Nanjing greets us with a beautiful sea of morning fog below us (or air pollution but only hardcore rationalists would ponder over the difference). From our room on 69 floor, we have a view on the lake and the hills in which the Sun Yatsen memorial lies.
Nanjing is so close to Shanghai but we never managed to visit. Until last weekend. Patrick gave us a nudge. Well, Nanjing is indeed worth a visit.
Day 1, 20.10.
We arrive Consultant style. Michi from Shangahi, and me flying in from Beijing meet with Patrick at interContis 78th floor bar for pre dinner drinks. Patrick takes us to 1912 district fir dinner and drinks. Great night with japanese BBQ and drum performance by Michi and Patrick. We end at Blue Marlin, watching the intercultural mating dances of the Expats.
Day 2, 21.10.
We sleep in. Interrupted only by taking pictures of the sunrise and by breakfast.
Around noon, we head out to the lake aand hike to the Ming Tombs and Sun Yatsen Memorial. Its about a 5km hike, mostly through parks (although besides roads). Sun is shining, beautiful. Ming Tombs are not quite spectacular but still nice (esp. thr main building, which allowes a view over the park).
We move on and see the unmistakablee sign that we are close to the Memirial: A big snake of people is pushing through the forrest. Sure enough, after a few minutes we see the stairs that lead upwards to the memorial of the founder of the Republic of China (interestingly cherished by bith, the communists and the kuomintang). The memorial is quite small and a ling line waits to get inside and pay tribute. We watch from the outside. From here, we can also watch PLA cadets train running on the stairs. Its late afternoon, and we hike back to take the subway to Confucius’ Temple.
The old streets around Fuzi Miao are packed, as is to be expected. We accidentally enter the museum of the Emperial Exhibition System, which is an oasis of peace in the middle of the crowd. We stroll along the river and later enter the museum, a giant underground complex. Highly recommended.
Back outside with the crowd, we push our eay into Conficius’ Temple. It is impressive to see this temple of knowledge and Chinas early dedication to education. If you search for the ancient, intellectual China this is a good place to start.
At ca 19.00 the restaurants in the area are filled to the brim. Hence we decide to go back and eat at the InterConti Chinese restaurant. Great view, but that is it.
Day 3, 22.10.
Today, we hike the city wall. First to the east, then to the north. Its a giganticand well preserved wall that fortified the old southern capital.
We light some incents at the temple at the city wall, as they came with the 10 RMB entrance fee.
Interestingly, there are pricelists for salvation. The full package (fortune, health, wealth,…) for the whole family costs only 188RMB. Beat that, Christianity.
From the temple we walk to tge beautiful Nanjing University. We find the John Rabe House closed on weekends. A bit of German bureaucracy in China. As trains are laargely sold out, we take the expensive but increadibly comfortable business class home.