Datong Part I :: The Hanging Monastery

How about one.last.trip in China before school starts??? 

Let's head to Datong.  Have you heard of it?  I certainly hadn't until we moved to Tianjin. Hopefully you'll see why people talk about going there…it's definitely an interesting place to visit with several very beautiful and interesting sights to see.

It's also the shortest flight I think we've ever been on (at least in China)- it's less than one hour flying time.

This time we are in a bit of a competition.  With what???  The weather!!!!  There has been talk of a tropical storm that could affect the Tianjin area. Yikes!!!  So….maybe we'll be flying to Datong or maybe we'll be staying at home.  Which will it be???  So far the skies don't look heavy with rain and the flight isn't listed as canceled.  We're sitting on the edge of our seats wondering.

How about some ice cream from TCBY to take our mind off the dilemma:

Yes, there is a TCBY in the Tianjin Airport!

YAHOOOOOO!!!!  Our flight…although delayed…is still on!!!

We're boarding now. Hurry up!  We've got to get on a bus which will transfer us to the small jet.  No people sucker for us!  

Less than one-hour later: we're in Datong!  The hotel couldn't arrange a car for us so we've got to try our own luck getting a taxi.  Oh my.  It looks like there are TWO taxis to choose from.  Oy!  Let's hope one of them will take us to the hotel.  Whew!  For 80 RMB.  Compared to the 400 RMB we paid for the airport- hotel transfer Xi'an 80 RMB seems like nothing!!!

We're heading to the Garden Hotel in Datong.  All the reviews on tripadvisor.com pointed to the Garden Hotel as being a great hotel to stay at.  Our friends had also mentioned the Howard Johnson as being a great place to stay at but the thing that sold the Garden Hotel to me was the mention of great Illy cafe cappuccinos at the breakfast buffet. I do have certain priorities- great coffee being one of them!!!  ;-)

The hotel itself is very pleasant and the rooms are very clean and tidy but the view out from our room isn't anything to write home about:

Hmmm…the beds in China!!!  Ack!!!  They leave something to be desired!  Why do they insist on such hard beds?????  

However hard the bed is the room itself was neat, tidy, clean. 🙂

Very nice bathroom- very clean and well-lit.

At least the Garden Hotel has something that the other hotels don't seem to have- very nice, soft pillows!  They even have a pillow menu:  and for some reason I can't find the photo I took of this menu…it had so many unique and unusual options (I'm not talking about pillow firmness). 

ETA:

Pillow Menu

And guess what???? The reviews are right!  They DO serve excellent coffee here!!!  The breakfast buffet really is quite nice.

Let's head downstairs and see if we can't book a taxi to take us to see some of the sights.  Done!  The taxi will pick us up in thirty minutes.  

Are you wondering where we are taking you to???  Just wait and see!!!

Cramped quarters in the back of the taxi!!!

Mountains!!!

Can you see what we're heading to?

Let's go buy some tickets and then we can properly show you what we came to see:

Here are the tickets:

Here is some information for you:

Look at what we're heading to….

 This way—>

Whoa!!! Too cool!!!!

Let's go check it out!  Looks like we can actually walk around the buildings. We're going to have cross over this bridge to get there:

Let's get a closer look…

Tight walkways! How very un-Chinese- we have to walk single file throughout the structure!!!!! How can the Chinese tourists stand for waiting their turn??

Great words to live by: be polite and friendly!

Tight walk ways with steep stair cases! Egads!

Let's poke our head into the doors- you can't go inside the buildings (except for using the staircases). 

a quick peek inside one of the rooms in the monastery.

Walking up the steep stair cases

I certainly hope these logs hold out at least long enough for to walk through safely!!!! (the buildings are anchored into the walls using other methods as well… whew!)

Say Cheese!!

A view of the valley from the Hanging Monastery

The beautiful decorative paintings on the walls:

Smile!!! Whoops. Annika has run into a dead end. Guess we have to turn around and find a different way.

Some more lovely, aged artwork:

Wood beams painted to look like….wood beams!!!

Yes, it is amazingly crowded here but I think you'll agree with me that this place is worth struggling through the crowds to get a closer look at.  Right?? 

Love that door!  I want a door knocker like that!!!

Time to get out of the tight quarters….and now it's time for the ritual photo taking session.  Annika came up with a clever way to "politely" decline having her photo taken- she's started asking for 5RMB from anyone who wants their photo taken with her.  Hahaha!!!  So far she's baffled all the Chinese people who've asked and they've all walked away shaking their head in confusion.  Heck, if they're taking photos of us as if we're an attraction we might as well charge a fee for the privilege.  I'm joking….sort of. 😉

Annika munching on a piece of fruit from the hotel. Mmmm!!!

Time for a walk around the place.  

Carrying water in buckets.

Mark, Ava and Annika waving hello on the suspension bridge.

 Sitting close to this sign:

Was a young boy drawing this:

Oh my! Quite impressive!!!!

Let's go take a closer look at that dam:

Dam you!!!! har dee har har!!!!

Time to head back to the car:

Ah…the breeze!!! It feels great!!! Oh…and here's a funny thing….the girls got their first introduction to car windows that you have to manually roll down. How old fashioned! LOL! Annika didn't know how to open her window and I didn't realize that she's never been in a car that wasn't all automatic.

And we're off to our next BIG THING!!!  Stay tuned for the next installment of our Datong trip!!!