Chinese Tourism Introduction

Jiu Zhaigou Tourism

A General Introduction of Jiu Zhaigou:
Jiu Zhaigou (Nine-village gully) is located at Jiuzhaigou county, Aba prefecture, Sichuan province. It is around by nine stockaded villages and got its name. The altitude of Jiuzhaigou is more than 2 kilometers, and it spread over forest. There are 108 lakes in Jiuzhaigou. Wu huahai, Colorful pool, Shuzheng waterfall, Ruo Rilang waterfall, All very beautiful. The scenery so excellent and colorful, so it has a name “fairy fale”. Giant pandas, golden monkey, takin, spotted deer roam the forests of Jiuzhaigou, along with many other species of animals and birds. Jiu Zhaigou as a key of China scenic spot, it was declared a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1992. May 8,2007, Jiu Zhaigou by the National Tourism Administration approval for the state 5A-class tourist attractions.

The blue sky, white cloud, jokul and forests with the waterfall, river, lake and shoal constituting an attractive painting. The campfire, roasting mutton, Tibetan dance, age-old and beautiful legend are showed that the Tibetan hot and doughty ethnic customs. Jiu Zhaigou is a colorful and florid jasper lake, it’s an original ancient and illusion mysterious fairyland on earth, it’s a fairy fale of purely and no dust. Jiu Zhaigou is the only scenic spot possessing the titles of “World heritage” & “World Biosphere Reserve”. Jiu Zhaigou has original entironment, clean & fresh air, snow mountain, flourishing forests, blue rivers & lakes, all of these offer the tourists a cabalistic, fantastic and charming natural views. It comes out the nature is the best beauty, the best beauty is the nature. Do you heard top-five of Jiuzhaigou? They are colorful grove, the top peak of Jiuzhaigou, blue lake, multilayer waterfall and Tibetan customs. All over the world people call Jiuzhaigou “heaven on earth”.

In Jiuzhaigou, the Tibetan language, dress and customs are different to the else Tibetan of other areas. According to research, their ancester live at Maqu, Gansu province. You can travel Jiuzhaigou all the year, but autumn is the best time for traveling. Now, Travel boom in Jiuzhaigou is getting hotter every year, especially in Spring festival, if you have no early booking, you may have no place to sleep there.

At present, there are four travelling routes of Jiuzhaigou: Shuzheng area, Rize area, Zezhagui area and Zharu area. Its length is more than 60 km, the sights are distributed throuthout six big scenic spot: Shuzheng, Ruorilang, Jianyan, Changhai, Zharu, Tianhai. It has 3 gullies and 118 lakes, including 5 shoals, 12 waterfalls, tens of rivers and fountains. Combined with nine stockaded villages and 12 mountain peaks being an alpine-valley natural landscape. The views are charming all over the year.

Jiu Zhaigou is covering an area of 62 square kilometers, the excursion area is 50 sq.km. The sights of Jiuzhaigou are distributed in the main gullies: Shuzheng, Rize, Zezhagui. In Shuzheng area (its length is 75km), there are Bonsai Shoal (Penjing Tan), Shuzheng Group of Lakes (Shuzheng Qun Hai), Shuzheng Waterfall, Double Dragon Lake (Shuanglong hai), Spark Lake (Huohua hai), Wolong Lake, and so on. The sight spots in Rize are Ruo Rilang, Pearl beach waterfall, high waterfall, mirror Cliff, Panada area, Fragrant Grass area, Swan Lake, Sword Cliff, Original Forest, Suspensory Spring, Flowers area, and so on. The Long Lake and Five-color Pool are in the Zezhagui area. Zharu area has Devil cliff and Zharu Temple.
A lot of people said, “if you back form Jiu Zhaigou, you will not attractive by other places for enjoying water.” The water is the numen of Jiuzhaigou, lake, river, spring, waterfall and shoal go together to make a swinging, tougher with suave, moving and static, and colorful picture. The water streaming among the trees, the trees grow up in the water, the flowers blossom out in the water, how beautiful they are!

Tourist lodging in Jiu Zhaigou:
At the present time, there are dozens of 3-5 star hotel. Including two 5 star hotel, one 5 star standard hotel, three 4 star hotel, more than ten 4 star standard hotel, and so on.

5 star hotel: Intercontinental Resort Jiuzhai Paradise, Sheraton Jiuzhaigou Resort.
5 star standard hotel: Holiday in Jiuzhai jarpo

Remark: Intercontinental Resort Jiuzhai Paradise and Holiday in Jiuzhai jarpo are charged by the world’s biggest Intercontinental Hotels Group. Sheraton Jiuzhaigou Resort is charged by Starwood Hotel Group.
4 star hotel: Qianhe International Hotel Jiuzhaigou, Gesang Hotel Jiuzhaigou, Xingyu Jiuzhaigou hotel.
4 star standard hotel: Jiuzhai holiday village, Jiuzhaigou Sunshine Hotel, Jiulv Holiday Hotel, Jiuzhaigou Jiulong Hotel, Grand Hyatt Jiuzhaigou, Jiuzhaigou North West Hotel, Jiuzhaigou China Travel Service Hotel, Jiuyuan International Hotel Jiuzhaigou, and so on.

Jiu Zhaigou entrance tickets:
Jiu Zhaigou: entrance tickets is 220RMB in Apr. 1 to Nov. 15 and 80RMB in Nov. 16 to Mar. 31. If you want to take the ECO-car, you should pay 90RMB.

Huanglong: entrance tickets is 220RMB in Apr. 1 to Nov. 15 and 80RMB in Nov. 16 to Mar. 31. Maonigou’s ticket is 70RMB.
Ticket of Diexi Quake lake is just 5RMB, Heldendenkmal der Roten Armee is 8RMB, Jiuzhaigou Angel Pool entrance ticket is 100RMB, taking tour bus needed 90RMB per person., 40RMB for battery cart. But the ticketing packages of Jiuzhaigou Angel Pool is 398RMB, which consiste of tour bus, battery cart, guide and one lunch.. You can choose by yourself from these two way.

