Wondering and Wandering

On October 1, 1949, Mao declared the People's Republic of China and now it is a National Holiday. The Chinese have an entire week off each autumn and they take to the road on vacation. The holiday often includes the Autumn Moon Festival, which this year fell on October 6th. Well, when in China do as the Chinese, so we have the week off from school.

Since buses, trains and planes are packed with Chinese tourists, Leslie, Becky and I decided to stay close to home and explore the area of Liaoning Province which is the coastline between Dalian and Dandong. Dandong is about 250 kilometers from Dalian. We were fortunate enough to hire a car and driver for the five day adventure. We set out Saturday, September 30 in a black Nissan sedan with Mr. B at the wheel. Actually one hand was on the wheel and the other hand was on the horn as driving in China requires a GREAT DEAL of horn honking.

There is an expressway that would have taken us speeding up country at 120 k.m. an hour, but we chose the local road route. What a good decision. It is harvest time and we were driving through beautiful and obviously fertile farm land. The corn was being harvested. Stalks are macheted down one plant at a time and the corn is taken off the stalk. The stalks are bundled and then leaned in picturesque teepees in the fields. The corn transported back to farmhouses in all manner of cart that is pulled by all manner of critter from horse to donkey to oxen to loud sputtering engine . Back at the farmhouse the corn is shucked and the family compounds are littered with shucked and unshucked corn. The shucking is a family project. The house tops are then covered with bins and stacks of shucked corn. It dries on the roof tops and then the kernels are stripped from the cob and sold or stored for meal and animal fodder. In addition to acres of corn fields, there are fields of rice that are shades of green and gold. There are groves of fruit trees and on some huge apples are ready to be picked. Autumn harvest has arrived in China and it is plentiful and stunning.

Our first day destination was Zhuanghe which is 112 kilometers from Dalian. What with meandering through the countryside it took us four hours to get to to Zhuanghe. The countryside is stunning and the mixture of old China and new modern China is never so pronounced as in the countryside.