Monthly Archives: June 2024

Hangzhou (1) Nine Creeks in Misty Forest

Driving along Zhijiang Road (之江路), passing Liu He Ta (六和塔）and Zhejiang University Zhijiang Campus (浙大之江校区), you’ll arrive at the Nine creeks tourist area. This is one of my favorite places to visit in Hangzhou, especially in June. It is beautiful and cool (temperature). From Zhijiang road where the buses and taxis stop, the walk towards Nine Creeks in Misty Forest is like 1-2 miles, but the trail is covered by the treetops and you don’t even need sunscreen. The creeks run along the trail. The water is clear and not deep, so you can go down anytime to trek the creeks. There are stones and little waterfalls, and it is certainly a fun walk. Of course, remember to bring your water shoes, for the stones can make your feet really hurt.

The left and right sides of the trail are the slopes where the tea trees grow. They are the famous long jing tea production fields. It makes a typical “Jiangnan” （江南）scenery that I often miss when in US. I saw some bike riders, and it indeed looks like fun to ride on this road.

If you are tired of walking, you can spend 8 RMB to take the electric go-cart ride. Here is the map. There are many restaurants and hotels around the area.

The water is originated from the two sources, one from the Shizi peak at the Longjing mountain (龙井狮子峰) and the other is from Yangmei Ling, Wengjia Mountain (杨梅岭，翁家山). The water splits into nine creeks in the area, and eventually they are all merged and enter the Qianjiang river (钱塘江). The longest creek is a total of 7 km.

There are 18 creek-crossing like this along the trail. You can trek through the waters or jump around the stones to cross. You can also rent a tent and some tables/chairs for some tea nearby to enjoy the misty forest, 25-38 RMB per person, dependent on the type of tea.

The ice bars here are shaped with tourist symbols. I have been admiring them.

There are also waterfalls and beautiful Mandarin ducks to see if you hike around. You can play there whole day easily.

What to wear: water shoes (for both hiking and creek walk), T-shirt, shorts
What to bring: water (you can also bring water toys, towel, hat, slippers and bug spray if you don’t mind carrying things)

Northern lights

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I have been wanting to see the northern lights for many years. When I was in Sweden and Voyageurs national park, I especially looked up the sky and imagined that green. One day, they arrived unexpectedly.

I was very busy on 5/10 weekend, and on Saturday morning, when I got up and heard that many parts of the north American saw northern lights last night. “Oh I would’ve driven to the Voyageurs national park if I knew it.” Then the radio said “the northern lights will continue on 5/11 and maybe 5/12”. When it got dark, we headed out to the Ada Hayden lake, the north part of the town. The parking lot is full. The benches around the lake were full. We also saw some tents here and there. The road near the lake had many traffic lights. They were the crowds leaving from the graduation ceremony. It must be a good weekend.

The sky looked purple redish, and near the horizon, it has an edge of yellow green. “Is it the northern light?” We were not sure. The picture below has much more obvious color compared to what we saw in person. We sat in the dark and guessed whether the lights would arrive like lightening. Northern lights are cool because they looked very differently at different places although they happened at the same time in the northern atmosphere.

All the planets are under the horizon that night but it is cheerful to see the starry dippers and the fast moving international space station.

Around 11pmish, the sky has some stronger red and green at places.

It was such a beautiful night. Although my family was hurry to go back to sleep, I was totally in the mood of 20s:

Walk around the lake late at night
Sit in the darkness hand in hand
We watch the stars and chat about the life

Coles Famous Tenderloins

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The memorial day was passed not long ago. We remembered to visit this little restaurant again. It is located in a little town in Iowa called Slater.

This restaurant is run by an old man and his young Philippine wife. It has been here since I moved to Iowa in 2014. There is a popular biking trail across the street, so whenever we came over for a bike ride or skating, we often visited this restaurant. It has excellent root beer float and tenderloins. Every time I went, the owner came over talking to me and started with “are you from Philippine?”

super tenderloin (with onion and brisket)

During the COVID, many restaurants are closed. This one also only opens sporadically, but it is not closed. Later, there was a fire happened in the kitchen and the fire burned half of the restaurant. It was remodeled and opened again, only with more fun flavors. Initially, we ate inside, and after remodeling, we only dine outside or takeout.

On the window near the menu hangs a picture of a handsome young man dressed in the Marine Corps uniform. When we asked, the owner told us that it was his only son, who died in the war (If I remembered correctly, it was the Desert Storm operation). This restaurant was initially started by his son. After the son died, the father decided to continue running this restaurant in memorial of his son and followed his vision. Every time I think of this, I feel something warm and soft inside. It is a tough restaurant although there is a “tender” in its name.

We often learned the history from the textbooks and Internet, which I found is dry and cold. But by coming over here often, I feel I am lively interacting with the history. I often brought my friends over just to support this restaurant. I find glory and gain much energy from this ordinary small restaurant.

(I wrote this story on a plane flying over near Iraq, salute to our heros)