South Korea/China: Ming tombs, Dr. Sun Yat-sen's Mausoleum
... and more of the Nanjing city wall, plus a stop at the most famous restaurant for dog in Nanjing.
The rest of John's friends arrived the night before-- Mike and Emily, and Yuan. Dim sum was a fancy place-- tons of little individual dishes for everyone. Very different than it is here or in Hong Kong. The long walk up the hill to Dr. Sun Yat-Sen's Mausoleum, then more walking around Ming-era tombs and statues in the outskirts of Nanjing showed plenty of forests and nature in China. The area is subtle in appearance: it's huge, but mostly left to the forests, with the blue roofs and stone walkways rather than more gaudy buildings. Supposedly we weren't supposed to climb on the animal statues near the Ming tombs, but no one told us that, nor did we see any signs, and plenty of others were doing it... uhhh... umm... **trails off into silence**
We tried to hit one more place, but it was closed or something. IIRC it was an aerial walkway over the forest. Instead we walked down the mountain-- fortunately a short way-- and made it to a park with a large stone. From there we found a few taxis to get us back to the hotel.
Dinner was hot pot, complete with slices of dog meat, a local speciality in Nanjing along with duck/duck blood. Walking up, even John was shocked at how ghetto it was. Inside, fortunately wasn't too bad, and the meal was delicious. I wouldn't go out of my way to eat dog again, but the meal itself was pretty good, novelty and all.
If memory serves, we did get very good massages that night, too. Compared to the lousy massages we had in Shanghai later in the trip, these were awesome. And downright cheap compared to what it costs in the US!
