Nature Park自然公园

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Just after the National Week here in China I had the chance to visit one of LangFangs tourist sights and explore more of LangFang. My friend Mike had come at the start of the National Week with his return to China. I had been here for a few days before his return. Between my return and his had been only a few days. It was a busy time leading up to his landing and the week that he was here was a nice change. On the Monday, before I had to start my new job here in LangFang I had the pleasure of seeing Nature Park. That morning I had brought Mike to the train station, so he can go to Beijing then eventually to Shenzhen and other places down south. To continue his own journey. After we had bought his tickets, I had went on my own way to Nature Park. Instead of taking a normal taxi I had decided to take a little tuk tuk car. During the time it took me to get there with this gentleman driving, had almost gotten into two major accidents. The first, the car beside us not far from the train station decided at the last minute to do a U-turn the driver of the tuk tuk barely stopped in time leaving less than an inch of space between his vehicle and the car. The other one came closer to the park itself, where we had approached a roundabout. Instead of going around like everyone else he had decided to cut through cutting off oncoming traffic. One car was going a decent speed put on his brakes narrowly missing us by an inch or two. I got to Nature Park unscathed and in one piece.



Getting out I snapped a few shots of the entrance and proceeded past the main gate to meet my other friend who had come from Beijing to visit me and see the sights of LangFang with me. We had started our little excursion and exploring of the park. Near the main entrance was a place where we could rent golf carts to ride around the park, making it easier to see the park. It is a spacious area with a nice lake inside its own boundaries. Bordering at the back of the park is the High Speed train tracks. We decided to rent the golf cart for our trip around the park. We went past some amusement type games and small rides as well. At one point we saw a camel, and a woman with her child there. Now this particular place you could for 20 RMB get on the camel and have your photo taken with the camel. I figured what the heck, it would be something nice I could show everyone back home.



We rode around for some time seeing a bit more of the park. Until we came to an area a small zoo, it is on what’s called Monkey Island. We decided to see the zoo and I must say I was rather disappointed in what I saw. There were several animals’ big animals at the second area of the zoo, lions, tigers and a bear whose living area is quite small. This majestic animals should have a bigger living area. It was very disheartening, at least this area of the park. I didn’t see all of the park. There was a calligraphy museum that I didn’t get to see, maybe on my return visit to the park I will see it. It was a nice relaxing afternoon out with a good friend. I do recommend seeing this park, but don’t hold much hope for the park increasing the size of the animals’ living space.

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