What's Up Al ? 遊記隨筆 生活點滴

After the "serious" business of admiring Peony flowers and inspecting the marvelous achievement of ancient writings on the Oracle bones by our ancestors, it's time for a few fun days out -Theme Parks time ! First on the menu was the Huanghe (黃河) Scenic Park In Zhengzhou (鄭州) where we hailed a one hour taxi ride from a polite young man and spent a whole day at this massive park - complete with a twice-a-day Kung-Fu performance set in the Three Kingdoms era. We took our time to visit the different parts of this spacious park - ogling at the beautiful birds in the peacock garden, strolling along the shores of the Huanghe River, climbing the giant statues modelled on long-ago Emperors (炎帝,黃帝), visiting the extremely informative on-site Geological Museum and learnt about the formation and accumulation of the loess (黄土) in China and the importance of these loess in determining the ancient farming and military practices and their geo-political consequences.
Next up was a 20 minutes ride by the High Speed Railways from Zhengzhou to the ancient capital of Kaifeng (開封) where we took a boat trip on The Sung Dynasty Royal Canals (大宋御河) and experienced what it was like to be Royalties 1,000 years back - well, it was most pleasant on this sunny Spring day and especially, by sheer chance, having the boat all to ourselves ! We did visit this famous city almost ten years ago and could recognise the different landmarks (開封府, 包公祠, 大相國寺 包公湖) around this famous city. At the end of both trips, the non-stop walking and sight-seeing left us with a huge appetite and we consumed a big bowl (each) of the famous and delicious Zhengzhou braised noodles (鄭州 燴麵) when we arrived back in Zhengzhou !