Don't worry or go to the bathhouse! China-2017. Part 12. Tales of ancient China.
Furong 2017-06-05 >
There-ta-da-dam, there-ta-da-dam - the drum beats anxiously under our window. Seven in the morning.
The children go to kindergarten.
The pouring rain dances its shamanic dance on the leaves of the trees.
We jump up cheerfully, admire the rain and marvelous music of the pioneer line, have breakfast with our burgers and leave for Furong.
The golden man loads our suitcases into his car, at the bus station he reloads them directly into the passenger compartment, placing both of them on the dashboard of the driver. The bus stops for a long time, I go out for a smoke. No smoking signs everywhere and everyone smokes.
In China people generally smoke a lot and in the most unexpected places. So if you are allergic to tobacco smoke, China is not your country.
The bus is old, but quite decent. We drive for about two hours, the road does not have time to bother us, as we already land at the bus station of the mysterious town of Furong.
For two thousand years, this city was called Wangcun Village. And it was a rather crowded periphery, little known to anyone. And then luck smiled, a film crew arrived, filmed the revolutionary film "Hibiscus City" and since then tourists have simply rushed to see the ancient city where their favorite heroes lived.
The village was quickly converted into a city and generally called "Hibiscus". The Chinese say Furon, forgive me Palladium experts. The letter p is not growled like us, but buzzed like the French. But they are obviously pulling in O, and not in U. However, they still do not hear our sounds, you can not really strain.
Turnstiles were placed at the entrance to the old center and began to collect money from tourists.
And I'll tell you, even without any film, just walking through the old city is very pleasant.
Expensive but worth it. No, if you just take a walk, then of course they would have been waiting near their turnstiles for those who wished for a long time. But there is an absolutely amazing place in the old city. This is a waterfall. It’s not a pity to pay 110 yuan for it. Especially if you stay in a hotel with a stunning view of this waterfall for absolutely crazy money.
I don't really like writing about hotels. Well, cockroaches don’t run on the head, it doesn’t blow from the window, the puncher doesn’t squeal - that means nothing like a hotel, you can live. But this one! This hotel deserves to be written about separately. And I highly recommend not to complain to enjoy the city in this place. Tuwang House, https://www.booking.com/hotel/cn/fu-ron. . . f1cd67885c. US$72, CNY 480, per night.
Leaving the bus, we trudge with our suitcases to look for how to get to the old city, a girl catches up with us with the usual question for us Chunali, we show her the address and she leads us to her minibus. We agree on 20, people sit down on the way, obviously this is a minibus for 1 yuan, but we, as "dear" laowai, pay 10 tickets from the nose. Give the taxi driver a tip, he needs to feed his family. Everyone exits near the turnstiles, and we buy tickets and then we go to the hotel alone. We drive for a very short time, on the way we see an incredibly beautiful covered bridge, but while I got the phone, while I put the mark, we arrived.
We unload things, I ask the price to the Red Rocks, I bargain for a long time, but things do not move below 150. That is, it does not move at all, as she named the price, she stands on it.
The hotel is not visible. We turn our heads. I ask how to get through, the driver nods at the steps.
- Down? I ask in surprise.
- Down!
The stairs are steep and long, we chug, dragging our suitcases. The hotel is already visible, it is located on the side of the mountain and looks like a Chinese fairy tale come to life.
And here we are at the gate.
Turnstile.
They ask for tickets. They make holes in them.
Showing a printout from Booking. Both guards just stick to her.
A minute passes. Another.
They are silent. Read.
Nadia guesses first.
We didn't come there.
- Tell me, please, how to get to this place? - I’m trying to pull them out of hibernation with a very cultural and already worked out phrase.
And it starts.
The hotel is here, but you can’t enter from this side. There is a museum and a waterfall. And to the hotel you need to go upstairs, to the road, and there is another staircase.
Well, not kapets?
-And call the hotel, let them help us with the luggage - please.
They understand, they call.
Negotiations last quite a long time, Nadia pulls me by the sleeve.
You don't need to speak Chinese to understand that no one is going to fetch our suitcases. You'll have to carry it yourself.
We thank the guards, they did everything they could. We drag the suitcases upstairs and curse.
Important: if you have heavy things, and there is a long ladder ahead, the best solution would be to send someone alone to scout. The Chinese love to help. Even if they do not know the way, they will definitely help you.
When we get to the hotel and go down the very short stairs to the reception, I am overwhelmed by a lot of emotions.
First, the waterfall. First impression - WOW!
From here, from the reception, the most successful view opens and the spectacle is mesmerizing.
Perhaps at other times it is not so full of water, but in June it is extremely good!
Secondly, I am exhausted and angry that they did not want to help with luggage. But I can’t express my fe because of the limited Chinese vocabulary.
