Nanjing

April 17, Saturday

Today we sailed into Nanjing, a mid-sized city for China with 5 million people, which was the capital of China for 10 different Imperial Dynasties and also for the Republic of China after the 1911 overthrow of the last Emperor. The captital was moved to Beijing in 1949 when the Communists won the civil war from the Nationalists.

In the morning we had an excursion to the Purple Mountain Park which has the elaborate Mausoleum of  Dr Sun Yat Sen, the leader of the 1911 Revolution. It is a beautiful park: large with extensive landscaping . The Mausoleum is very impressive at the top of a 392 step climb.The park was full of people, foreign tourists and Chinese.

 In the afternoon I left our group as they returned to the boat for lunch and was picked up the family of a a good friend in San Diego.  They took me to a grand lunch in the old part of the city in a private room of a restaurant…..they just kept bringing food- most of which was not identified. Only the 14yo son spoke English and did not know the English names for most of the foods…. He was able to explain to me that I had eaten duck blood soup (after I ate most of it). We also had a dancing girl do some traditional Chinese dances while we ate.

 

 We also visited the Fuzi Temple and shopping/restaurant mall surrounding it….lots of local families were enjoying the fine weather there.   

We also visited the grand  Zhongua Gate in the impressive city wall built during the Ming Dynasty. 

I was brought back to the boat and we set sail for Shanghai late in the afternoon.