Nanjing exploring purple mountain

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The area on the south of purple mountain is called the Zijin scenic area. The whole area is forested which makes it very pleasant even though some of the sites are popular. My first visit was to the Linggu Si area. This included a visit to the beamless hall, a 14th century building, unusual because the brick arches are self supporting. I made a brief visit to the temple and then walked up to the Linggu pagoda. This is a 1930s pagoda. It wasn't a good day for views, but I climbed up for the panorama over the forests of purple mountain. I could just about spot the Xuandu lake. I explored some of the forest before taking the electric bus to the mausoleum of Sun Yatsen. Sun Yatsen was the first president of China after the fall of the empire. The mausoleum is in blue and white colours. These are the colours of the Kuomingtang, the Chinese Nationalist Party. From the gates at the entrance to the mausoleum to the burial chamber is 700 metres and it is mostly steps up. This gives a feeling that you are making a pilgrimage. The memorial hall contains statues of Sun Yatsen. It doesn't seem to matter too much to the Chinese tourists visiting the mausoleum that The Kuomintang was defeated by the communist party and that there are important ideological differences. My combined ticket included entrance to the open air theatre near the mausoleum. This is popular with families who feed the white doves. I walked the short distance to the next area the Ming Xiaoling, an early Ming dynasty tomb and sacred way. I visited the tomb first. In the last few years restoration and rebuilding work has been carried out so some of the buildings are new and some are more or less as they were. The huge stone platform which is the burial chamber is clearly original because you can see where stalagmites and stalactites have formeddue to water dripping down the outside. There is also some original brickwork on the side walls. The sacred wjus looked just like it did in the photograph on my ticket with a few autumn colours. Along the way there are pairs of civil officials, pairs of generals and then pairs of animals. All were very impressive, but it was the elephants that made me smile. There was time for a stroll up to Zixia (purple cloud) lake. There were lots of locals swimming here, although there are notices everywhere saying no swimming. It did look good fun and they all seemed to be enjoying it - at their own risk of the "consequences". It was a challenge to get back into town. I ended up taking two different buses and then the metro. I tried out for supper a small place I spotted yesterday. You ordered the food and cooked it yourself over hot coals, like a barbeque. It worked out very well. My timing with the weather was not bad. It started to drizzle when I was at the lake, but I was about ready to leave and when I arrived back at the hotel there was a thunderstorm.

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