Jiu Zhaigou Cate:
In Jiu Zhaigou and Huanglong, lots of goods are delivered from outside and the traffic is not convenient, so most of the food are very expensive. Therefore, there is no necessary to consider about the food costs, because you would have no idea to cut the costs down.

You can taste much ethnic foods in the local hotels, such as Roast Whole Lamb, chang, Jiuzhai dried persimmon, Jiuzhai pickle vegetable noodle, Yam Ciba, Jiuzhai potato ciba, and so no. Most of these are Tibet flavoured food, so maybe some people don’t like them.

Various food introduction:

Ruyi dish:
Ruyi dish is fiddlehead shreds, it got the name by its shape like a green ancient jade Yu Ruyi. Foreigners rank it as health food, and call it “king of potherb”.

YA tea:
YA tea is made of tea’s branch and large leaves, its locality is YaAn area, so call it “YA tea”. The main food of the Tibetan is meat, they seldom eat fruites and vegetables, so they are lack of vitamins, drinking YA tea can meet their needs of vitamins. And YA tea is the necessary material to make buttered tea, the smell of YA tea is very heavy, so it can cover the smell of butter and milk.

Yam Ciba:
Yam Ciba is the most famous food in Jiu Zhaigou. Yam also called potato. Boiled the potatoes until softened, then Put in a cask and mashing vigorously. Making it as Ciba, add the pickle vegetable and pepper after it cooked. It tasted smooth and very dilicious.

Buckwheat noodle:
Pulverizing the buck wheat and then make various foods. Buckwheat steamed bread and noodle are roughage, they are good for health. The buckwheat noodles are very dilicious and fragrant, you can have a bowl of beef buckwheat noodle for your dinner.

Bracken:
Bracken is very fresh and tender, and it has very high nutritional value.

Chang:
Chang’s color is light yellow, and it taste sweet and sour. Chang is well known as “Tibet beer”, it’s indispensable to Tibetan. Chang is also the top-grade spirit to celebrate a festival with jubilation and hosting. According to Tibetan custom, when the guests are coming, the host would put up the chang flagon and serve 3 bowl of full chang to the guests. The guests can drink by yourr own quantity drinks to drink the first and the second bowl of chang, you can drink it up or drink a bit, but you can’t drink at all. The third bowl of chang, you should toss off the bowl to show your respect. The Tibet always sing toasting song when they urge the guests to drink. The songs are rich and colorful, the melody is enchanted, too.
Pickled vegetable:

Pickled vegetable tasted good, and it can adjusted the taste and increase your appetite. It’s also helpful for your digestion.

Yak meat:
Yak native form plateau of Jiu Zhaigou, the meat has fragrant and mineral taste. Now, there are some yak meat fabrication plant in Jiu Zhaigou. The meat is made for cooked food and packed in a vacuum packing, so the tourists buy and take it more easily and carry back to their friends and relatives as presents.

Local Product:
Ruyi dish, yam ciba, yak meat, chang and so on.

Shopping in Jiu Zhaigou:
In the area of Jiu Zhaigou and Huanglong, you would buy the local particular Qiang embroider, shading apple, Chinese medicinal herb, Tibetan handicraft article like Tibetan ring, Tibetan knife, beads and so on.
Northwest of Sichuan is filled with caladium, worm grass, muskiness and so on, these herb are all very precious.
You also can buy some wild pepper, bracken and agaric. The Tibetan knife is so characteristic, but it’s not allow to book and check through in the airport. The Tibetan ornaments are refined and beautiful, but you should know that they are not very expensive, and you can dicker with the seller.

The way to Jiu Zhaigou:
At present, there are just two ways to Jiu Zhaigou, bus and plane.

1、Plane:
In the circumstances of no discuount ticket, flying to Chongqing city then transfer to Jiu Zhaigou, more cheaper than flying to Jiu Zhaigou directly. There are planes from Chongqing to Jiu Zhaigou every day. The air fare is 980RMB + 50RMB MYC + 50RMB airport fee = 1080RMB.

You also can fly to Mianyang first, then take bus to Jiu Zhaigou. Jiu Zhaigou airport (in full) is call “Jiuzhaigou Huanglong airport”, short for “Jiu Huang airport”. The airport located at north 12 kilometers of Chuanbeisi town, Songpan county, Aba prefecture, Sichuan province. So the airport also called “Zhusi airport”.

Now, the opened flight include many line, e.g. Chengdu to Jiuzhaigou flight, Chongqing to Jiuzhaigou flight, Xian to Jiuzhaigou flight, and so on. But some flights would be socked in the off-travel-season.

There are lots of buses between Jiuzhaigou-Huanglong and Jiu Huang airport. All of the buses are using GPS & DIMS, and there are stewards give you a tour guide service. It’s very convenient.

Bus fare:
(1) Jiu Huang airport to Jiu Zhaigou: single ticket is 45RMB, return ticket is 80RMB. Single trip needed one and a half hour.
(2)Jiu Huang airport to Huanglong: single ticket is 22RMB, return ticket is 40RMB. Single trip needed one hour.

2、Bus:
Most tourists come form the direction of Chengdu, therefore, you can buy a bus ticket to Jiu Zhaigou in Xinnanmen station and Chadianzi station in Chengdu. But the buses in Chadianzi is more than in Xinnanmen, so you’d better go to Chadianzi to take the bus.

The bus fare is about 125RMB for single trip. Vehicle-hour is almost 10 hours.

Jingdezhen has a long history and a magnificent culture. It crouches on the south of the Yangtze River as a important town on the south of the Yangtze River, and was listed with Foshan in Guangdong Province, Hankou in Hubei Province, and Zhuxianzhen in Henan Province as the four famous towns in Chinese history. It is designated one of the first 24 famous Chinese cities of historical and cultural interests and a first-range city opening to the foreigners by China’s State Council. In June 1953, Chinese Administration approved Jingdezhen City as a municipality under the direct jurisdiction of Jiangxi Province. It now covers an area of 5256 square kilometers with a population of 1,520,000, including 400,000 urban residents. There are one city, one county and two districts : Leping City, Fuliang County, Zhushan District and Changjiang District.

