Nanjing - Day 4 (2) Zhongshan Ling

(Date travelled : 1/11/2012)

Next to The Ming Xioling tomb, it's the Mausoleum of Dr Sun Yat-Sen.

When I was about 9, we visited the Memorial Hall of  Dr Sun Yat-Sen in Taipei. We witnessed the process of changing of guards there which takes place every hour. He was really a great man and well respected in the Chinese world.

 Before that, we had some local eateries as lunch around the area. The weather was getting warm now and the place was flooded with local tourists.

The entrance.

After the entrance, this was awaiting..........
 

There  are 392 steps.
 

At the top of the stairs , the tablet hall.

 

It says that Dr Sun is buried here.

Further up, we reached the coffin chamber.

 

Inside, the alter with the statue of the great man.







Mi managed to capture a picture before the guard noticed. He was then then heard shouted at someone that photography is not allowed.

Beyond the door behind the alter...

It used to open to to public but not anymore.
 

 

View from the top.

 

Then we bought some souvenirs and took a rest before we took the steps down and continued to the next and final stop at the area, the Linggu temple. The area is really vast. We had to take a cart to get there.

 At the entrance....

 

 

We found that this area is a less visited area. It's not as popular as the previous two. It was quite quiet which suited us best.

 

Walking around, we came upon this structure.  The sign on top says "beamless hall".

 

 

When we walked in, the  plaque says the "The alter of the revolutionists". It is a memorial hall for the revolutionists.

 

The testament of Dr. Sun, The alter, thick wall and windows and the beamless roof.

We were not prepared to explore such a vast area.  As we wondered around, we realized that there were a lot to cover. We had to quicken our steps as the day was getting late. 

 

Finally at around 5pm, we hailed a taxi to bring us to Qinhuai river. The plan was to have dinner and  witness the night scene of the river.

 

 

Dinner was yummy at a restaurant by the river.



Beautiful river .

The area came alive at night. It was full of restaurants and shops to satisfy everyone. We bought some cheap souvenirs and then took a cab back to the Orange hotel.

 

 

 



Nanjing - Day 4 (1) Ming Xioling Tomb

(Date Travelled : 1/11/2012)

We checked in Hotel Orange when we arrived late yesterday evening. The hotel is new and clean. We had dinner at a small eatery nearby the hotel.

In the morning, we had breakfast in the hotel. We then hailed a cab to Ming Xiaoling, Tomb of emperor Chu Yuan Zhang, founder of Ming Dynasty! It's listed in the Unesco World Heritage sites and it's about 600++years old! Legend says that in order to prevent robbery of the tomb, 13 identical processions of funeral troops started from 13 gates to obscure the real burying site. (info courtesy from Wikipedia.)

This is the layout of the whole area. It's designed like a Chinese garden. I was wondering about where is the exact last resting spot. Pa then pointed to me that it's the large mound beyond the inner most structure. I still didn't get it. Let's check it out.

Before we entered the gate, we found ourselves in a path with 12 pairs of stone auspicious animals. This is served to safeguard the place.



The almighty Elephant path!

Kissing the ancient animal, the Unicorn!



The horses, but of course they are auspicious!

 

Xiezhi, another ancient sacred animal!

We all know that these animals or rather creatures are not real. They are fantasies. Created for the power of combination of a few animals.

After the Elephant path, we proceeded to the gate. When we entered, we found ourselves facing another path. At the end of it is the Tablet Hall.  The tablet hall contain a stele constructed by emperor kangxi as a homage to emperor Zhuyuanzhang who is his predecessor of 300 years.

  

 

 

This is the stele. It sits on a turtle which is often used as a sign of longevity. As you can see here, the front half of the turtle is facing the door where the second half of it is at the back of the wall. I   find this very interesting.



The front half...

The back half...



When we walked further in, we were at the second path as the layout. This path is beautifully lined with tall trees.

This place is really vast. We finally reached the inner most structure.

There is an arched entrance at the bottom of the big structure.

When we entered, we found ourselves in a tunnel with a flight of stairs upwards.

When we were out of the tunnel, there was just a wall.
But Pa, where is it? I asked. Where is the final resting spot? Pa pointed to the wall, he said "this it is". Where??   The huge mound beyond the wall!
What??  So big??   Yes, there are chambers after chambers in the mound, down there, chambers with tons of treasures!! And the chamber for the coffin!

The crafted words says "Emperor Ming is buried here"!

I was really dumbfounded. The mound is enormous! Complete with the garden and the paths!!
 

 

In the hall at the top, we read that there are lots of emperors' tomb around China and most of them like this one stayed untouched all these years. The designs are similar to each other. And the greatest among them, of course is the Emperor Qin Shi Huang with the priceless terracotta.  

 

 

View at the top of the structure.

 

Ancient gargoyles.

Sacred path.

 This is the first half of the day. To be continued to the second half of the day........

 

 

Shanghai - Day 3

(Travelled date : 31 Oct 2012)


Day 3 was our last day in Shanghai.

In the morning, after our lousy breakfast near the hotel, we took a taxi to one of  the most prominent landmarks of Shanghai - The Oriental Pearl TV tower.

On the way, we saw how the Shanghainese go to work in the morning. Ladies in nice outfit riding motorcycles wearing high heels which is a "never-seen-before" in Malaysia. In Taiwan, we did come across this scene, lots of Ladies riding in motorcycles. The motorcycles must be their mode of transport. We are the lucky lots, majority can afford at least a national car.

Going to work....

Well, after about 20mins of busy traffic, we were at the other end of Huangpu river from the Bund.

Oriental Pearl is a Radio and TV Tower. 

Viewing deck at 2nd sphere, 263m high.

Pa purchased the ticket and off we went inside to the building to queue for the lift up. Once we were up there in the observation deck, we were greeted with the view of Shanghai concrete jungle with all the tall buildings soaring up towards the sky.



What a concrete jungle!

Skyscrapers!

Huangpu River from the top. What a sight!

We then went one floor down to the awaiting Glass Deck. This is really mind blowing! Both the flooring and the wall are transparent! The wind was blowing through the open area and the temperature was quite low, it was cold!



Pa, standing "on air"!

It was not a big problem for me. I could just stepped directly into the deck, though a little scared.  The experience was one of the kind and wonderful!  Walking on something which is transparent and high. I felt like I was on top of the world.

Sitting down.....having fun

Us, looking down....

Facing down......enjoying the thrill!!

Mi was very scared at the beginning. She needed to hold on to my hand. But after a few steps and she was fine. We really enjoyed ourselves up there. Well, a lot of people up there also were scared of the height. We saw a man holding on tight to the railing and moved inch by inch with real difficulty.

 

After spending quite a while there, we went down to the museum located on the ground floor. The museum is very interesting with the history of Shanghai city.

 

 

Without us realizing, it was already way passed the lunch time when we finished. No wonder everyone was hungry. We then took a cab to the Yu Garden again . There we took our lunch and visited the temple .

Lunch, Xiao long bao of course!

 

 



 Yu Garden is very different in the day time. It was packed with tourists around the world.

Comfortable seat
 

The speed indicator.

It was then time to say goodbye to our short and brief visit to Shanghai city. We walked to the hotel to retrieve our luggage and off we went to the station to take the bullet train to Nanjing, our next stop.