The next morning we took a train to the Mount QingCheng
(Qingchengshan). I really wanted
to come here more than any other place in the Chengdu region. It was near impossible for us to get
tickets because of the National Holiday.
We spent hours at the train station the day before trying to organize
tickets. We were able to get standing
room only train tickets for 645 am along with return tickets around 4pm the
same day. The train took about 45
minutes to get to QCS.
QCS is the supposed origins of Taoism. It is a mountain with many temples and
pagodas nestled in the temperate forest.
The QCS park has hiking trails up the mountain, as well as a cable car
line and old Chinese boat to help you get around and see everything. The surroundings are gorgeous. The forest is dense and lush, the
mountains are beautiful, and the temples are all intricately detailed and
appear to be placed with purpose within the environment.
We hiked up part of the way, took the boat across the lake,
then took the cable car up.
Outside the cable car was perhaps the best sign I have seen so far in
China. It said that you shouldn’t
ride the cable car if you “suffer from habitual abortions.” I tried to take a picture but it was so
dark and far away I couldn’t get it sharp enough. Anyway, it was a perfect day. Wispy clouds enveloped the mountains. Looking out across the valleys and the
peaks was breathtaking. Seeing
temples and traditional Chinese buildings nestled amongst the trees and the
hills in the distance was something to behold. It was a very relaxing and beautiful place. After reaching the highest peak and the
final temple, we headed back down the mountain.
Much like the previous day at Leshan, there were loads of
people. It wasn’t so bad going up
because we got there so early.
Going down was almost impossible though because of the sheer number of
people coming up. After we
eventually made it down though we walked through “town” back towards the train
station. I say “town” because it
was either abandoned or had never been lived in. At least the part of town we saw. We walked along a “biking green” that cut through town and
saw nobody except for one worker sweeping. Looking in the apartments that were to our left and right
along the path it was clear that no one was living in any of them. It was a little bit creepy. We did however stumble upon a small
Taiwan Food Festival though and grabbed some lunch before heading back to the
train. I had some fried bacon
wrapped cucumber and some dumplings.
Wasn’t bad, wasn’t great.
At the train station while we were waiting a young mom took
her 1-2 year old kid over by the wall and held him while he peed on the
ground. Yes inside the train
station. With a bathroom about 100
feet away. The janitor saw
her encouraging the kid to pee and walked over to her and began to yell and
scream at her. She just walked
away and sat back down in the waiting area. He followed her and continued to give her hell. He eventually walked away, however he
never did clean up the pee during the time we were waiting (about 45
minutes). China is an interesting
place.
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