Christmas 2014 - Round The Coast Of Zhejiang Province Via The Yan Dang Mountains Geo-Park (雁蕩山)
Posted On Saturday, December 27, 2014 at at 8:20 PM by Alvin
We spotted a break of blue sky in the Winter gloom and decided on the spur of the moment to hit Zhejiang Province (浙江) on the South Eastern coast of China. We landed in Wenzhou (溫州) - the export capital of the world for goods like shoes, clothes and even cigarette-lighters (!) and paid a visit to the local landmark of Jiang Xing Yu (江心嶼) - a small island 1km in width and 4 km in length, just 5 minutes' ferry ride from the city. It was a pleasant blue day and the peacefulness and quietness away from the hustle of the city, left us a good impression of this city. Next came 2 days of hiking in the International Geo-Park Yan Dang Mountains (雁蕩山), traveling further north for an hour by bus.
Essentially, eons ago this area of China was part of an enormous volcano (think Yellowstone), and hence we would today in Yan Dang Geo-Park, find volcanic remnants of the collapsed caldera, lava balls, lava flow patterns, gigantic volcanic features such as sky-scraper height and size rock "screens", "doors" and miles-high waterfalls. Mind you, it was great to be hiking in the off-season as we practically had the whole park (靈峰 靈岩) to ourselves and we hiked for 7 hours in the shadows of the giant mountains to the waterfall of 大龍湫, passing many rural villages along the way. Lungs full of fresh air, we were ready for some city comfort as we moved on to the beautiful port city of Ning Bo (寧波). Ning Bo surprised us with its modernity and the amount of green space and leisure parks. We took our time exploring different parts of the city - 中山廣場, 天一廣場, 鼓樓, 月湖, 天一閣, 佛教居士林, 天封塔 and 城隍廟. We even packed a day out to the nearby city of Shao Xing (紹興), now that was a very busy Christmas !
