Day off and time to organise a road trip.
We had a quiet period over the National Holiday and decided to go for a look around a few of the well known sites to the north of Shuozhou back around Datong. We organised a car and driver and three of us Aussies loaded up with our translator Fion, a local girl, and Bruce, our driver for the day.
Only an hour or so up National Road 208 we stopped off at Yingxian and spent a couple of hours having a look at the Wooden Pagoda. This thing has been standing 900 years, through wars - plenty of that in this country -, earthquakes and the elements. Not one nail was used to build it and it's full of the Buddhas and associated carvings, reliefs and assorted statues found in most Buddhist shrines. There were National Day celebrations going on, yet another excuse for fireworks, and a really good caligraphy shop. I'll be back. Got a project in mind.
From there we travelled another hour over some of the worst roads in China. The bitumen/cement just needing grading over to fill in the holes you'd could lose a car in. Bruce - his English name - took it all in his stride, nearly wore out the horn, and got us to the Hanging Monastery. The monasteries are built ON to the side of a cliff face above a river bed that has been dammed only a few hundred yards upstream. Because of the public holiday there was a huge crowd so we decided to skip it and come back when we do the Caligraphy re run.
Into Datong we went, had a feed at McDonalds - ah well, why not? - then out to The Yungang Grottoes. All my gear went into the front pockets when a little street kid made a bee line for me to try the 'bump/there goes your wallet', and off Phil and I went to have a look at the Grottoes. The story goes that one of their Emporers gave the Monks a hiding back in 446 AD,and cleaned them out just before he suddenly became sick and died. His successor thought that his death must have been retribution for the way he treated the monks so he made sure they had an army of thousands to rebuild their shrines and into Wuzhou Mountain they dug. What is now really obviosly eroded away would've been a sight in it's day with all the intricate carvings and huge Buddha statues. During the war with the Japanese all the eyes from the Buddhas were ripped out, by the Japanese, because they were all precious stones or jewels. It was a bit of a shame to see a lot of the people climbing over the areas they could get to, including one area fenced off as wagon tracks in the stone. They dont seem to be big on preserving their cultural heritage as much as the countries that only have 200 yrs worth. In China that would hardly rate a mention.
Going to have to do a trip back to Datong one weekend as well, the place looks big enough to have a shop that sells fresh milk and butter. Not to mention bread made without sugar. The food isn't the only thing in this country that is a little different but 'yi qie duo hou' - it's all good.
