|
| |
| My
younger brother Mridul and his wife Kochi went to
China last July of 2006. Here are some of the
pictures and their travel stories from their website at
www.moinul.org |
We went to visit China for
vacation on July 15, 2006 and spent 10 days
visiting 4 cities. We returned on the 25th of July. We
visited Beijing, Xian, Guilin and
Shanghai. We enjoyed the trip very much and were very fascinated
with all the things that we saw in China.
China has a very rich history. We saw tombs that were very old (2200
years old!), palaces for different dynasties and very modern
high rise buildings.
Our international flight to
China was via Air China. All the domestic flight were also on Air
China with one eexception when we used
China Eastern Airlines. The domestic flights and terminals were all
as up to date and comparable to the domestic air service in America.
The links on the left will lead you to pictures and more information
of our trip to China. Look around and enjoy. Remember to click on
the pictures to get a larger view of the picture.
We used Ritz
Tours to visit China. This is the first time we took a tour to
visit a country. We had a very good experience with them. They
handled every aspect of our trip from the moment we landed in China
to the time we left China. We would recommend them to you.
Our group consisted of 20 people. See the
picture below. Also included in the picture is our overall tour
guide manager, Nelson (top left) and the
local tour guide for Beijing, Crystal (top right).
Further down you will find
a map of China as well. Enjoy the pictures.... |
| Tiananmen Square – World's
largest central city square - 440,000 square meters and can hold 4M
people at a time. Below are some pictures from Tiananmen Square.
Forbidden City – Now known as
the Palace Museum. Construction began in 1407 and completed in 1420.
It has been the imperial palace of the Ming and Qing dynasties. The
Forbidden City is divided into two sections. The southern section
(Outer Court) and the northern section (Inner Court). From the Outer
Court emperor exercised his power over the nation. In the Inner
Court, the emperor lived with his royal family.
There are 9,999 buildings. The yellow color is dominant in the
Forbidden City as yellow is the symbol of the
royal family. Below are some pictures of the Forbidden City. |
|
|
| Summer Palace at
Kunming Lake – The Summer Palace is the archetypal Chinese
garden, and is ranked amongst the most noted and classical
gardens of the world. The Summer Palace can be divided into four
parts: the court area, front-hill area, front-lake area, and
rear-hill and back-lake area. |
|
|
| Temple of Heaven – The
Temple of Heaven is much larger than the Forbidden City. The
Temple was built in 1420 AD in the Ming Dynasty to offer
sacrifice to Heaven. Chinese emperors called themselves as “son
of heaven” and thus dared not to build the Forbidden City larger
than Heaven.
The northern part within the wall is semicircular symbolizing
the heavens and the southern part is square symbolizing the
earth. The northern part is higher than the southern part. This
design shows that the heaven is high and the earth is low and
the design reflected an ancient Chinese thought of 'The heaven
is round and the earth is square'. |
|
|
| Shanghai - is the
largest industrial city in China. It has a population of
about 19 million people. |
|
|
Xian - is one
of the birthplaces of the ancient civilization in the
Yellow River Basin area of the country. During Xian's
3,100 year development, 13 dynasties such as Western
Zhou (11th century BC - 771 BC), Qin (221 BC - 206 BC),
Western Han (206 BC - 24 AD) and Tang (618 - 907) placed
their capitals here. So far, Xian enjoys equal fame with
Athens, Cairo, and Rome as one of the four major ancient
civilization capitals
The Terra Cotta
Warriors is the most significant archaeological
excavations of the 20th century. The Emperor Qin Shi
Huang, the first emperor of China, took 11 years to
build this mausoleum. |
|
|
| Guilin
- is a place of natural scenic beauty. The city is
located in an area where the hills are stunning. The
city came across as homey. It just felt very relaxed
and comfortable.
Li River
Cruise - We were taken on a three hour cruise on
the Li River. There were breath taking scenery all
around from the start of the trip to the end. Both
President Nixon and President Clinton has taken this
cruise and enjoyed it very much. |
|
|
| Reed
Flute Cave - There was another stop on the way
back to Guilin. This was a limestone cave. We got to
see limestone formations, stalactite and
stalagmites. The caves were all lit up with bright
pure colors and the view was incredible. |
|
|
|
 |
|
This
page was last updated on
Saturday June 07, 2008 |
|
