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Another China photo entry!
During the course of the boat ride up the Yangtze, there was a great deal of downtime and not much to do with it. There were few options for things to do other than sitting on the boat; I opted to do one of them, the Fengdu Ghost Village. Which was actually rather fun, in a somewhat touristy way. I enjoyed wandering around and taking pictures, and reading about various Daoist myths as catalogued on plaques around the grounds. Overall it was a little surreal; for a place meant to represent a highly creative afterlife, I suppose that's only to be expected.
This is the gate going in, which is remarkably cheerful and bright despite being the "enterance to the afterlife" or whatever. Competing with a gloomy, overcast sky is somewhat to its detriment, though.
The people sitting behind me in the chairway, and their puppy.
The first of the temples in the complex. I don't know if they count for being actual temples or not, given the theme-park nature of the place, but there you go.
The courtyard inside. I like the contrast between these pictures.
One of the arhat statues inside. I saw Buddha statues and arhat statues in temples throughout China, but these are the only ones I took pictures of out of respect for the various temples and their worshippers. There were no worshippers here, really, just people with cameras. This one was holding a dog, which was pulling at his earing, and had a comical expression on his face.
And this one had a Buddha in his stomach!
A lush courtyard garden.
My first picture of incense for this trip, beginning of a trend.
A gate that I especially liked because of the bats.
This temple had either been recently restored or was simply well-maintained. It appeared to have actual monks and worshippers, so I limited my photos to architectural details.
Fun statues of demons.
Another gate that I liked.
Supposedly in this tower ghosts were given their last chance to look back towards their homes and "cry their eyes out." At which point they'd be fully dead. Very cheerful, don't you think?
The enterance to the "Palace of Heaven."
The gate gaurdians.
The dragon gaurdians.
Close-ups.
You don't really want to go to hell, because these are the guys responsible for thinking of ways to entertain you there.
I liked this tower, with its pleasant courtyard setting.
The other side of the park was the so-called "Ghost Street," and had a much more third-class amusement park feel to it, which culminated when I entered the Chinese equivalent of a haunted house. Still, the scale was impressive.
The entrance.
No, there's nothing ominous about this gate.
Or this one.
Ghost Street kinda reminds me of Spirited Away, actually.
That was the whole of the Ghost Village. I was the only one in the tour group who went, but according to the others I didn't miss anything exciting; there was no town nearby outside a single street of shops, so they spent the time pursuing quiet activities on the boat.
During the course of the boat ride up the Yangtze, there was a great deal of downtime and not much to do with it. There were few options for things to do other than sitting on the boat; I opted to do one of them, the Fengdu Ghost Village. Which was actually rather fun, in a somewhat touristy way. I enjoyed wandering around and taking pictures, and reading about various Daoist myths as catalogued on plaques around the grounds. Overall it was a little surreal; for a place meant to represent a highly creative afterlife, I suppose that's only to be expected.
This is the gate going in, which is remarkably cheerful and bright despite being the "enterance to the afterlife" or whatever. Competing with a gloomy, overcast sky is somewhat to its detriment, though.
The people sitting behind me in the chairway, and their puppy.
The first of the temples in the complex. I don't know if they count for being actual temples or not, given the theme-park nature of the place, but there you go.
The courtyard inside. I like the contrast between these pictures.
One of the arhat statues inside. I saw Buddha statues and arhat statues in temples throughout China, but these are the only ones I took pictures of out of respect for the various temples and their worshippers. There were no worshippers here, really, just people with cameras. This one was holding a dog, which was pulling at his earing, and had a comical expression on his face.
And this one had a Buddha in his stomach!
A lush courtyard garden.
My first picture of incense for this trip, beginning of a trend.
A gate that I especially liked because of the bats.
This temple had either been recently restored or was simply well-maintained. It appeared to have actual monks and worshippers, so I limited my photos to architectural details.
Fun statues of demons.
Another gate that I liked.
Supposedly in this tower ghosts were given their last chance to look back towards their homes and "cry their eyes out." At which point they'd be fully dead. Very cheerful, don't you think?
The enterance to the "Palace of Heaven."
The gate gaurdians.
The dragon gaurdians.
Close-ups.
You don't really want to go to hell, because these are the guys responsible for thinking of ways to entertain you there.
I liked this tower, with its pleasant courtyard setting.
The other side of the park was the so-called "Ghost Street," and had a much more third-class amusement park feel to it, which culminated when I entered the Chinese equivalent of a haunted house. Still, the scale was impressive.
The entrance.
No, there's nothing ominous about this gate.
Or this one.
Ghost Street kinda reminds me of Spirited Away, actually.
That was the whole of the Ghost Village. I was the only one in the tour group who went, but according to the others I didn't miss anything exciting; there was no town nearby outside a single street of shops, so they spent the time pursuing quiet activities on the boat.
