HONG KONG air HANGZHOU (2N) train SHANGHAI (2N) train SUZHOU (1N) TRAIN WUXI (1N) train NANJING (2N) AIR HONG KONG
Fly to Hangzhou, the serene and scenic historic city and fabled beauty spot around West Lake beloved by poets and emperors for a millenium -- particularly during a long stretch of the 17th and 18th centuries under 2 outstanding Manchu rulers Kang Xi and Qian Long (each ruled 60 years). Hangzhou is also southern terminus of the Grand Canal, an engineering triumph and the longest man-made waterway in the world (furthermore, its entire 1000 mile length between Hangzhou and Beijing was dug while Europe was in the depths of the "Dark Ages").
During your stay in this capital of Zhegiang province, you enjoy a boat ride across placid Xi Hu or West Lake, by common consensus and historic tradition Hangzhou's most attractive and gracious combined natural and manmade landmark, with a variety of gardens, pools and teahouses; included is a visit to the center island containing the Three Pools Mirroring the Moon, a kind of set of interior lakes within the lake. Also visit Linyin Temple with its 60 foot tall Buddha and the Temple of Six Harmonies, a reference Buddhism's traditional "six codes."
Train ride to Shanghai, China's largest (pop.: 12 million) , most sophisticated and cosmopolitan city with its mounting number of new skyscrapers, crowds of energetic shoppers, more fashionably dressed women trendy youth as well as its busy port and smoke-belching factories Located on the Huangpu River, Shanghai is also linked by Suzhou Creek to the north south artery of the Grand Canal.You visit the historic Bund where locals stroll and practice their Tai Chi, bazaars of Old Town and Yu Yuan (truly a Garden of Happiness, this idyllic location is also a touching symbol of filial devotion) and nearby charming Wuxingting Teahouse over water.
Visit the famed Jade Buddha Temple with its two white jade statues of the Enlightened One and adjacent vegetarian restaurant run by the temple's monks, the glittering emporiums along Nanjing Road, Arts and Crafts Exhibit for more shopping and finally witness the remarkable performing skills of the fresh-faced, enthusiastic and well-drilled young pupils at the so-called Children's Palaces. In the evening you will be entertained by an acrobatic show.
From Shanghai by train to Suzhou, the 2500 year old "Venice of China" whose graceful canals and other beauties give it a special blessed place in Chinese hearts: "To be happy on earth," according to one proverb, "one must be born in Suzhou." Visit Tiger Hill Pagoda (it is one of the oldest in China), the Humble Administrator's Garden, Garden of the Master of Nets and view the many arched stone bridges -- Marco Polo reckoned there must be 6 thousand hereabouts -- of this alluring, tranquil garden city.
Continuing further by train from Suzhou brings you to Wuxi, or alternatively you may come via boat cruising the Grand Canal, designed some 1400 years ago as a vital water transport link between theYangzi Valley breadbasket and northern cities. Known for its silk production and clay figurines, Wuxi offers sightseeing highlights: Lake Tai with its hundred islands, Plum Park and Turtle Head Island.
Travel by train in the afternoon to Nanjing, an ancient and important city with a long, fascinating and sometimes very bloody history: the capital several times, it was the locus of the enormous, massively destructive -- and savagely suppressed -- peasant explosion in the mid-19th century called the Taiping Rebellion and, in this century, the scene of the infamous, sickening "Rape of Nanking" of 1938 during the Japanese invasion of China.
Visit the Mausoleum of the revered Dr Sun Yatsen, one of China's authentic modern heroes, Jiangsu Provincial Museum and Yangzi River Bridge, a big and dauntingly difficult engineering feat to span the stormy Yangzi which was accomplished without Soviet or other help and is a source of deep, widespread national pride. Nearby is a towering monument, with an inscription by Deng Xiaoping, one of the commanders, commemorating the Communist crossing of the Yangzi and capture of Nanjing in 1949 in the final phase of the long civil war against Chiang Kaishek's forces.
Return flight to Hong Kong.
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