Jingdezhen city lies in the Northeast of Jiangxi Province. To its Northwest is Dongzhi County of Anhui Province, to its south Wannian County, to its West Boyang County, and to its Southeast Wuyuan County. It is located in the transitional area between the Huangshan – Haiyushang mountain range and the Plain of Poyang Lake at longitudes 116°57′ -117°42′ east and latitudes 28°44′ -29°56′ south in the monsoon subtropical climate. It enjoys enough sunshine, sufficient rainfall, and a mild and moist climate, with clearly demarcated four seasons. It has beautiful scenery featured by a network of many rivers and streams and a chain of mountain peaks one rising higher than another. The city is 320 meters above sea level with an average temperature of 170C, an annual rainfall of 1763.5 millimeters, and average annual sunshine of 2009.8 hours.

As the world-famed ceramic capital, Jingdezhen City has a long history of ceramics making and a rich cultural heritage. In accordance with the historical records, Xinping (as the city was known as then) began to make pottery in Han Dynasty. It is evident that pottery was first made in Jingdezhen in Han Dynasty. In the first year in Jingde Reign of Song Dynasty (1004), the royal court decreed the city made porcelain wares for imperial use with the wording ‘Made during the Jingde Reign’ printed on the bottom of every piece. Hence the city got its name ‘Jingdezhen’. From Yuan Dynasty to Ming and Qing Dynasty, emperors sent their officials to Jingdezhen to supervise the manufacture of royal porcelain. They set up the Porcelain Office and built the royal kiln, which produced many wonderful ceramic articles. Among them were those particularly famous for the four classic decorations: blue and white, famille rose, rice-pattern and color glaze. The porcelain made in Jingdezhen enjoys the praise of ‘as white as jade, as thin as paper, as sound as a bell, as bright as a mirror’ .Guo Moruo (a famous historian and scholar) highly praised the brilliant ceramic history and culture in Jingdezhen and the ceramics connected the Jingdezhen to the world closely with the poem that ‘China is well known by the porcelain, the famous porcelains are made in this city’.

The Name of Macau
   
Macau is derived from the name of a Chinese goddess, popular with seafarers and fishermen, known as A-Ma or Ling Ma. The village where Macau now stands was previously known to the Chinese as Hou Kong or Hoi Keang.

According to legend, a junk sailing across the South China Sea one clear day found itself in a sudden storm. Everybody on board was about to give up all hope of surviving this natural calamity, when an attractive young woman, who had boarded the ship at the very last minute, stood up and ordered the elements to calm down. Miraculously, the gale winds stopped blowing and the sea became calm. Without further incident, the junk arrived safely at the port of Hoi Keang.

The young woman stepped ashore and walked to the crest of the nearby Barra Hill where, in a glowing halo of light and perfume, she ascended into heaven. On the particular spot where she set foot on land, a temple was built in homage to her.

Centuries later, when Portuguese sailors landed and asked the name of the place, the natives replied A-Ma-Gao (Bay of A-Ma) and so the peninsula was renamed. In modern usage, Amagao was shortened to Macau.

History
   
Macau was home to Cantonese farmers and Fujian fishing folk when Portuguese merchants arrived in the 1550s. It was the great era of exploration initiated by Prince Henry. The Navigator Vasco da Gama had made his historic voyage to India, Albuquerque had settled in Malacca and the Iberian explorers were seeking a gateway to China.

In 1513 Jorge Alvares became the first Portuguese to set foot in the land Marco Polo called Cathay. Others followed and began trading with the Chinese. They established various temporary outposts before coming to an arrangement with the mandarins of Canton to settle on a tiny peninsula at the mouth of the Pearl River estuary that they named Macau. It rapidly became fabulously rich as the sole entrepot for China’s seaborne trade with Japan and Europe.

Macau also served as a vital base for the introduction of Christianity to China and Japan, an activity that provided the city with some of the most glorious – and tempestuous – moments in its history. Because of the prosperity it was enjoying and its privileged location, other European nations began casting covetous looks at Macau and plotted to seize it from Portugal. The Dutch actually tried to invade the city in 1622 but were repulsed. As tingle passed and other trading nations from the west sent missions to China, Macau became the summer residence for the taipans (great traders) who retreated from their ‘factories’ in Guangzhou (better known perhaps as Canton) to await the opening of the trading season.

In 1841 the British settled on the island of Hong Kong, 40 miles east-northeast of Macau, with a deep-water, sheltered harbor that became the major port and commercial hub of the region. The foreign merchants moved to the new colony and Macau’s economic importance declined. Now it became a holiday retreat for Hong Kong residents, who came to gamble at the legalized casinos and enjoy a taste of old-world Europe in a classical Chinese setting.

In the latter part of this century Macau has developed into an important manufacturing center and travel destination, as well as a commercial gateway to the Pearl River Delta. It continues to be a unique crossroad of East and West, preserving a heritage that with over four and a half centuries, and has been nurtured by the coexisting cultures and interchanging traditions of China and Portugal.

Although it has witnessed many changes during its 440 years of existence, Macau has always been a stronghold of Portuguese presence and culture in the Far East. Macau has proudly flown Portugal’s flag continuously even when the Motherland’s throne was occupied by a foreign king, in the 17th century. When Portuguese rule was re-established, 60 years later, the city of Macau was granted the official name of Cidade do Nome de Deus de Macau, nao ha outra mais Leal. (City of the name of God, Macau, there is None More Loyal).

Macau has been under the Portuguese administration until the establishment of the Special Administrative Region of the People’s Republic of China, in December 20, 1999. In accordance with the principle of ‘one country, two systems’, the SAR, subordinate to the Chinese Central Government, will be highly autonomous with executive, legislative and independent judicial powers. The present social and economic systems as well as the respective way of life will remain unchanged for 50 years.

