...We All Scream for Ice-Cream!!

On Wednesday, we started our day with a visit to the Teng Wang Pavilion. The Pavilion, first built in 659AD, sits on the banks of the Gan(jiang) River. Poems written by the Tang Dynasty (618-907AD) poet, Wang Bo, helped to make the tower famous. The 9-storey tower has been rebuilt and repaired 28 times since its inception. The weather Wednesday was again very pleasant, making for a relaxing visit. The views from the tower were fantastic, and we could see the new growth of Nanchang across the Gan River. As part of the tour, we also saw a small show in the pavilion with music and dance.

Following our visit to the pavilion, we grabbed some (again) delicious lunch. The spicy chicken was sizzling hot, but very tasty – Jennifer bowed out early, and the pumpkin “cakes” were delicious.

After lunch, we started our journey to Jiujiang, Hannah’s birthplace. The drive up from Nanchang was very scenic, with hills and mountains surrounding us in the distance. Along the way, we spotted some collapsed structures from the recent ice and snowstorms in China.

Jiujiang is a cultural and historic city situated on the crossing of the Yangtze River and the Beijing-Kowloon Railway. The 2,000 year-old city has a population of just over 4 million, and is traditionally known as an agricultural region with the outputs of cotton, rapeseed, silk, fruit and aquatic products. From our waterfront hotel window, we witnessed how the Yangtze River provides a passage to move goods in and out of the city. The bridge that crosses the Yangtze River is the largest on the entire river, and is a passage by rail to Anhui province, and by automobile to Hubei province.

The hotel (Chevalier) was quaint, nothing too fancy, but clean. The beds were literally like “sheet” rock, harder than any other bed we have slept on in China – but that’s just part of the experience. After settling in our hotel rooms, we had a lovely, relaxing walk at the edge of the river in the late afternoon. Whether related to our arrival in Jiujiang or not, Hannah seemed to be very free-spirited. To our delight, when picking up some groceries in a small shop, we hit the jackpot…15 cent ice-cream bars!!! This is going to be a very yummy stay in Jiujiang with unusual flavours like Tarot and Green Pea ice cream!!

Well it’s off to bed (??) to rest up for our special visit to Hannah’s orphanage.