 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
Early the next day we took a bus to Emei, 2 hours south of Chengdu, where we left our luggage at the train station and bought tickets for our night train to Xichang. But first we had to visit the "Grand Buddha", in the nearby town of Leshan. This is the largest Buddha in the world - 71 m. (250 ft.) high. It was carved into a cliff overlooking a river at a spot where local boatmen used to vanish. A Buddhist
monk who hoped its presence would protect the locals constructed the Buddha there. As it turned out the rocks of the sculpting filled the hollow in the river and thus made the river safer. We spent an hour visiting the temple at
the top of the hill as well. Here we saw 1000 almost life-sized replicas of Buddhist monks. The most interesting thing about this was that every one had a different expression. Some looking pretty scary as well! After viewing the
Buddha via a boat ride from the river and taking the necessary pictures we returned to |
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Emei and had another dinner of Peking duck at a hotel there, before boarding our sleeper-train to Xichang. It was a 10:30 pm train - I was tired and slept right away waking up just before we arrived at 6:30 am> The folks say the nith-trains are the best, as we board so late, sleep as the train chugs through the night, and wake to the early morning music piped throughout the compartments - just in time to arrive at our next city. |
|
|
|
|
The city of Xichang was bigger than we had expected and the large hotel was more than I had expected... It had its own 10-pin bowling alley!!!! Needless to say I enjoyed our 4 days spent there, bowling a few games, exploring the old part of the city with its mix of Han, Yi and Hui people. As my folks love markets, we spent a an afternoon strolling through the local one on the nearby banks of the river. Besides having the usual market stuff here I witnessed small stalls selling live chickens, after being slaughtered the chickens are dipped first in a vat of boiling tar, then cold water. (The sticky tar made the feathers easy to pull of). I guess this is what they mean by "tar and feathered"! |
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
Please click here to go to the next page. |
|