So, as we wrote last Friday, we took a three day trip to Huangshan, which translates directly to Yellow (Huang) Mountain (shan). It is one province over, so we have added one to our list! We were invited to go by one of Ramsay's students and her parents. The co-teacher was supposed to accompany us on this journey but she had to back out at the last minute due to a weekend staff meeting, so another student - Alice - joined us instead. These two 10 year old girls would act as translator for the conversations we couldn't follow over the next several days. Our total party included the parents of the first student, the additional student, Ramsay, Jack, Sophia, and I. We thought we would be taking a van down but instead we took two cars. The first car had the girls and the parents, and the second car had us and a couple driving who were going for a visit in the same area and agreed to ferry us down.

The drive took about 5 hours and we stopped in the city for the night. It was around 10pm when we arrived and we were eager to get to the hotel and rest. However they invited us to dinner so we went. We walked down this street with what looked to be restaurants on either side and animal cages sitting out front of each place. These cages had chickens, guinea pigs, rabbits, and other miscellaneous prey. How it works is, you pick whatever meat you want and they kill it and cook it up right there. You can't get any fresher than that! We walk into one of the restaurants and we sat at a round table in a window. They bring us fresh tea to sip while we wait for the food to be brought out. They start us with delicious chicken soup, and several other dishes (not sure what they were but they were good). Then they brought out a huge steaming bowl of hairy crabs. Hairy crabs are very popular in eastern China. They are lake crabs and are in fact hairy. They are much smaller than big Alaskan crabs, about a third of the size I would say. We had to get a quick lesson on how to eat them, as it was our first time. You have to open them up from the bottom first, and scoop out the lungs and some other organs and discard them. Then you break the crab in half and eat this bright orange roe. Essentially the sperm and eggs, after you dip each half in some sweet ginger soy sauce. It is proper to slurp it out, you must make the slurping sound. After eating our fill we headed to the hotel room. This was a real treat, we each had a bubble bath! We haven't had baths in months, only showers, so this was awesome! After getting all warm we swiftly fell asleep.

Breakfast at the hotel consisted of the usual: Rice, noodles, vegetables, sausages, steamed buns, eggs, toasts, and some watermelon. We ate as much as we could knowing we would need the energy for the hike that day. We checked out and drove maybe 45 minutes to a bus station. We then took a bus ride through a beautiful bamboo forest to the cable car station. Following this we got on a cable car and rode 10-15 minutes and thousands of feet up the mountain to the start of the trail, gaining spectacular views as a preview of what we were heading into. We hiked for 3-4 hours to the summit, stopping for lunch half way. Sophia had to be carried most of the way because of the precipitous drops that were prevalent at such altitude. We packed a bit too much, and the steps were incredibly steep in some places. Our guides, Annie's family, had brought along snacks such as prepackaged chicken feet, fig-newton-esque thingys, and other morsels. The mountains we passed through were gorgeous, consisting of weathered granite peaks shaped in charismatic shapes by centuries of weathering, bearing names like the 'arhat playing chess' and the 'arhat with a backpack'. A trail led up to 'beginning to believe peak'. This place we were traveling through had been the haunt of numerous famous poets and Taoist masters over the course of its long history. All around us as we hiked, the infinitely varied rock formations stretched to the horizon, playing tricks with shadows and light, sparsely covered with wind-twisted trees. We navigated throngs of tourists, many of whom stopped to take pictures of us, especially the kids. Sometimes everyone would have to make way for an individual who had paid to be borne up the mountain on a palanquin by two stout carriers. We also passed a number of the men who make their living by carrying up supplies to the hotels scattered through the park's many trails. Finally we reached the top and our hotel, after an arduous uphill climb of many hundreds of feet.

The hotel was an interesting kind of hotel that can only be compared to other hotels that exist in places where road access is not available. Since everything the hotel uses must be carried up the mountain by porters, there is a definite need for renovations. Essentially, not to dwell too long on the subject, the place was not worth half the price charged, but it was an interesting experience. We had a very Chinese meal for dinner, at which it was a bit of a challenge to get the children filled.

We were awoken at around five A.M. to the sounds of the many tourists in the hotel getting ready to view the sunrise. It is a serious tradition that anyone who spends the night on the mountain does it primarily for this event, though when we went outside in the freezing pre-dawn to vie for a few square inches of view around the hundreds of other people doing the same, it seemed as if the experience was not quite what a mountaintop sunrise was supposed to be like. It was certainly beautiful, what could be seen of it, but the throngs were a bit offputting. And to think that this was the offseason…!

After seeing the sunrise and having a breakfast of rice gruel, we set out on the second leg of the hike, another four or five hours that found us winding and twisting around the peaks through more of the incredible landscape. This time the hike was more arduous, Ramsay's arms were tired from carrying soph, and there were some ascents that were simply brutal. It was also much colder. We reached the cable car down around midday and got inside, exhausted and content with having had an unforgettable experience. Annie's family got everyone a chocolate bar, which turned Soph's frown upside down with the quickness.

Now back to our home in Suzhou for the past week, we are still thinking of the beauty of that place, and the fascinating way Chinese tourists can blitz a place of natural beauty to the extent that it becomes something other than what it is they went to find.