Part II

By this point it was lunch time and following the day's running theme, there was no plan. So we went to a fast food baozi place. Baozi are steamed buns with a filling inside, essentially dumplings with yeast added to create a fluffy texture. I'm not so keen on them as they are super filling, and a lot drier than jiaozi. Next we had to go see the Giant Rubber duck! I don't know if you've heard about it, but it's been floating around the whole world, and now it's in Beijing yay!!! But first we had to traverse the long garden which is 460m long and 20m deep. Just after Lunch, with the midday sun beating down, and some cruddy Chinese pop blaring out at me the walk wasn't a highlight for me. 

Pretty view at the top...

... Shame I mar it ;)

Look it's a giant duck!

The next stop was the JiangSu gardens, which I had been assured were beautiful. A lot of Chinese literature and art has been inspired by them. They were gorgeous, if it weren't for the hordes of tourists they would have been very tranquil. The design and use of rocks and pools created a very delightful effect though.

The pebbles used for paving are meant to be very good for you, as they work the pressure points on your feet.

In the pavilion is a traditional Chinese instrument, the 古筝 gǔzhēng. It's like a harp laid on its side.

Artistic waterfall shot.

The next place was the Beijing rose garden. It was really pretty and in comparison to the rest of the park quiet and peaceful.

A suitably Chinese photo of me in the rosebed, there was actually a queue of girls all trying to get the same shot. They love taking very staged photos in scenic spots, the whole park was littered with girls posing next to plants.

When we were in the Haikou garden we saw this crazy big bug. I think it might be some kind of praying mantis? Maybe?

The Haikou garden. It's the capital city of HaiNan province in the South, it's nickname is the coconut city.

Those rocks are actually volcanic as HaiKou is near an extinct volcano.

Next was the ChengDu garden, I didn't actually expect to see pandas; but they had them there. It was so exciting! 

The Chinese for Panda is 熊猫 xióngmāo.

It was quite sad because the enclosure was really small, and didn't look particularly fulfilling or stimulating. There was a massive crowd around the enclosure to see them. Helen was really shocked that I hadn't seen one before, but they aren't exactly in a lot of zoos.

This is from ShanXi a Mountainous province.

This was NingBo, where the 旗袍 qípáo originated from. A Qipao is the traditional close fitting dress.

Next we went to HuangZhou, which is where the Dad is from. It is famous across China for its beautiful lakes, and is another place known for producing great works of art and literature.

Some super big fish!

Modelled on the Lotus pavilion.

That was our last stop, so after this we went home. Everyone was pretty exhausted, but that night we went for dinner with the Fathers great uncle and his wife. We went to a traditional HuBei restaurant as its the Fathers home province. There was this horrifically sweet plum wine (think grenadine with no watering down) and a selection of dishes such as Chinese cabbage, and something that looked like pâté, but tasted awful. The highlight of the meal however was the fish head soup. One thing I've noticed is that the Chinese don't tend to remove the fat from anything. So as soup kept getting poured into my bowl, these people really don't understand the word no, alongside the fish were these slimy bits of fat. The fish itself was really nice, and the broth had a great flavour. I didn't eat anything weird unlike the rest of them who tucked into the head, but the fat floating around was really off putting. 

All in all it was a good day, but I did get sunburnt, so maybe I should've used an umbrella.