Thursday, February 21, 2013
Baoting, Hainan Island, China
Our next
stop was Baoting where we had decided to treat ourselves to a few days at a thermal
resort complete with hot pools.
We managed
to find the bus without incident, traveled the 3 hours and negotiated a taxi
with our trusty Chinese translations to the resort.
The resort
was as we had hoped was very classy and we had a wonderful view from our room
of the five fingers mountain. We were happy to find a young man working at the
hotel who spoke English well which made our stay easy.
We spent
most of our time relaxing around the resort and enjoying our own private hot
tub on our deck—what decadence!!
Menus once
again were only in Chinese but with help from a Chinese tourist who spoke a
little English we had a lovely beef chili dish and a bowl of mixed steamed
vegetables our first night. Feeling adventurous the next night we ordered
something else and were presented with a dish consisting of a lot of bones with
a minimal amount of meat attached and a plate of what appeared to be steamed
weeds—hmm. The following night we reverted to our first choice. The weed like
greenery was still the base of the vegetable dish but at least was supplemented
with other things—other than mushrooms we were unable to identify most things!!
We went
into the town one day and found that here as everywhere we have been is in the throes
of “lifestyle’ development. Huge numbers of classy high rise apartments are
being built and advertised as a “sunny lifestyle” choice. One would hope that
China does not sink into the recession which has plagued the rest of the world
as there will be a massive number of empty half-finished high rise complexes
all over Hainan.
The city
centre is clean and well planned with a huge amount of money spent promoting
the art and culture of the minority tribal people from this region.
We came
across what looked to have been a temple which turned out to have been made
into a tea house so we had a lovely hour being served tea in the traditional
manner as two young women played music on their traditional instruments. They
did not speak any English but were very smiley—we had found that despite the
area being a major tourist region it is only visited by Chinese tourists. In
fact once we had left Sanya which is full of Russians we had not seen a white
face at all.
We
definitely prefer these smaller towns and have enjoyed our experience since
leaving Sanya.
Wizhishan
With the
aid of our note written in Chinese we made our way to the bus station and once again joined the line where it appears that one should argue the price of the ticket and each person takes 5 minutes to process. Finally we reached the front of the line and paid the requested amount and were
guided to the bus to Wizhishan.
We had read
that hiking up the Wizhishan Mountain was a worthwhile hike and we really felt
the need to get out of the cities. The local bus trip was through the
countryside and as it picked up and dropped off passengers we felt as though we
had finally found the “China” we had been seeking. It was hilly and tree
covered with terraced rice paddies on the hillside.
We arrived at
the town set on a pretty river and walked across to the hotel recommended in
the Lonely Planet only to be waved away by the man who appeared to be in
charge. As we walked along the road a sign pointed to a fancy hotel overlooking
the river. It looked as though it would be out of our price range but found
that it was brand new and the rooms were half price at $60 a night—perfect.
We wandered through the town and markets which were lovely with much less panic and
noise than we had been subjected to in Haikou. The stalls selling betel nuts abound. This is the nut
from the betel palm tree which is pounded and wrapped in a leaf along with lime
and is chewed as a wad in the mouth. It obviously is an addictive drug but
results in red and rotting teeth. Spitting is a nasty after effect and the
sidewalks are all sticky and red—yuk!!
Stores
selling massive amounts of fireworks and others with huge numbers of Chinese
lanterns reflected the preparedness for Chinese New Year. It actually lasts
forty days and traditionally everyone travels home but as they are becoming
more educated and affluent they travel further afield. We would often hear the
strings of bangers going off and came to the realization of how long the celebrations
will go on. After the fireworks finish there is a huge area with remnants of pink pieces of
paper remaining. We heard a report of a truck loaded with fireworks had exploded blowing up the road and killing several people--we were not surprised.
We caught
the bus to the village where the head of the trail for the 5 hour hike up the mountain was. It wound through the picturesque tribal villages with the mountain towering above. We set off up the trail but the effects of the cough we
had had since Sanya `caused us to stop frequently to have coughing fits. We
were also sweating profusely and after one hour decided to go back down
as four more hours of this would not be enjoyable.
Once we got
to the bottom we wandered along the picturesque road where people were tending
the rice paddies and vegetable gardens along a lovely treed area. We flagged
the bus down and got the last two seats. As the bus progressed it picked up
children going home from school and other locals all of whom had to stand. At
one stage I was surprised to see everyone sit on the floor and the bus driver
after a few minutes yelled and everyone stood again. Oh oh a few blocks later
the bus was stopped by an official who was obviously a bus inspector. He made all of
the standing passengers get off the bus and the fares were refunded—it seems
that the driver had misjudged where the inspector would be and the previous
sitting episode was so the inspector would not see the standing passengers.
After having been in buses which were so crowded you could hardly breathe we
found it strange that suddenly the rules changed.
The hotel
was lovely but no one spoke English. The menu had pictures which helped but
many advertised meals were not available—after having been in Asia for 18
months that is no longer a surprise!! Once again communicating was a huge issue
and we were frustrated with their miming skills or lack of them and we were
unable to have our simplest requests answered in any way at all. We found the
town very pleasant and thought we would like to stay one more night. After
trying every way we could imagine to ask for the extra night one young woman
finally had the bright idea to have us write into her translator---wow eureka!!
Her answer
was that we would have to pay more money—whew no problem and we were now booked
for another night.
We wandered
along the river marveling at the cultivation being done even in little plots on
the river bank. We followed a lovely trail which was being planted with decorative
bushes and plants to see a castle like structure at the top. As we neared it we
went through what was obviously an expensive condo complex in a western style with
lovely views. People were driving golf carts through and we could easily have
been in North America. The tower turned out to be a 6 star hotel which looked
almost ready to open. We had come across another huge one near Wizhishan Mountain
which looked to be ready within a few weeks. It seems that tourism is alive and
well in Hainan.
Our next stop was to be Baoting at a fancy resort where we will splurge for a few days.
Our next stop was to be Baoting at a fancy resort where we will splurge for a few days.
Thursday, February 07, 2013
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
