Saturday, 17 September 2016
China: Day 5 - Suzhou to Wuxi
Our unscheduled trip on the Maglev left us a little behind, and we started this day at a silk spinning mill which was part of the previous days itinerary. Very interesting tour of how they get the silk unraveled from the cocoon, and create thread. It was obvious our guide was on commission, as most of the visit was a sales pitch. It worked as Brenda bought a silk comforter set for our bed (which I'm sure I will enjoy) and a scarf. At least they are shipping it to our last hotel in Xi'an so we don't have to pack it with us all over the country. If all goes well it will be there before we depart the country.
After the silk factory, we headed to Wuxi (" you shee" ) where we were greeted by another local guide who called herself Christine. She led us on a visit to the Lingshan Grand Buddha, a 80 meter tall statue. This was an large area almost like a theme park without the rides. The Buddha statue was mounted on the side of a hill at the far end of the park. There was huge lotus shaped water fountain in the middle of the park with shows about every 2 hours. By the time we wandered to the bottom of the 300 or so steps up to the standing Buddha platform, it was time to turn back to see the 2:45 water fountain show. I didn't really need to touch the Buddha's toes anyway, although one member of our group touched all 10 toes and each time said he wished to win Lotto Max. The water fountain show was interesting, but not quite what you would see in a place like Las Vegas.
The park also included a royal palace, but we didn't go through it as time was tight and the line was long. A beautiful building with golden tops above each tower. Unfortunately they were repairing the main tower and it was wrapped in scaffolding.
We wandered around the small lake and went through the smaller temple beside the lake. Inside the temple was a central stair case that wound up 3 floors. There were 4 statues faced out each of the four compass directions, and on each floor you could look down and get a different view of the statues. The wood working was amazingly detailed dark wood - possibly all mahogany at one point in time.
Late in the day we stopped at Nanchang Street, a converted residential street that now houses a long line of small tourist type shops, bars, cafes, etc. - including stuff like Baskin and Robbins and Starbucks. Our guide Christine said she grew up in the area. A few years ago the government came in and resettled the people into new homes (high rise apartments likely). They repaired the buildings and rented them out to the shops that inhabit the street now. Nanchang Street is fairly wide and follows the canal for quite some distance. We never had a chance to walk the full length, which I think is about a mile long. We walked some distance until we found a bridge that crossed the canal, and walked back on the opposite side. Quite different on that side. Very narrow, and some very old buildings that looked to be still homes for many people. There were a few that were renovated and converted to new shops with some high end carvings, and other trendy products. Certainly not what the residents of the street would afford. Unfortunately it was getting quite dark by that time so we didn't get many pictures of that street.
One thing I noticed was that many of the people on the side street stared at us, especially Brenda. They don't see many white people, especially blond haired, green eyed women.
We stayed the night at the Swiss-Belmont Hotel.
