China - Sunday

On Sunday we had the day off, with nothing to planned. We obviously can't do nothing all day, so we made plans to see the lake! But first I needed some nail clippers. So Jeremy and I walked over to the mall, had breakfast, and I grabbed a pair. Pink and sparkly and fabulous...  but they worked!  With out bodily needs taken care of, we caught a cab across the river to save us a mile of walking, (correctly) anticipating that we would be thankful for it later that day.

(Jeremy) taught me that they replant the tree higher, turning
 the gnarled roots into the bottom of the trunk!

Arriving at the lake the first thing we checked out was the Bonsai garden! Very peaceful, and Jeremy was full of interesting Bonsai facts, apparent he and his wife have recently taken a class on it!  Hundreds of miniature trees filled the tiny park on the lakefront.   When we finished admiring the miniature topiaries we made our way to the next island and scared some wildlife into the water! Some sort of aquatic mammal- it took off swimming beneath the surface. We tracked it and when it finally resurfaced we found it wasn't the cool kind of aquatic rodent, like muskrats or nutria... it was the more common kind - like sewer rats. Turns out sewer rats are great swimmers - which really shouldn't be a surprise.


Setting off to find more wildlife, we veered inland to the pet store (so many pretty birds!) and continued to the market! Most of your typical edible animals, typically alive in buckets: fish, snakes, snails, shellfish, squids, turtles, eels, and frogs. In the dry area, there were more animals in cages, including (but by no means limited to) pigeons, ducks, porcupines, guinea pigs, and a couple of extremely feral cats. I considered trying to rescue one, but I figured they'd do me the "favor" of dispatching what they'd expect to be my dinner, and then I'd be left with a dead cat on my hands. So instead we compartmentalized and set off across the lake.

(Jeremy) captured this great shot of Dongpo looking stately.

We crossed several bridges and made our way up to the central pagoda, and the nearby house of Su Dongpo - Dongpo was banished to Huizhou in 1090 for "being a free thinker and a virtuous man."  (Looking it up, it was over his criticism of the salt monopoly - and a lot of intricate political feuding lost to time). He's revered in Huizhou for his poetry, his calligraphy, and helping them organize the town government and build bridges...  He's a little like Johnny Appleseed and George Washington rolled into one, in a country that reveres bureaucrats as much as soldiers. We toured the academy built in his memory when his exile was rescinded, checked out the tomb of his concubine, and saw some of his writings and belongings.

A little too intentionally casual there...

Continuing back across the lake over more bridges, we picked up a tail. The zig-zag bridges might be an impassible barrier to demons, but they were powerless against a pair of highschool girls who were attempting to surreptitiously follow us... I say attempting because it's hard to be inconspicuous while your trying to get random Caucasian dudes in the back of your selfies.  We'd been getting looks all day for being white (we saw no other white people today), but this was a bit too awkward so we shook them by reversing course in the midst of a garden.

After leaving that garden, we continued around the lake to.... another garden! This one was in the style of the Tang period - where they were really into the contrast of plants and stone. As someone who is into cool rocks, I was into it as well.

We also checked out a viewing platform for the bird sanctuaries in the center of the lake and met a young boy.  He saw us on the other side of the pier, glanced back at his parents for approval, and sprinted over to us. "Hello, good morning, good afternoon!" he used literally all of his English, and after we used literally all of our Chinese, we waved goodbye. "How are you goodbye!" he replied.

By this point we'd made our way to the Crocodile Lake. We'd driven by this field of mud all week and one of our goals for the day was to see it in more detail. They had dammed up one arm of the lake and pumped it dry for.... public works reasons. (There are definite upsides to the Chinese make-work economy, as illustrated by all these well maintained parks and facilities.) This condensed all the fish into small puddles, where they were feasted upon by birds and fishermen alike.  In the center of the (dry) lake we found Crocodile Island, featuring the "Male in proud glory overshining the female crocodile" while their children scuttled about. It was definitely weird, but like most things here, that's part of the charm.  While we were out here in the center of the lake I decided I should head out into the mud-pans and see what the fishermen were catching. A Chinese grandfather and his grandson became very interested in me (as Jeremy was too smart to participate). The rocky shoreline was carpeted with snail shells, thick as gravel - it must be the remains of generations of snails living on the algal growth in the euphotic zone (I admit I had to look that one up - it's the sunlit part of the the ocean... It's much shallower in silty lakes) . Once I got past the rocky shoreline and onto the mud itself, I made it 2 or 3 entire steps before turning back to an extremely amused trio.

I was giggling about Proud Male Glory for about an hour... 

There was one area of the park we hadn't been to yet, and - checking the map - we decided to take a shortcut through the forest behind the lake, but when we arrived at the access road we were met by a large "NO PICTURE MILITARY BASE" sign. I really really wanted a picture of it, but I don't think the Chinese government has a sense of humor. Like at all, but especially not about taking pictures of a "NO PICTURE" sign. So I smiled at the armed guard watching from back at the gate and we doubled back along the trail to the final unexplored area of the lake. It was a quite pleasant walk, and they played special "5pm end of the day music" - probably to celebrate the fact they didn't have to arrest a random whiteboy.

Walking down this unexplored arm of the lake we came upon temple stairs! We assumed that the temple was locked and the stairs only offered a view of the lake, but we went up anyways - to find an open door to a courtyard!  Stepping inside we found lots of statues, ancillary buildings, further courtyards - an entire courtyard.  At this point a group of passing teens asked for a selfie - which I obliged, of course. Being the only white people in town is weird, but fun.  Making our way upward into more courtyards we came to the temple itself - in the midst of a funeral service.  Incense drifted across the courtyard as they sang a dirge out the open doors. It was otherworldly - a scene that was thousands of miles from home and could have been thousands of years from home as well. I feel truly blessed for all the circumstances that aligned to allow us to experience it.

We continued around the final arm of the lake (which included a detour for a lookout pavilion and several more bridges) and ended back at the Bureaucrat's Residence that I had visited my first trip.  I (again) thought it was 1000 years old, but the signs still say 1846.. With Jeremy there to bounce ideas off we noticed much more, and figured out that the beds were smaller due to malnutrition, figured out all the very precise scales were for opium - which also explained why so many pipes were found.   However, it doesn't explain this.

I don't think anything can explain this.

We headed back toward the hotel and cut through another market - this one mostly clothing shops instead of food. We made a circuit, randomly picking shops or alleys to check out, and made a single purchase: ibuprofen. We were beginning to feel the effects of the day. We finally crossed the river and made it back in the mall we started at - and after looking around for a simple dining choice we settled on pizza. With a bit of sign language and a lot of pointing we got two pizzas and some much needed lemonade. Only they were all a bit weird, because all the food in china is a bit weird.

Reviewing the maps we hiked 12 miles over 6 hours. It was an incredible day: fun, bizarre, fascinating, and spent with great people (us!). I am looking forward to the rest of my night though, I have a date with a cold beer and a hot tub. And several Advil.