Macau ABC

Religions
There is complete freedom of worship in Macau. The main religions are Buddhism, Catholicism and Protestantism. The majority are Buddhists, while 7% are Catholics.

Population
The total population as on December 99, is estimated at 438,100 with about 95% of the population Chinese and 5% Portuguese, Europeans and from other regions.

Language
Portuguese and Chinese are the two official languages, with Cantonese the most widely spoken. English is Macau’s third language and is generally used in trade, tourism and commerce.

Currency
The pataca (often writtern as MOP) composed of 100 avos is the official unit of currency in Macau. It is available in coins and banknotes in denominations of:
Coins: 10, 20, 50 avos; l & 5 patacas.
Banknotes: 20, 50, 100, 500 & 1,000 patacas.
The Macau pataca can be freely converted into Portuguese escudos or Chinese yuan. It is pegged to the Hong Kong dollar – which is circulated freely in Macau – at the rate of 103.20 patacas = HK$ 100.00, with a permissible variation of up to 10%. US$1 buys 8 patacas.

Climate of Macau

The climate of Macau is moderate to hot, with an average annual temperature of just over 200 C (680 F) and a yearly mean variation between 160 C (500 F) and 250 C (770 F). The humidity is high with an average range between 75% and 90%. Rainfall is also high with the yearly total between 40 and 80ins. The best season is autumn (October-December) when days are sunny and warm and the humidity low. Winter (January-March) is cold but sunny. In April, the humidity starts to build up and from May to September the climate is hot and humid with rain and occasional tropical storms (typhoons).

Natural Geography

Macau is located on the south-eastern coast of China, at latitude 22014′ North and longitude 113035′ East. The territory comprises a peninsula and two islands in the Pearl River Delta of Guangdong Province. Some 60 kms to the east-northeast, across the mouth of the river, is Hong Kong, an important financial and trading centre.

The city of Macau is built on the peninsula; two bridges of 2.5kms and 4.5kms respectively link it to its nearest island of Taipa, which in turn is joined to Coloane by a 2.2 km-long causeway. At the extreme northern end of the peninsula, on a narrow isthmus, is the imposing gateway (Portas. do Cerco, or Border Gate), which leads to the Zhuhai and Zhongshan areas of China. Coloane is also connected fo Zhuhai City by the newly opened Lotus Bridge.

The territory of Macau has a total area of 23.8 sq.km. The peninsula is 7.8 sq.km. including the Praia Grande reclamation project. Taipa island, is 6.2 sq.km. and Coloane 7.6 sq.km. and the reclaimed land between Taipa and Coloane has 2.2 sq.km.

Source: Macau Government Tourist Office

Huangshan Mountain has many peaks, a total of 72. The altitude of Heavenly Capital Peak, Lotus Peak and Bright Peak are more than 1800 metres, the peaks look like up to the sky, full of power and grandeur, majestic and beautiful. In Huangshan Mountain, the weather is very nice, there are wonderful views through four seasons. Huangshan Mountain is well known as the first graceful mountain in the world. It’s famed for strangely-shaped pines, peculiar stones, the sea of clouds and hotsprings. So it has the praise of “after seeing Huangshan, the Five Mountains are nothing”. The sceneries of Huangshan Mountain focus on the range of Huangshidang in the east, Xiaolingjiao in the west, Erlongqiao in the north and Tangkou Town in the south. The total area is 154km2. In Huangshan Mountain, the famous landscapes are the seventy-two peaks, the twenty-four creeks, three waterfalls and two lakes. The main six tourist districts are hotspring, Yuping House, the North Sea, Cloudy Valley Temple, Pine Valley Hut and Fishing-Bright Hut. In Huangshan Mountain, no peaks have no stones, no stones have no pines, no pines are not unique. The two lakes, three waterfalls, sixteen springs and twenty-four creeks are contrasting finely with each other. You can enjoy the beautiful sceneries in Huangshan Mountain no matter which time and which day. The sceneries are different in four seasons, and they are vary form day to day thanks to variations in the weather, day and night. The sunrise, sunset, cloud, Buddha light and rime-pine are contending for their beauties by themselves.
In spring (Mar. to May.), enjoying many flowers are competing to blossom out, the pines are budding and appreciating various birds singing.

In summer (Jun. to Aug.), you can seeing the pines, cloud and mist, and it’s a nice rest and entertainment place.
In autumn (Sep. to Nov.), appreciating the beautiful natural sceneries, such as pines, stones, red maples, yellow chrysanthemums, and so on.

In winter (Dec. to Feb.), seeing ice, snow and fog-pines, you can enjoy the unique pines and peculiar stones in sunny day, seeing the sea of clouds change form minute to minute in cloudy day, appreciating the springs and waterfalls in rainy day, looking the snow-wrapped trees and pines in snow day, when the wind blows, you can hear the songs from empty valley and the soughing of the wind in the pines.

Huangshan Pine is one morph of Chinese pines thanks to the especial topographical features and climate in Huangshan Mountain. Huangshan Pine is usually grow in the place which altitude is more than 800 metres, in Huangshan Mountain, most of the Huangshan Pines are in the north slope of 1500 to 1700 metres or in the south slope of 1000 to 1600 metres. Different poses with different expressions of Huangshan Pines are considered to be related to the natural environment of Huangshan Mountain. The seeds of Huangshan Pines can be blew to the crevices of granites by wind, in the crevices, the seeds are budding, rooting and growing by their indestructible drilling efforts. There are potassiums in the incarnate long stones of granites, and in summer, the nitrogen in the air will change to be nitrogen salt after the rain, they will be absorbed by the terrane and soil, and then be absorbed by the roots of pines. The pines’ roots would continue excrete one organic acid, which can dissolve the granites and decompose the mineral salt in the granites to work on itself. The leaves, grass and flowers are also decomposed to manure after they become rotten. So that the Huangshan Pines can survive and grow up in barren granites. The topography is so bumpy in Huangshan Mountain, and there are so many steepy cliffs, the Huangshan Pines are unable to grow up vertically, so they can only grow up zigzag, or even grow adown.

