A Frenzied Farewell to Kunming
In
anticipation of our last free Saturday in Kunming, Fafa and I made a plan to
visit the Western Hills (Xishan) overlooking Dianchi Lake. Throughout the week
and Saturday morning, our party slowly expanded to a group of six – besides
Fafa and me, Shayley (a classmate from Yale, appearing anonymously in the
previous posts “Examinations and Excursions,” and “Cheer up, Captain, buy a
flower off a poor girl”), Elizabeth (previously seen in “A Note on Guitars”),
Bekkah, and Shuting (Fafa herself should be familiar from the post “Cheer up,
Captain, buy a flower off a poor girl”).
We left at
nine in the morning with Fafa at the helm, boarding the bus to the closest
metro station and then riding to its final stop at the foot of the Western
Hills. Fafa noted the journey took exactly 52 minutes.
The hike
was not exactly what I imagined it to be. The road from the metro station to
the park’s actual entrance was broad and asphalted, swarmed by locals looking
to get out of the city for the weekend. Every few minutes, the crowds would scatter
before a tourist bus cruising up and down the mountain at a very unsafe speed –
once or twice, my life flashed before my eyes as I imagined myself splattered
on the front of a bus.
We stopped
by two temples on our way to the entrance. The first housed five hundred golden
statues, with a huge statue of the thousand-armed Guanyin at the very centre.
The second was not as impressive, but housed a very good, relatively cheap
vegetarian eatery.
A temple at the foot of the Western Hills
A deer statue
Dragon detail
Another dragon detail
A small section of the 500 Buddhas Temple
A not very natural trail (and this is as natural as it gets)
Dragon
Phoenix
Upon
reaching the gate of the actual park, we found out that the entrance was
ticketed, as were a tourist bus and a cable car, none of which we were aware of
while planning our journey. We gathered around a map to lay out a plan,
eventually coming to a consensus that we should buy a ticket for the cable car
and then simply walk down the hill. As we soon discovered, this was the most
logical plan, and therefore it coincided with the plans of almost every other
tourist at the location. We waited in line for maybe half an hour before
boarding the cable car, which deposited us into the midst of a crowd at a rest
stop.
It took us
a while before we realised that the line of people slowly moving away from the
rest stop was in fact a line that snaked past the temples, caves, and gates all
the way to the bottom of the park. The excruciatingly slow hike was
occasionally dotted with beautiful views of the Dianchi and an occasional
temple. We also spotted several vibrantly coloured birds.
Happy to
make it out of the overcrowded hell hole, we boarded the pedestrian-killing bus
down to the metro station. We got back a little before half past four.
Riding the cable car
The tourist hordes around Dragon Gate, the most famous spot at Xishan
"Dragon Gate"
Dragon Gate from below
A phoenix carved into the mountain
Dianchi Lake below the mountain
Another view of Dianchi
Yet another view of Dianchi
Flowering trees over Dianchi Lake
It was the
perfect time to return, as Shuting’s KTV group was to leave just then. The nine
of us walked leisurely to the KTV place, only to find that despite all of our
research, it was closed. Most people were set on using the evening to pack for
tomorrow’s departure, which is why we decided to go in the afternoon in the
first place. An alternative plan was quickly to put into action: Buy egg tarts,
takeaway, bring them back to the hotel, and then eat, sing, and celebrate
Shayley’s birthday. It was a fun evening.
Shayley's birthday
After eating egg tarts
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