lot of money. It's a cab ride home. It's dinner. It's 1/3 of a Starbucks. So being the cheapskate I am, I only paid for one sight, a temple. Yes, a temple. I know, there like everywhere, but it was worth the $1. Why? The fish and turtles.
Here's the pool with the koi and turtles. You could buy a little bit of food and feed them. They were all sitting waiting for food to be thrown at them.
Finishing the walk, there was a nice little creek that ran with the path.
Well, that's it for today. Maybe tomorrow I can visit Kaiping, or not. We'll see how I feel in the morning.

Remember, only 13 days until Oktoberfest!