Articles from this Category
13 April 2025
Bailong Elevator We had read horror stories of people queueing for two hours to get on the Bailong Elevator. We were determined not to do that and started early, getting to the park entrance before 0700 and onto the first buses bound for Bailong. There was actually a short elevator ride to take us to […]
12 April 2025
Entering Zhangjiajie National Park We commenced our exploration of Zhangjiajie National Park today and had agreed to grab breakfast at 0700. With rain still ongoing, we messaged each other and delayed breakfast to 0800 before walking through to the park’s gate just after 0900. We had booked for an entry time of 0900 to 0900. […]
11 April 2025
Moving to Wulingyuan I slept soundly last night despite the noise of revellers outside. But the others told me that the noise came to an abrupt stop at midnight. After breakfast at 0830 near the hotel, I walked with E & BW to enjoy the final bit of time we had at Fenghuang. Despite breakfast, […]
10 April 2025
Moving to Fenghuang I took breakfast in my room again while the others went out. Today we moved on for an overnight at Fenghuang Ancient Town which involved a taxi ride to the Zhangjiajie West station once again before boarding the 1040 train to Fenghuang. We arrived 59 mins later and took two separate cars […]
9 April 2025
Ascending Tianmen Today is our first day exploring the mountains in this part of China, starting with Tianmen. The hotel advised that if it isn’t busy, one can normally turn up for the cable car before the timeslot that has been booked. We grabbed a disappointing breakfast around 0645 a couple of doors away from […]
8 April 2025
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 […]
7 April 2025
Orange Island Changsha was meant to be a stop simply it was along the way. The main sight was Orange Island and even then, it was more iconic rather than a must-see. I did want to go to Dufu Pavilion if convenient but wasn’t keen on Mount Yuelu as we had many mountains ahead on […]
6 April 2025
Bullet train to Changsha Today we move on to Changsha by bullet train at 1126. With the station far away, we started around 0800 with breakfast at last night’s wonton shop. We had specially made an arrangement for them to open somewhat earlier for us. We took two separate cars to Wuhan station where everything […]
5 April 2025
Yellow Crane Pagoda E & BW had arrived late last night and despite the late night arrival, they were ready at 0830 to begin the day with breakfast at Hubu Alley before heading to Yellow Crane Pagoda. BW is fluent in Mandarin and can read. Until now, I was the best Mandarin speaker amongst us […]
4 April 2025
Qingchuan Pavilion With my bodyclock on New Zealand time, I woke at 0540, lazed around before having breakfast of muesli and coffee (from the machine in the lobby). I arranged to meet KL & M at 0900 downstairs before going out to explore Wuhan. First up, we took a car to Qingchuan Pavilion. There we […]