International Snow Sculpture Art Expo

The sun rose around 0700 but we didn’t rush to get out of bed. After a simple hotel buffet breakfast, we wandered around the old part of Harbin a little. The weather was cold, clear and crisp.  We found the walking street which was only 2 streets away. What we needed was a scarf and a mask to cover our nose/mouth. Ear protection would be good too. Everything on the walking street was expensive and high-end.

It didn’t take long before we need a warm refuge which we found at McDonald’s with a cuppa tea each. We ran into some foreigners who told us where to get our warm accessories, so we made our way there.

We actually got some of the items on the roadside on the way there, and the remainder in the suggested place which was three floors of stalls attached to the Manhattan Hotel/Mall. What captivated us most were the Samsung S4 copies which were selling between CNY450 to CNY950 (less than NZD100-200). The finish and smoothness of the interface varied with the price but the screens were all very sharp. The screen-protector showed the different specs; some appear to be quad-core like the real thing whereas others were just lookalikes.

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After some lunch and a rest, we walked to Stalin Park where people were skating and generally having a new experience on the frozen waters of the river. That led us to the cable car which took us high across the river to get to Sun Island.

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Sun Island is the venue of the International Snow Sculpture Art Expo (best during the day) and the Ice & Snow World (best during the night). From the cable car, it was only a short walk to the former, so that’s where we ended up.

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We spent over an hour walking around.  It was cold and we needed warm refuge a couple of times, including once in a cafe. A tiny cup of bad instant milk tea was CNY20 which would have bought a huge simple meal in town.  We managed to take a taxi back to the hotel in time for dinner in Food Street next to our hotel.

Just to give you an idea how cold -20 degC is:

• Icicles form on eyelashes and eyebrows.
• Exhaust fumes from stationary cars leave an icy patch on the ground within minutes.
• Fingers go cold within about 15 minutes even with good gloves; feet get really cold too even with good shoes and we put heating pads in our shoes just to take the harsh edge of the chill.  We found that our upper body remained warm at all times; it was just the hands/feet that were the weakest link.

We learnt there was an order to putting on our cold weather gear.  The nose/mouth mask goes on first as it secures behind the ears.  Then the beanie, and finally the ear covers.  At first, we would put some items on in the wrong order and had to start again!