Huangshan Mountain is one of Chinese famous scenic spots, and it’s a popular tourist scenery in the world. It’s located at Huangshan city in the south of Anhui province. The highest peak is Lotus Peak, its altitude is 1864 metres. Huangshan Mountain belongs to eastern subtropics monsoon climate region, because the mountain is very high and the valleys are so deep, the climate is changed vertically. At the same time, thanks to the difference of sunny radiation at northern slope and southern slope, and due to local area mainly reacts to the climate, it is forming the climate of cloudy, foggy, high humidity and rainy. Huangshan Mountain gets all good aspects of famous mountains, it has Taishan Mountain’s majesty, Huanshan Mountain’s steepness, Hengshan Mountain’s cloudy and foggy, Lushan Mountain’s waterfalls, Yandang Mountain’s unique stones and Emei Mountain’s prettiness, Huangshan Mountain gets all advantages of them. Xu Xiake, who is the tourist and geographer in Ming Dynast, had been to Huangshan Mountain twice, he highly praised “if you being in Huangshan Mountain, other mountains are not mountains any more”. He also remained good reputation as “you won’t want to visit any other mountains after returning from Huangshan Mountain”. And Huangshan Mountain is known as “the first unique mountain in the world”. In Huangshan Mountain, no peaks have no stones, no stones have no pines, no pines are not unique. It’s famed for strangely-shaped pines, peculiar stones, the sea of clouds and hotsprings. The two lakes, three waterfalls, sixteen springs and twenty-four creeks are contrasting finely with each other. The sceneries are different in four seasons. And Huangshan Mountian has the praise of “the nautral zoo and world’s arboretum”, too. It has about 1500 kinds of plants and more than 500 kinds of animals. The climate in Huangshan Mountain is quite agreeable, it’s advantaged summer resort, and it’s also a national scenic area and convalescent summer resort. In 1985, Huangshan Mountain was selected as one of the top ten scenic spot in China, and it was selected into the list of world cultural and historical heritage by UNESCO in Dec, 1990. It’s Chinese first scenery which in the world heritage list by both culture and nature. It was being world geological park in Feb, 2004. Huangshan Mountain becomes famous in and abroad, it is unforgettable for everyone. There are many poetries and articles about Huangshan Mountain across the world at all times. May 8, 2007, Huangshan Mountain was approved for the state 5A-class tourist attractions by the National Tourism Administration.

The beauty of Huangshan Mountian is a beauty of an artistic conception which no words can express. It has so many cultural beauty which can cause someone to get many associations. It shows the beauty of manly in burning sun shine, or it appears the elusive charming beauty amidst drifting clouds, or it emerges its romantic beauty with flowers blossom all over the mountain in spring March, or even it unveils the beauty of sanctity which is dressed in white in snowy severe winter, all these beauties will give you appreciation of enjoyment and aesthetic edification.

There are 365 days a year, but there are just 52 days that you can see the sea of clouds in Huangshan Mountain. Everyone which have been to Huangshan before said that Huangshan Mountain’s main theme is in the clouds and fog. This is to say that the best excellent sceneries of Huangshan Mountain is in the top peak region, especially when it covers with much clouds and fog. When people at the top of the mountain, looking down at the cloud layers, what you see is the shoreless clouds, like standing at the bank of sea, waves surging turbulently, sprays are flying up, and the raging waves pond on the bank. Huangshan Mountain’s cloud-sea is very wonderful, the clouds and roll-cumulus all over the sky are wandering with the wind, sometimes raise, and sometimes goes down, sometimes whirl, and sometimes unfold, forming a fancy daedal grand sight of cloud-sea. Every time when the sea of clouds pouring out, the whole Huangshan Mountain scenic spot would divide into many seas of clouds. The peaks which cover with dense fog are cropping out in layer upon layer and indistinctly. So that Huangshan Mountain’s elegancy and oddness are expressing out perfectly. The moving clouds like a layer of veil floating in the mountains, the sceneries are changing variously, it changes so fast that it’s different in every minute. In Huangshan Mountain, there are 62 freezing-fog-day and 35.9 glaze-ice-day every year, most of the freezing fog is granular fog which easily takes shape in the temperature of -2℃ to -7℃. When the granular fog expand to drizzle, it becomes to be glaze ice. Huangshan Mountain with a varied topography, and microclimate has significant difference, so some places have much freezing fog, and other places have much glaze ice, sometimes both of them appear together.

After the establishment of Huangshan City, owing to the history, it’s forming three same placenames: Huangshan city, Huangshan area, Huangshan scenic spot. Huangshan city was Huizhou area, which is the motherland of “Hui Culture” that is one of Chinese top three local cultures, the other two top local cultures are Tibetology and Dunhuang Culture. In 1987, in order to develop tourist industry, Huizhou area is changed its name for Huangshan city, at the same time, changing the original Huangshan city which was Huangshan county before as Huangshan area, therefore there are three Huangshan of different nature. At the present time, Huangshan scenic spot is in the administration region of Huangshan area, it’s not in the city government area, Huangshan city government area, Huangshan station and Huangshan airport are about 75km away form the Huangshan scenic spot.

In order to resist storm wind and withstand ice and frost, the needles of Huangshan pines are short and thick, flat like paner, their color is deep green and dull, the tree trunk and branch are also very tough and extremely rich of elasticity. Another characteristic of Huangshan pines is that most of the pines are growing out the branches just in one side thanks to expose to the weather. Huangshan pine is toughly and proudly, distinctively and beautifully. But its growing environment is very hard, so its growth rate is extremely slow, a huangshan pine which less than one zhang (three metres) tall should grew more than one hundred years or even more needed several hundred years. The length of its roots are always severalfold or dozens of times longer than the tree trunk. Huagnshan pine can stand at the rock strongly thanks to its roots are taking deeply. Facing wind, rain, snow, frost and shine, but Huangshan pine still keeps green forever.

