trip in review: Wuzhen

So, I was looking back at the entries I've already posted about our trip, and I thought the best way to fill in the gaps would be to post an entry about each of the places we visited, along with some pictures. I already put up some pictures from Shanghai and Hangzhou, our first and second destinations (from 1/20-1/27). I'll just pick up from there.

Wuzhen wasn't really a destination of it's own, but still cool enough to warrant a blog entry. We took a day trip from Hangzhou to visit this little town. It's kind of hard to describe. Basically, it's built on a series of waterways, and has been restored to resemble a Qing-era village. But people just go on living and working right in the areas of the town that have been restored, so when you go to visit it, it's not like you're walking through a dead museum house of the Qing. Instead, you're walking right through the place where people live today, surrounded by artifacts and elements of a previous era.

Kind of strange.

But fascinating all the same. Also, there are demonstrations put on by the townspeople of a number of crafts, such as weaving, winemaking, and dyeing the blue and white cloth they have been making for centuries.

Ben in a Wuzhen alleyway

Wuzhen market




Play in the public square





River ferry




Ben and Wuzhen dyed fabric

We loved Wuzhen. And then we almost got stuck there. The day we went there was the first day of the Chinese New Year, and so some of the later buses were cancelled that day (I'm still not entirely sure why). We didn't know that the buses were cancelled in advance, so when we showed up to take the last bus back to Hangzhou (where all our stuff was, and where we needed to be in order to take a train away from there the next morning), we were told there was no bus for us.


Oh, man.


A moment of panic followed. And then two really nice girls from Guangzhou, who were planning to take the same bus, showed up like knights on gleaming white horses. Hearing that we, too, needed to get back to Hangzhou, they simply said to us, "Let's go to Hangzhou," and even though we had no idea how they intended to accomplish that, we followed them like puppies. They knew what they were doing. They instantly starting negotiating with a line of taxi drivers lined up outside the station. We all ended up hiring a guy in a van to drive us all the way back to Hangzhou for 300 kuai (about $40 USD). We were all a bit stunned when we realized we had actually made it back.