Romantic Fenghuang&Rustic Dehang

Trip Start Apr 06, 2008
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Trip End Jun 20, 2008


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Flag of China  , Hunan,
Thursday, May 1, 2008

Its a 5 hours drive on a modern highway from Changsha to Huaihua, passing some long tunnels (7km!) with  very beautiful spot lights.Huaihua is not exactly the spot in China where a lot of English is spoken.Also not so many travellers pass here, and if they do, mostly on transit.Just like me.I am happy to find a nice bed just besides the train station, food is more of problem today, and I  end up in the restaurant's computer room where the waitresses check out the electronic english-chinese dictionary for my mushroom/vegetable order.
The village of Fenghuang, on a pittoresque location along the Tuo River, is a "dream destination".
Beautiful wooden houses, wonderful pagodas, stone bridges almost like in Venice and romantic red lanterns in the night with lively night markets, all that in just one place: Fenghuang!But here comes the other side of the coin:
Local tourists have discovered the place as well, and they come in hordes.Chinese people dont have much holiday, but it seems that they spend this year's May holiday (3 days !) all in Fenghuang.
The local "Miao" girls can make a small fortune today just by posing for the tourists, and renting out their costumes, for instance an olivegreen Red Guard uniform with a Kalashnikov gun, for picture taking.
From Fenghuan to Dehang it's only a short distance, but you end up in a different world: Dehang is much smaller, more intimate, less spectacular;there are no important historical buildings, except maybe the old "Jielong bridge", but what makes out the charm of  Dehang is its friendly people, the relaxed athmosphere, plus the nice walking trails up to the  waterfalls, its a  kind of "Swiss alps" feeling up here, I am almost getting homesick!!
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Comments

sgtmaje5h
sgtmaje5h on Oct 21, 2009 at 09:40AM

I am going to fenghuang china to marry ...
I have been to about 200 countries, I was born in sevilla espana, my mother be spanish, my dad be norseman. I was born on marone afb, it no longer exists, I am trying to go to china, Changsha and when I leave I hope I have my inspiration in hand. we have been talking for five years, now she wants a commitment, I want to take her back home to where I grew up washington state. any tips and advice be most appreciated. actually I want a true map of where fenghuang is, I been having a little trouble with it. may I call you Tom...

may you be blessed
sarge

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