The most famous Huangshan Pines are Greeting-guest Pine (which fronts a stone-lion of Yuping tower), Departing-guest Pine (which at right side of Yuping tower), Futon Pine (which locates at Lotus Gully), Phoenix Pine (which at Sky Lake), Chessboard Pine (which at Pingtian Stone Bridge), Guiding Pine (which lies to the Shixin Peak), Kylin Pine (which stands between the North-Sea Hotel and Qingliang Pavilion), Black-Tiger Pine (which lies between the North-Sea Hotel and Shixin Peak), Exploring-Sea Pine (which near the Jiyu Bei of Tiandu Peak) and Uniting Pine. The above pines are the top ten famous pines of Huangshan Mountain. In the past there was someone had compiled a book named /famous pines list/, it embodied huge of Huangshan pines, there are hundreds of pines which can mention their names, every pine has its unique beauty and elegant style. Huangshan Mountian’s sceneries are very peculiarly, especially in winter. In winter, Huangshan Mountain likes ice sculpture and jade inlay, it dress in white, not only there are unique sceneries of ice peg and rime, but also there are hallucinatory images of clouds sea and buddha bright. According to records, winter is the optimal season to form the clouds sea in Huangshan Mountian, sometimes it would covers huge amounts of clouds all over the peak for several days. For this reason, tourists at home and abroad have great interests to make winter travels for Huangshan Mountain.

Jinggangshan city (Jinggangshan shi), also known as Ciping, is located in the southwest of Jiangxi Province, near the border with Hunan. This remote region is famous in China as the area where a young Mao Zedong and other communist leaders set up the rural Jiangxi Soviet, an outpost against Nationalist (Guomindang) suppression. It was from here, after the People’s Liberation Army troops, led by Zhu De and Zhou Enlai, fled here from Nanchang, that the epic Long March (1934-1936) was to begin. This group were to advance, harried by Guomindang troops and bandits, on a circuitous route through some of China’s harshest regions, finally arriving in the little town of Yan’an, northern Shaanxi.

Most of the town has now been set up for tourism, with many hotels and dining facilities, and as a patriotism education center. Some of this is worth visiting, since the “city” has a rural charm, and the sights are propagandorially interesting. These include the Jinggangshan Revolutionary Museum (Jinggangshan gemin bowuguan), that used to house the Red Army Dormitory (Gemin jiuju) and Mao’s House (Mao zedong guju), and the Former Revolutionary Headquarters (Gemin jiuzhiqun), the communist command center in 1927-28.  

It is the sights out of town that are of most interest, however, up in the mountains. This is a wild area, that is full of walking and hiking trails and the chance to experience a little of what the communists must have lived like. Maps of the area, not overly useful, can be bought from the bookstore of the Cuihui Hotel at Hongjun nanlu. Tours or cars can be booked through local hotels or through China Travel Service (Zhongguo luxingshe, Tel: 0792-6552504). Probably the best of the sights for rural walking and beautiful scenery are the Five Dragon Pools (Wulong tan), about 10km northwest of town, although the higher area, the Five Finger Peaks (Wuzhi feng), also known as Jinggangshan, are better known.

Introduction of Gui Lin travel:

Gui Lin city is at the southwest of Nanling cordillera. Its average elevation is 150m. It belongs to typical Karst landform. Limestones which be airslaked and erosion through aeon can be found everywhere in Gui Lin. So many peaks around it, a long river sorround it and you can enjoy many peculiar caves and beauteous stones. People call the unique landscape as “Guilin’s scenery is the best in the world”. The most representative sceneries are Elephant Trunk Hill, Fubo Hill, Nanxi Hill, Rao Hill, Unique Beauty Peak, Seven-star Cliff, Reed Cliff, Sengpi Cliff, Cap-rock, The Ming Dynasty Intramuro, Ronghu Lake, Shan Lake and so on. The most sight of Lijiang river landscape is at Yangsuo county. There are still many great views in other areas of Gui Lin. Longji terrace, Xinan Ling canal, Zijiang driftage, Wupai river driftage, Eight-angle stockaded village, Bao Ding waterfall, and so on, all of these beautiful landscapes will give you more and more surprises.

Gui Lin is an ancient cultural city. It has more than 2 thousand year history and high cultural deposits. After Qin Shi Huang united China, it set up Gui Lin county, excavated Ling canal, communicated Xiang river and Lijiang river. Gui Lin became a main town running north and south form this time on. After Song dynasty, Gui Lin have been a political, economic and cultural center of Guangxi province. A long period of time, Gui Lin’s limpid water and fancy stones are attracted huge amounts of poets and literary men. They wrote a lot of wonderful poets and literatures, they engraved more than 2 thousand lithoglyph and carvings, additionally, the history remained lots of antiquities and ancient ruins in Gui Lin. So Gui Lin get the praise “climbing mountains like read history, appreciating mountains like enjoying paintings” by its especial human landscapes. In the Second Sino-Japanese War, Gui Lin is Chinese famous cultural town. Numerous patriotic authors and artists flock together in Gui Lin, composing revolutionary articles. With long history, ancient and fancy Gui Lin gets rich cultures.

For centuries, Gui Lin always is the hot treasured traveling landscape. Now, it’s forming a large scenery which putting Gui Lin as a center and including surrounding landscapes in other 12 counties. Here, there are vast green forests, there are grand & steepy peaks and valleys, there are lotic impetuous creeks and waterfalls, there are difform mountains and terraces…… Tens of minorities live in this supernatural land, like Chuang, Yao nationality, Miao nationality, Tong nationality, Maonan nationality, and so on. Huge amounts of chinese and foreigners travel Gui Lin city, even the presidents of many countries enjoy Gui Lin. They all are attracted by the natural scenery, ethnic customs and historic cultures.

Gui Lin Scenery:
Because of its beautifu scenery, Gui Lin is a well-known tourist scenic city, it has unparalleled Karst landform. The mountains are up the ground and have variety of shapes; the water of Lijiang river is zigzag like snake and limpid like mirror; many mountains with many holes, the holes are deeply so the scenery is mystically; numberless queer stones are created by the nature. All of above landscapes form the top-four sceneries of Gui Lin “comely mountains, limpid water, peculiar holes, fancy stones”. So there is “Gui Lin’s scenery is the best in the world” of praise all the time.

