Waking up in Chongqing
It was a difficult first night’s sleep in Chongqing, due to either excitement, jet lag, or both. Mat and I were both awake in the early hours of the morning, being unable to get a solid’s night sleep. We tried (in vain) to sleep, and before we knew it, morning have arrived. I asked my hostess, via WeChat, as to what a typical Chongqing breakfast consists of. She kindly told me that raw fried bread and beef noodles was a very popular breakfast here. I would usually have had a Full English breakfast or a bowl of cereal, but as they say “When in Rome do as the Romans do”.
(If you missed my first day in Chongqing, check it out here)
So we got up, prepared ourselves, and ventured out in to the heat and the bustling street outside our apartment. We scanned around for something resembling the raw fried bread I was told about. Conveniently enough, the stall opposite our apartment seemed to have some on offer. We sat down, pointed at the bread and somehow managed to get it across to the kind ladies working there that we wanted a bowl of beef noodles.
I’m no expert at chop sticks, and neither of us knew what to do with the fried bread, do we rip it and eat it or do we dunk it in to the broth? Due to these two facts, the ladies serving us got one hell of a kick out of watching us, there were even tears from behind me! We took it in full stride and soldiered on, thanking them for breakfast.
Tip!
When in China, I highly recommend installing WeChat on to your phone. Anyone you meet or want to talk to in China will have it, and apps such as Facebook, WhatsApp, and anything Google don’t function correctly/at all. This includes Gmail, Google Maps, the Google search engine, the Google Play Store, and more! If you want to speak to your friends or family easily back home, get them to install WeChat too whilst you’re at home. There can be a tedious verification process which usually requires an existing WeChat user to verify your account before you use it.
Let the exploration, begin!
Before I came to China, I downloaded the Lonely Planet’s guide to China (https://www.lonelyplanet.com/china) to help with navigation and finding things to do. So we picked a few places which were free and sounded interesting and set off. We set our eyes on a point of interest called Hongya Cave, and navigated the streets of Chongqing. Contrary to its name, Hongya Cave isn’t actually a cave, but actually a small touristic shopping centre built in to the side of Chongqing on the river.
Nowadays it’s a large complex of stilt houses, but it was formerly a military fort thousands of years ago, but appeared fairly quiet when we arrived. After 10 minutes or so of browsing the stalls and alleys, we had ventured every street we could, so we returned to the surface. After this we soaked in the views from the side of the Jialing river where we could see the bridges and the city on the other side. The temperatures were soaring, so we didn’t loiter for too long.
Luohan Temple
We marched onward to our next destination: Luohan Temple. This 1,000-year old Buddhist Temple looked peculiar because it’s set amongst the towering sky scrapers, so it was surreal as to how peaceful it was inside. At only ¥10 (just over £1) per person, it’s well worth it for what you experience inside. The experience was a very authentic and humbling one.
The grounds and temple buildings were abundant with exquisite rock carvings, fantastic statues of previous Buddhist characters, and some amazing artefacts. The temples are very quiet and calming, and you’re able to purchase incense to burn at some of the shrines should you wish to. We spent a good deal of time here, wandering around the numerous buildings, each different from the next.
The architecture was also astounding, just how you’d imagine real Buddhist temples to look. After an hour or two, we exited on to bustling high street, which was a large contrast to what we’ve just experienced.
An evening in Chongqing
We had a walk to the other side of town, just relishing in the mayhem that was Chongqing. As the day progressed, we became exhausted due to the distance covered and the heat beating down on us. We decided to head back to the apartment before dinner. On the way back we had an enjoyable encounter with some school children who wanted to test out their English skills with us.
When we arrived back at our apartment it was late in the day, and we didn’t have any accommodation or transport booked for Guiyang tomorrow. I seemed to have taken on the role of transport organiser, whilst Mat had become the accommodation manager, worked for us! After trawling through hostels and sifting through train schedules we were all booked, job done.
After a long day, we decided to relax and go for some food. We had heard of the Chongqing hotpot which was supposed to be super spicy, so we thought we’d try to find a place that did it somewhere.
Tip!
For booking accommodation we mostly used Booking.com (https://www.booking.com) and for transport in China, chiefly trains, we used Trip.com (https://uk.trip.com). When booking hostels and hotels in China, some do not accept foreigners, so check the hostel’s page to see whether they do or not, otherwise you could be in for a nasty surprise when you turn up. Also, I would advise using hostels over Airbnb because hostels that accept foreigners have a system setup where they send your passport and information to the police upon arrival. However, sometimes the Airbnb host may not do this for you, so you could get in to a spot of bother if you haven’t registered with the local authorities within 24 hours of arriving.
A challenging Chongqing meal
When we entered the restaurant, neither of us actually knew how these ‘hotpot’ events worked, and boy was it hard work to find out. Absolutely no one spoke English, I thought someone may know something, Chongqing being a big city. I even did an award winning chicken dance to try and explain we wanted chicken in our hotpot. We had the waitresses around us, then came the cooks, then came the customers, and God knows who else. It took 30 minutes, 10 people, and 3 translation apps to get us sat down with some chicken skewers in a hot and spicy broth. All part of the experience!
We didn’t have any sort of fancy hotpot, but it sure was spicy as hell. Many tears were shed in this food hall, an experience for sure. We had an audience the entire time, I’m glad we could inadvertently liven everyone else’s night up. After walking out with our heads held high, and some heckling from Chinese diners, we left the establishment where lessons had been learned.
Just outside our apartment, we treated ourselves to the only food we could find that resembled dessert, caramelised strawberries. I must say they were very delicious, and I have a huge sweet tooth, so my pudding addiction had temporarily been sated.
When we returned to our apartment, we turned in for the night and both hoped for a better night’s sleep as we were up fairly early tomorrow for the train to Guiyang.
Extras
