Nanjing was a city that we just added on the end of our trip mostly so we didn’t have to go back to Shanghai early, where we’ve already been.
It is the ancient southern capital of China.
I didn’t expect it to be one of the most aesthetic places on the planet.
Word(s) of the day
Nan 南 - South Jing 京- Capital
On the train to Nanjing, we we’re trying to pick a hotel with a nice view for our final city. We found one.
Nanjing is ridiculously nice looking. It has my three of my favorite styles all in one place:
- Ancient asian temples
- Brutalist concrete apartment blocks
- Cyberpunk future towers
Day 1
This is an ancient area on the south end of nanjing where the Confucius temple is located. This is where people would study the teachings of Confucius. Nanjing is also known for its city wall, the longest ancient city wall remaining in the world.
When we got off the train here, we walked past some Hanfu clothing stores. These are places where they will dress you up in traditional royal clothing. It’s pretty popular with the women there to do this and take pictures, and when Kai said she always wanted to try it, it was kind of a no brainer.
So for the rest of the day Kai looked like a princess.
We spent a long time exploring the old areas, the canals, and the ancient wall.
Nanjing has a huge lake with islands in the center, a large mountain, and the city - with it’s modern and ancient parts intermingled.
Next we went to Jiming Temple, on a hill overlooking the lake. The south shore of the lake also has the wall running around it.
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| Later the evening we went back to the canal to return the clothes |
Day 2
Purple Mountain
We decided to do a hike up the Purple Mountain today. An easy subway ride took us right to a trail leading to the top. After a steep path we got our reward:
The previous day I also found a beautiful hat-scarf
Zifeng Tower
After exploring the mountain for a while, we hiked back down (almost accidentally walking into a military zone) and took the subway right to the middle. I wanted to see the big skyscraper up close.
This building is another one of those tall ones - the Zifeng Tower stands at 1,450 ft - exactly one Chicago sears tower.
I also learned it is designed by the same architect who designed the Trump Tower in Chicago - Adrian Smith. You can see the similarities in their design. This ended up being one of my favorite skyscraper designs - it’s quite imposing in person.
Skyscraper Cat
We now had to rush to make our train to shanghai - we were leaving China today. We got one last meal from a street shop - a final Chinese hamburger.
Lake Xuanwu
The train station is on the north shore of the lake, and we were on the south. It was perfect to finally walk across the islands.
The islands are rich with history. They used to be walled off, where the royals built their palaces and gardens.
I’m not kidding when I say this last walk was one of the prettiest I’ve have ever been on.
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Of course made bitter sweet with the knowledge we were on our way to leave.
Nanjing was our last stop in China. We got on our train and made it back to Shanghai. After a quick ramen stop, we made it to the airport - and our flight back to London.
China was a huge adventure full of ups and downs. We needed to cancel our original plans, and doing so lead us to discover new things. It’s a country of extremes - the tallest, the longest, the biggest - they can be found in China.