The most classical natural landscapes are “three mountains, two holes and one river”, they are essential representatives of Gui Lin scenery. “Three mountains and two holes” are Elephant Trunk Hill, Fubo Hill, Piled Silk Hill, Reed Cliff and Seven-star Cliff. The three mountains are stringed as three bright pearls by Lijiang river. Reed Cliff which is praised as “natural artistic palace” is the representative of Cliffs and solution cavities, and every chief of states, who visiting Gui Lin, would travel Reed Cliff. Gui Lin has many landscapes, but the three mountains, two holes and one river are the certain sceneries you should go.

Lijiang river is the cream of all sceneries, and it’s the world generally accepted and world class landscape. Traveling Lijiang river means that you would travel from Gui Lin to Yangshuo by trip, it’s length is 83km. Lijiang river is connected with Gui Lin landscape and Yangshuo landscape.

Lijiang river scenery:
If Gui Lin is a life entity, then Lijiang river is sure the spirit of this entity.
Lijiang is originate from cat-mountain of Xingan county. Its length is 83km from Gui Lin to Yangshuo. Lijiang river likes a sinuous jade belt, it’s entwined round green and peculiar peaks, becoming the biggest and most excellent cave scenic area of the world. Traveling Lijiang river by trip, you can enjoy the inverted image of peaks, limpid river water and green mountains, singing by vaquero, fishing, rustic countryside and fresh air, all of these take you in a fairyland.

At the present time, there are three sections of Lijiang river for travel which have been sanctified and opened, they are Gui Lin section landscape, Lijiang river essential trip and Yangshuo section landscape. I introduce the schedule of Lijiang river essential trip for you as follows:

Landscapes: Scalper-Gill, One-side ferry, lawn, Yangdi scenery, Wave-Stone scenery, Nine-Horse-Drawing Mountain, Yellow-Cloth Beach, Xingping town, fishing village, Full-happy Land and Elephant Trunk Hill.

The best time for travel:
The latitude of Gui Lin is very low, so Gui Lin belongs to the,subtropical monsoom climate. Overall, Gui Lin has a moderate climate, it make a clear distinction between the four seasons, the climatological condition of Gui Lin is very good. Its average temperature is 19.5℃, so it is said, “few snow in winter, flowers bloom all the year”. If you want to travel Gui Lin, you’d better tour between Apr. and Oct. In this period, there are two golden weeks “Labour Day” and “National Day”, these two weeks are also the tourist fastigium, huge amounts of tourists have a trip in Gui Lin, at the same time, the booking and truffic are become crowded, and the ticket price also will be more expensive than usual, so you’d better avoid these two golden weeks. You can travel in off season, it’s not only cut you travel cost, but also let you enjoy the beautiful scenery by heart.

Tourist lodging in Gui Lin:
Gui Lin has flourishing tourist industry, and various hoteles can be found everywhere. There are 2-5 star hoteles, county non-star hoteles, family hoteles, modern artistic hoteles, personalized hoteles, and so on, so many polytype hoteles for your choice. According to areas, the hoteles are classified as follows:

River-sight area in the central city:
This area is beside the Lijiang river in the center of Gui Lin, near every scenic spots, there are many medium and top star hotels which environment is comfortable and sights are gracefully. These hoteles vary in price from 188RMB to 900RMB per night.

Railway station area:
This area is locate in the southern part, being railway station and bus station for the center, it’s the main overland entrance of Gui Lin. Thi area has convinient traffic and most hoteles are affordable economy hotel. Their prices are between 198RMB to 480RMB per night. The ordinary hoteles, medium and small hoteles be all over this area. They give more choices for the generic tourists. The ordinary hoteles are not only economy, but also has nice service and the price is just 50RMB to 180RMB per night.

Lake-sight area in the central city:
This area is in the scenery with two rivers and four lakes, nearby the center of Gui Lin. Comprising Gui Lin city government office and interrelated administrative institutions and famous scenic spots. A majority of the hoteles are 3-5 star hotel, and the price is between 208RMB and 700RMB per night, you can choose by your needs.

Exhibition hall of QIEC area:
This area is locate in the southern side, it’s Gui Lin’s new region which near the exhibition hall of QIEC and near the new and high-tech development zone. There are most of 4 star hoteles and economy hoteles in this area. They are cost 169RMB to 570RMB per night.

Food street:
Gui Lin city has 6 main food streets: Binjiang road food-street, Jiefang Xi road food-street, Putuo road food-street, Gui Lin food-town, Zhishan road food-street, Wangjiao food-street (which is the most famous food-street in Gui Lin).

Special activities:
Gui Lin has many national minorities, so there are lots of folk carnival activities. The rich and colorful custom has been a scenery in Gui Lin. In common traditional chinese festivals, all national minorities will celebrate in various ways and bustling with noise and excitement, like Lantern Festival, Dragon Boat Festival, Spring Festival, and so on. But the most wonderful activities are their unique festal celebrations of every national minority.

Gui Lin scenery tourist festival:
In order to increase tourist fame and attracte more tourists, Gui Lin’s government hold an annual national tourist-festival activity in off-travel-season (Oct. to Dec.). Gui Lin scenery tourist festival is beginning form 1992, the tourist festival is not only enrich tourists’ travel life, but also be more and more welcomed by tourists from home and abroad.

Local snacks:
The most famous snacks in Gui Lin is rice noodles. Besides, the folk hand-crafted water chestnut cake and chestnut rice dumpling are also very popular. And there are other nice food, such as oil-tea from Gong town, braised pork with taro from Lipu town, beer-fish form Yangshuo and dog meat form Lingchuan,etc.

Do you heard about “Gui Lin triratna”? They are three hundred-year-old well-known foods: chili sauce, pickled tofu and three-flowers wine. But now, there is an additional delicious snack, called watermelon frost.

