Day 6
A much needed lie-in this morning followed by a walk to Houhai Lake and a visit to the former residence of Soong Ching Ling, wife of Sun-Yat Sen. Quite a lady, educated in America, married to an older man who died in 1925. She went on to live beyond 1981. A friend of Chairman Mao's, she was a champion of women's rights, and of children. Very actively anti the Japanese, she was revered and became known as the 'Honorary Chairman of the People's Republic of China'. She had a very nice quite moderately scaled house and beautiful garden just set back from the lake.
And then more walking. Last night's rain has cleared the air, and today was fresh and breezy, the ideal day for a 5 or 6 mile walk around the large Lake Kunming at the Summer Palace.
Away from the crowds, and quite stunning; hump backed bridges of marble, small pavilions, wild flowers, views of the lake, palaces and pagodas, and a delicious and memorable picnic of persimmons in idyllic surroundings.
Lucky to have the best info on Chinese history, language, culture, economics and all sorts else with Tour Guide Tim leading the walk. It all starts to make sense, even some of the basic symbols can be explained. We hit the crowds when we got back to the Palace area, a veritable human traffic jam.
Later walked out though the hutongs to a nearby Sichuan restaurant. My tour guide had written down what I should order, in Chinese. Spoilt or what!
It looked a great menu though, with some English translation that either said it all ('The bamboo fragrant hand rips the chicken'), or got lost in the translation ('Jishi Taro Children').
Full and tired, early night...
Flight to Taiyuan, and on to Pingyao tomorrow.
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