Holiday Trip – Zhang Jia Jie
Zhang Jia Jie (张家界), the similar to Avatar-scene in China, is located in Hu Nan Province, Middle-West part of China. Well, that’s my tour agent told us when they offered a Zhang Jia Jie trip. Honestly, I never heard of that place before (and later I knew that it was a very popular place). It has a really beautiful nature scenery. Really love it so much. To add some ‘crunchy’ experience, me and my friends took the trip using train, which took almost 24 hours from Beijing – Zhangjiajie. 1 full day in a train. Well, really ‘new’ experience for all of us, remembering that we never been in a trip in a train for a whole day. Lol.
Day 1 – On Train
We started the trip from Beijing Train Station at 11 am, so that we would reach the destination around that time too. Before that, we bought some ‘healthy’ food in a fast food restaurant (if i’m not mistaken, yoshinoya) for lunch in the train :p Well, you know, we can’t really depend the food on the train..
What did we do on train? chit-chat, read books, playing games. I took my galaxy tab filled with internet-able sim card, so i still can browsed web, but still i need to pay attention to the battery :p
Day 2 – Zhang Jia Jie – Feng Huang Gu Cheng (凤凰古城）
The second day, we arrived at Zhang Jia Jie train station. And then, we directly went to Feng Huang Gu Cheng (Phoenix Ancient City, if you want to translate that). Before that, we went to a place for rafting activity in a river. We called it piao1liu2 (漂流). We didn’t have the idea beside a regular rafting. So, when we arrived at that place, we saw many stall selling a plastic gun (water gun).. We decided not to buy any of it.
I got an uncomfortable feeling when I saw the place/river and everybody got on a ride, and they hold guns. Oh my god. And later on, we knew that we should hit and get hit by other people. And the person who ride the small boat also ‘encourage’ us to shoot another people from different boat. So, yes, we have been very wet!! and we decided to buy 2 guns (which later we found that it had poor quality) because we’ve been too tired to get shot while we couldn’t shot them back.
But, it was really really nice experience (no camera, no electronic, just brought 1 piece of 100RMB to pay the photograph later on). The scenery around the river is so nice. For me, it was my first experience to do rafting like that.
And in the middle of the journey, our photograph was taken (and we paid for it, quite expensive, 30RMB for a laminated piece, but it was worth it, since it was the only ‘memento’ we could take home).
Then, we had a quick shower and changed clothes, and then we entered Feng Huang Gu Cheng (we stayed there at night). We had a quick evening walking session around the city.
Beautiful Scenery
Scenery
Group Photo
Don’t ask me for the food :p Only a little of it will suitable for Indonesian’s taste LoL.
Day 3 – Feng Huang Gu Cheng + Zhang Jia Jie National Forest (张家界国家森林公园）
In the morning, till afternoon, we were given time to explore a part of Feng Huang Gu Cheng. I think we can call it a big city hall, where we can find many spot to take photos, traditional food + souvenirs stalls and kiosks. Even you can take a photo with traditional clothes from that place. Nothing really special tough.
Big City Hall
AAAA Tourist Object
Phoenix – Icon of the city
Use Traditional Clothes and Take Photos
Traditional Wine Shop
Buy Souvenirs
Wanna try to shoot?
Beautiful Souvenir made of rattan
Chili!
Beautiful Scenery
Daily Activities
Then, after having lunch, we went to Zhang Jia Jie National Forest Park. It’s an environment protected park and ecosystem, and consisted of many tourism spots inside of its area. So yes, it’s quite huge place. But * I think *, the scenery *although very beautiful* is quite the same everywhere *from the peak side*. It’s a mountainous place.
We bought a card, entrance card to the forest park which we can use one day (24 hour), so in this trip, we went to this area twice (day 3 and 4) but visited different spots. This area is closed around 5-6 pm. And, for those who is below 24 years old, you can have 50% discount *yay.. me that time is 23 years 10 months old :p*.. after went in to the entrance gate, we took a cable car to reach the top side of this forest. By the way, you should prepare comfortable shoes to go to this place. It won’t be too easy journey :p but still it’s comfortable and astonishing experience.
Entrance Park
View from inside of Cable Car
5-fingers Mountain
There is a temple up there
From that temple *upstairs*, you can see nice scenery
From the top of temple view
Maybe this is what they said like in Avatar film *No floating rocks of course ;’)
Day 4 – Huang Long Cave (黄龙洞）And National Forest Park
In the day 4, we visited Huang Long Dong (Yellow Dragong Cave). It’s a beautiful cave which inside of it is colorful stone. It has a route which tourist can follow and see many shapes and color of the mineral stone. We spend almost 1 hour to complete this journey. Tiring :p
Entrance side of the cave
Colorful
Photo of us
Inside of the cave
Short boat trip to see some unwalkable spot
Stalactites and Stalagmites
Beautiful Stones
After that, we went again to National Forest Park area and today, we went to Wu Ling Yuan Scenic Area (武陵源)
Map
Monument of One of Chinese General
The first bridge *naturally made* in the world, as they claimed
天下第一桥
Mountains everywhere.
I forgot which one is called “Avatar Hallelujah Mountain” (阿凡达-哈利路亚山) But that is the really name, seriously. And there is a photobooth/stand with the avatar Toruk where you can ride it (of course it just statue) and the photographer will take your photograph (another 30-40RMB, if i’m not mistaken) or whatever that huge bird :p Stands there also sells avatar T-Shirt. Avatar Mountain!
with lovely girlfriend at the bridge
Well, I have to admit that after the first day looking at the mountainous view, I felt bored with the similar scenes over and over :p Yes it’s very beautiful. But, I think it’s just the same things *mountains* with many variations of it :p
And the last but interesting spot is when we went to the highest outdoor elevator, which takes us from 300m height place to the ground level *from the top of the mountain till the ground.
You can see the ‘white’ -> the elevator tunnel that takes us down
Photo Group In Front of The Mountains
So the visit to Zhang Jia Jie Forest park is over.. 🙂
Day 5 – Historical Building named Lao Yuan Zi (老院子）
This is the last day of our tour, and our train schedule is 1 pm *another 24 hour trip*. So, in the morning, we still have one place to go. It’s more look like cultural historical spot/building, with very ancient style of it. And later on, we also enjoyed the chinese musical performance there.
The building from outside view
3D miniature of a city which used in a war *ancient times*
Lucky Turtle
Ancient Dining Room
Ancient Library
Empty Classroom. Love this picture so much. The lighting is very beautiful
Classroom full of students :p
Traditional Music Performance
Ensemble of percussion instruments
And after that, we go to the train station.
Ah yes, although this is not a metropolitan city *indeed its very traditional city* but the train station is so clean and neat. And we had our lunch there *instant noodle*. You should bring enough instant cup noodle when you’re travelling in traditional city. Really, trust me :p
To see more photos from this trip, you can see my flickr page here
Bye. See you in another trip :p