Gui Lin customs:
Guangxi tom-tom: The drummers have strong standing kung fu, they play tom-tom easy, free,spiffy, hard and soft with one accord.

Guiju opera: It’s Gui Lin local opera, and it’s one type of Guangxi typical dramas.
Nuo opera: It’s also called “God opera”. It’s come from the Nuo dance.

Gui Lin folk songs: fisherman-song and folk-song are responsing demotic labouring; Dragon boat song, filicitating bridegroom song and accompanying bridegroom song are connected with nationalities.

Color-tune opera: It belongs to lantern-opera system, including tune, color tune, color lantern, and so on.
Gui Lin acrobatics: The main programs are 《passing iron ring》, 《water-meteor》,《lion dancing》,《double tops acrobatics》 and 《headstand in ring》.

Gui Lin fisher-drum: It’s named Guangxi fisher-drum, too. It’s one of Guangxi typical local arts by saying and singing.
Gui Lin storytelling: It’s also named “Guangxi telling with singing” and “Guangxi telling story”.
River-lantern singing festival: In the middle of Jul. counting by the lunar calendar, the Ziyuan county will hold a big party to celebrate the river-lantern singing festival. Every ethical people will gather in town, on either of Ziyuan river banks, singing around the town for three days and three nights. In the night of 14 Jul, you can appreciate a grande charming view “Ten thousands of lanterns drift in Zi river”.

Gui Lin local product:
Artistic ceramics, jade carving, bamboo carving arts, gold and siiver jewelliry, metal handicrafts, porcelain carving, gem-handicraft picture, emerald mixed by hydro-thermal method, marblle products, reed handicrafts, Yangshuo drawing-fans, Gui Lin three-flower wine, fructus momordicae, ginkgo, colorful brocades, Gui Lin embroidery, paper umbrella, hand-drawing screen, knitted ornaments, etc.

Communication of Gui Lin:
Highway: The highways in all directions connect with all cities of Guangxi to the surrounding provinces. 321, 322 and 323 national highways pass through Gui Lin, and there are Arround highway, Guiliu highway, Guiwu highway, Guihuang highway, Guiyang highway, and so on. So Gui Lin has a rounded highway system, it can make sure to link all towns of Gui Lin, even of Guangxi.

Railway: Gui Lin railways connect with Beijing-Guangzhou Railway in north and Guizhou-Liuzhou Railway in south. The trains can arrive every large city of other provinces in china. At present, Gui Lin railway station (the common name is southern station) is the uppermost passenger railway station of Gui Lin. It’s renovated in 2005, the renovation greatly strengthened the handling capacity and serving capability. Gui Lin beginning-station (the common name is northern station) taking Gui Lin as beginning, and the destination are Beijing, Shenzhen (maybe to kowloon hongkong in the future), etc.

Airplane: Gui Lin two-rivers national airport take up an area of 4.06km2, building area is 170 thousand m2, concrete area is 650 m2. The grade of movement area is 4E, a runway of 3200m. It’s designed to be serve 42 thousand flights every year, the tourists handling capacity is 10,000 thousand per year. At the present time, this airport has 52 routes for home and abroad. 21 airline companies have flights land in Gui Lin airport. You can take a flight from Gui Lin to 45 internal cities and Hongkong, Macao, Fukuoka of Japan, Seoul korea, Bangkok Thailand, Kualar lumpur Malaysia back and forth.

Waterway: Xiangjiang river and Lijiang river. Lijiang river is connecting Zhujiang river via Wuzhou. So you can arrive Guangzhou, Hongkong and Macao directly by ship.

Lu Shan is an area that has long been known in China for its great beauty. Poets and painters have immortalised it, although it is recent history that has again popularised the region. After serving as a resort area for foreigners and wealthy Chinese in the mid-eighteenth century, Lu Shan was to become first a summer resort for the Generalissimo Chiang Kaishek in the 1930s and then became the meeting area for the Communist Party’s Central Committee.

Now a tourist area, the resort is centered around the village of Guling, 35km south of Jiujiang. Maps of the area can be bought from the shops and stalls all over town, and with one of these it is easy to treck off on your own. Some of the more distant sights may need to be reached by transport (ask at China International Travel Service, Zhongguo guoji luxingshe, near the Lu Shan Binguan, Tel: 0792-8282497). Sights of special interest in the town include the Meilu Villa (Meilu bieshu), named after Song Meiling and former residence of her and her husband, Chiang Kaishek, and the People’s Hall (Renmin juyuan), the venue for the Central Committee meetings.

Out of town is the chance to hike away, with numerous sights worth visiting including the Dragon Head Cliff (Longshouya), that rears to around 1,000 feet above sea level, the Donglin Monastery (Donglin si), one of the oldest monasteries in Lu Shan, and the Pavilion of Watching the River (Wangjian ting), where the Han Dynasty (206BC-220AD) historian Sima Qian wrote “I mounted Lu Shan in the south and examined how Yu the Great had dredged the nine streams”. Some of the best sights are in the Hanpokou area, about two hours walk to the east of the village. Also worth visiting, is the well kept Botanical Gardens (Zhiwuyuan), to the southeast of the pretty Lulin Lake (Lulin hu), within which are a good selection of alpine and tropical plantlife.

Nanchang, the capital of Jiangxi Province and the center of the provincial economy, politics, science and technology, and culture and education, is an old city Jiangnan (jiangnan means south of the Changjinang River.) with a long history, known as a heroic city because of the August 1 Nanchang Uprising. Governing five districts (East Lake, West Lake, Qingyunpu, Wanli and Jiaoqu) and four counties (Nanchang, Xinjian, Jinxian, and Anyi) with a total area of 7,400 square kilometers.

Over 5,000 years ago, ancestors of present-day residents used flint implements to exploit this rich land. The town was first built in 200 BC. In the fifth year of the reign of the Han Emperor, Gaozu (202 BC), Yuzhang Jun (Jun was an ancient administrative division equal to a present-day prefecture) was set up, which governed a county named Nanchang.

Description of Chinese tourism and culture.