Thirdly, an inanimate amoeba of about seventeen years old, sitting at the reception, fell into a stupor and examined our passports for half an hour without any attempts to ask seniors to issue us.
That is, you represent the picture? We are wet and angry, we are in a hurry, we still have to go to the Red Rocks, and the girl simply does not respond to stimuli.
-Ay, dear!
The heavens took pity on us and sent three Chinese people at once, who included a girl interpreters and began to explain to us in three languages that you need to buy tickets for the Red Rocks (they say Red Forest) on the Internet.
Then it will be much cheaper. We consider this idea for another fifteen minutes, but discard it as impossible. They can’t buy us, and we don’t even want to start to figure out how to do it without a Chinese card. In the end, they explain that they can provide a car with a wait of 3 hours for... 150 yuan)) But at 14.00. Earlier, nothing.
What the hell with those rocks, you should at least go to the toilet and see the waterfall at least with one eye.
Right here, in Furong, at the reception desk of an expensive hotel, which is presented on Booking, having a printout of the reservation in Chinese, knowing quite a lot of words in Chinese and even some principles for constructing Chinese phrases, having traveled through China almost already halfway there, having a Chinese keyboard and several translators on my phone, here, despite the above arsenal, I suddenly clearly understand that to hell we will agree with them.
The processes are looped and any phrase includes a new round of incomprehensibility. At some point, I just say - I'm tired - and sit on the sofa. Everything. That's how you want it to go on and destroy it. We arrived, they gave us a passport, the next move is yours. They talked a little more with Nadya (Nadya in English, they are in Chinese) and the process moved forward. Our amoeba, clapping its eyes and asking something every minute from senior comrades, began to draw us up. They asked me the name of our country. It's called VukelAn (and Russia - ElOs, suddenly you will also be asked)
When we finally, thank the Buddha, received the keys, a young guy picked up our suitcases and carried them to the room. Until two o'clock in the afternoon we are absolutely free. Once again reminding us that he would be waiting for us at the reception at two o'clock, the guy left.
And here I’ll tell you, it’s a pity that I don’t know how to write poetry in Chinese characters, because this city, the waterfall, and the Red Rocks are very worthy to be sung in poetry and songs in Chinese. And the hotel! When I dreamed about a trip to China, I dreamed about this place!
And now I find myself in the China that I invented for myself!
I loved every squiggle and every scuff of this place, and looking at it all live, I was incredibly delighted!
I didn't want to rest for a single moment. I wanted to climb every step, touch every ledge, photograph every rooftop.
You have already understood that the hotel is located in a cascade on the mountainside, above the river, at the very waterfall. And it was wooden, antique, very authentic and incredibly soulful.
Absolutely fabulous rooftops, lanterns, a view of the emperor's palace on a high cliff opposite, a roaring red waterfall... Even tables! Even the tables were very special here.
Yes, there are tables! Even the beds were special here)
Both the bathroom and the ceiling)
Exactly at two o'clock in the afternoon we went to the reception and the second series of the Red Rocks quest began. Our cute amoeba was in hibernation again, and the guy who was with her at the reception was another guy, not the one who negotiated with us and was neither a rumor nor a spirit at all. I tried to ask him what to do, where is the taxi and where is the previous guy, appealed to the amoeba to remember who promised us here, but I could not achieve anything. The guy found a way out and called his English-speaking friend, I gave the phone to Nadia. It became clear from the talks that we were once again reaching a dead end.
And then we made a strong-willed decision to forget everything that was between us before)) We just asked the guy to call us a taxi to the Red Forest. It worked.
The taxi arrived instantly, we waved to the amoeba and drove away to another planet.
150 yuan is a real robbery, because it's not far to go there. If you are going to the Red Rocks, keep in mind that now a bus goes there from the bus station.
At the entrance we buy a ticket for 148 yuan.
We are offered a guide, we refuse.
The first thing we see after passing through the turnstile is the red "pancakes" folded in small slides, a big dinosaur... and a little uncle who stuck to us tightly.
The dinosaur stood still, and the uncle trotted ahead, repeating Tsouba-Tsouba (let's go, I'll take you to the most incredible corners of our planet), looking back at us every minute. He led us to a lake with water lilies, then to a large beautiful plateau, photographed us several times, praising us, the views and his work:
(Beautiful)
And he demanded 80 yuan from us.
- Thai gweila - I answered him angrily, - Fear the Buddha, it's very expensive!
Uncle immediately took offense and left. No, well, we would have given him a twenty for a good mood, but this apparently hurt him.
Further we went without an escort, which was undoubtedly more pleasant and calmer.
