Outing to Xinchang
The Foreign Teachers at my university were invited on an outing to Xinchang, located in eastern Zhejiang Province, about 3 hrs. from Hangzhou. Xinchang has beautiful scenery and numerous historical sites, including three provincial scenic areas — the Dafo Temple, Chuanyan 19 Peaks, and Wozhou Lake. It is considered the center of the ‘Tang poetry road’ and ‘Buddhist pilgrimages’. Tianlao (Skyland) Mountain and Dafo Temple are famous, as the great Tang poet Li Bai wrote in a poem entitled “Mount Skyland Ascended in a Dream — A Song of Farewell”,
“Mount Skyland threatens heaven, massed against the sky,
Surpassing the Five Peaks and dwarfing Mount Red Town.
Mount Heaven Terrace, five thousand feet high,
Nearing the southeast, appears to crumble down.”
The Great Buddha in the Xinchang Dafo Temple is the earliest example of grotto art in southern China, having a history of 1,400 years. Okay, I guess I did plagiarize most of the above text, but you’ll get my meaning after you see the photos – click on the Photos Link to the right of your screen.
We took off at 7:30am that morning on a nice big air-conditioned/heated bus – large enough for everyone to have their own double-seat to stretch out in comfort! The Dafo Temple site is much larger than I expected and consists of several temples, ponds and lakes and very attractive scenic spots.
Lunch was reserved for us at an extremely expensive restaurant, with crab as its feature. My own large crab was put up for grabs, since I don’t like it. I thoroughly enjoyed the rest of the food – strangely enough, lunch consisted of many meat/fish dishes but only a few vegetables, this I really missed.
The Chuanyan 19 Peaks was really quite outstanding in its beauty. We trekked along a river-side path bordered with Bamboo forest (gorgeous!). Majestic rock cliffs cloaked in mist soared high above us. Best of all was the silence, only the sound of our voices as we rarely saw other tourists or even locals! The Xinchang area is not on the well-trodden tourist trail, that’s for sure! I recommend it highly!
I headed back along the trail well before the others (sore knees), and ran into two young Chinese men. One teaches English and the other is a science teacher. Their English is pretty good (contrary to their own opinions), so we had a great chat on the way back. They live in Wenzhou (about 5 hrs. away) and had traveled to Xinchang to enjoy the sights, just like us. My new friend was determined not to waste this opportunity – He asked me for advice on how to make his own classes more interesting. Unfortunately, as he must follow a very strict curriculum to ensure the students pass their exams, I cannot tell him to run his classes like my own highly ‘active’ ones. But, I was able to suggest some 5-minute warm-up activities and gave him some ideas about how to liven up some of the ‘drier’ exercises his students have to complete. I wish him well.
Back at university, we enjoyed our second huge meal of the day, this time in our university’s hotel restaurant. Dish after dish emerged from the kitchen – I thought they would never stop! And then the yellow wine began to flow. This is deadly stuff, but when the School President wants you to drink, you drink! There must be caffeine in that wine because it took me a long while to get to sleep that night, but I did wake up the next morning hangover-free!
Tags: Travel
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