Furong ancient town

Leaving Changsha

Today is a somewhat fragmented day where we can’t afford to have anything go wrong.  And fortunately nothing did.  In short, we move from Changsha to Zhangjiajie city where we would then do a dinner excursion to Furong ancient town, all by bullet train.

I chose to have breakfast alone in my room before setting off with KL & M at 0830 by metro to Changsha (rather than Changsha South) station.  E & BW had chosen to go by taxi.

The metro took us to what may have been the part of the station for conventional or shorter distance trains.  We initially thought we were at the wrong station as we couldn’t find our train on the departures board.

We had to walk along a long corridor to get to where E & BW were which was where we eventually left from, on the 1004 bullet train to Zhangjiajie West.

Zhangjiajie briefly

The ride was just over a couple of hours and once we arrived at Zhangjiajie West, we taxied to the Yunmengqi Boutique Inn and had lunch nearby.

We had less than an hour in our rooms before squeezing into one taxi to the same railway station for the 1555 bullet train to Furong.

Furong ancient town

It was a 23 min ride from Zhangjiajie West to Furongzhen station.  I’m sure we could have done the ride in a car and it would have been faster than the bullet train which required a taxi ride at both ends and also waiting time for the train.

But information is scant for people like me who don’t read Chinese so booked everything using option that provided certainty rather than try work out long-distance cars upon arrival.

The taxi dropped us at the entrance of Furong’s ancient city where we exchanged our online tickets for physical tickets, a step that’s not always required.

The ancient city was nice enough but a little reconstructed.  We did two circuits around, enjoying the walk under the waterfall as well.

First time around, we stopped for a beer at a place that offered what we considered to offer the best view of the waterfall and town.

Second time around, we returned to the same place for a meal.  Some dishes were pricey, so we only had one of the expensive one and ordered a few more cheap dishes.

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We grabbed a car back to the station in time for the 2128 train back to Zhangjiajie West, where we needed another ride back to the hotel.

We were back in our hotel around 2230 after a long fragmented day.  With our first day on the mountains tomorrow, I quickly settled into bed for a good night sleep.