In one place there was a sluggish trade in unpretentious food, we passed by, a young woman followed us and began to spit in our backs. I'm not lying! ) She was walking, muttering something under her breath and pah-pah-pah spitting, as if she had met a black cat crossing the road. We concluded that the white laowai is akin to a black cat and did not spit in response to her. And it would be funny.
The black cat looks back and pah-pah-pah as a victim of his black plan)
The Red Forest Park itself is small, as it seemed to us. Maybe an uncle for 80 yuan would show us other landscapes, judging by the map, we only went half way.
But even what we saw was enough to feel like we were on Venus or inside an old Chinese fairy tale with dinosaurs.
I was especially impressed not by red stones, but by black, overgrown with moss, I really like different moss.
In some places even goosebumps.
They say that the rocks were found only in 2002, and before that, no one had a dream or spirit that such a miracle even existed in the world. Personally, I don’t really believe in this, China, of course, is a huge country, but not so much that you don’t notice unusual rocks in the forest, not even in the jungle, half an hour from the tourist city.
We wandered a little more around the upper lake. This lake was not overgrown, but it did not look very good either.
And on advertising photos, the lake is prettier, and the rocks are redder, which is not surprising, because the Chinese generally like to decorate everything. And yet, the place is very alien.
Moreover, all these rocks are different.
In general, I have hundreds of photos of different colors and I am very glad that I visited such an unreal place.
When we got to the parking lot, our car was not there. We approached the guards and asked them to call. They nodded to us upstairs, they say, go there, there he is waiting for you.
We even stomped there and even some minibus tried to take us to the city for incredible money, something like 70 yuan per living person, when our driver drove up and safely drove us to the city. We got out near the ticket office and went for a walk around the city.
Very atmospheric town! Yes, I remember that I said this three times already, but what if you still don’t understand that you must definitely go to Furong).
It is interesting that apart from my grandmother, with whom we actively took pictures of each other, no one paid any attention to us at all.
In Zhangjiajie-Wulingyuan, where there are many more foreigners, people came up to us to take pictures, took pictures on the sly, looked at us, tried to talk. And here, where the appearance of laova is a rather rare phenomenon, everyone pretended that we were not there.
But no, I'm lying, the police paid attention to us, they were not too lazy even to get out of the car, catch up with us and check the tickets. And, in my opinion, it was outside the old city.
The shopping street was short, we walked it back and forth, went to the waterfall from the back,
we went back and went to the turnstiles to look for a covered bridge.
I generally love covered bridges, as it turns out.
First, we went to the square in front of the tourist center, even went inside and leafed through the guidebook to ask knowledgeable people where to look for the bridge.
But the bridge was not listed in the sights, which means there was no picture of it. Without a picture, I didn’t dare to ask anything, remembering how I struggled through the language barrier in the hotel.
They left. We looked back.
Found the bridge)
Well, it was not quite that bridge, just some kind of faint resemblance, but also covered, but what if we don’t find that one, let’s go at least to this one.
Without leaving all the same attempts, we stomped to our hotel and suddenly found it! )
It was magnificent and we stuck there for a long time, I even got out to the balcony in some bar to take this photo.
And on the way, they suddenly stuck to three grandfathers with the question - is it possible to shoot them. They laughed and pointed at each other:
- Take it off!
- No, better than him!
In general, can I say again how cool this Fuzhun is? )
Meanwhile, the evening was approaching,
and in the evening in our town the most interesting things began.
These are the local elders preparing for the dragon festival.
They invited us a hundred times, it’s a pity that everything didn’t start for a long time and we left for dinner.
Dinner was very tasty, but not without adventure, of course. I wanted crayfish, I saw them on the tables, I even knew how to say in Chinese that I wanted them, but, like all the dialogues in Furong, this one also did not lead to any result. I got angry and began to translate through Google from the picture, so we solved the problem of translating the menu for the future. There were no crabs on the menu. So we ate as always potatoes.
Now I will say seditious. Neither the Avatar Park, under which the whole trip was planned, nor the beautiful places that we still had ahead, and they were awesomely beautiful, you can believe me, did not sink into my soul like this old Furong. And it is especially beautiful in the evening, when the lights on the waterfall and numerous houses around turn on.
After dark, everything becomes just incredibly fabulous, but I can no longer shoot, so be sure to go to Furong and see it with your own eyes!
What else I forgot to say is that in Furong the language is slightly changed. For example, ten in Chinese would be Shi, and four would be Si. But in Furong both ten and four sound Si. Therefore, forty-four sounds enchanting - Sy Sy Sy (Four tens and four). And forty and fourteen are impossible to distinguish one from the other. Sy Sy) And the word Zhege (It) sounds like Gyga. And it will be like this all the way to Guangzhou, so we will get used to it)
