Sanqingshan

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Thursday evening I trained out to Nanchang, not getting there until around 10pm. Nathan met me at the train station and we headed to his place, I was beat and wanted an early-ish night.

On Friday we woke up around 5:30am, got ready, and headed to the train station to catch our train which departed at 8am. We found a reasonable mien bao che driver, picked up a few more passengers along the way, and were dropped at the station with plenty of time to spare. We were on the express train which is quite posh, so it was a very comfortable and fairly short ride. The city that our train dropped us off in is still a fair distance from the mountain, so we found another mien bao che driver to drive us to the mountain for a reasonable price.
The drive was gorgeous as we made our way through mountains, countryside, and along lakes. The drive itself took about and hour and a half to two hours, not too shabby. Our driver dropped us at the north-eastern side of the mountain where we decided to catch the cable car up instead of walking along the road trying to find the stairs. It was around 12:30pm then, and the light wouldn't last too many more hours.
The cable car ride was pleasant and short, dropping us off near the Goddess Rock. We slowly made our way up and down many stairs, weaving along narrow pathways, until we came to Sun-Rising Mountain Villa. We were disappointed to discover they had no rooms, mostly because we were tired from getting up so early and for hiking with our backpacksfor so long. After a couple trips up and down some of the paths we found a hotel, the Heaven Gate Mountain Villa. We were wiped and crashed early.

On Saturday we abandoned the bags in our hotel room and made our way back up to the Sun-Rising Mountain Villa. After talking to one of the porters we decided to take the path leading west, and also what turned out to be the longest way. However, the views were breathtaking and we were spit out at a nice lake and the Sanqing Temple. After looking around that area for awhile, we decided to head for Yujing Peak and along a different path which would take us back to the Sun-Rising Mountain Villa. Despite my protesting legs, Nathan and I climbed to the top of Yujing Peak, a whopping 1819.9 meters tall. Unfortunately a thick mist and rain had settled over us, so the views were mostly of the gray clouds that surrounded us.
We headed down from the peak and back along the alternate pathway where we discovered a great bridge and a place where there were glass tile so you could look down at the drop, eventually ending up back at the SRMV. We were both soaked from the rain, tired from the climb (stairs) and hungry. At the hotel we made instant curries, took hot showers, and collapsed into bed, falling asleep around 8pm.

Sunday morning we departed the hotel around noon, carrying our backpacks. We were ready to go home. We took the cable car down the mountain, found the bus, and hopped on. It was a two hour ride to the bus station, then a half hour taxi ride to the train station which we arrived at with plenty of time left to get snacks and relax before catching the train.
We arrived in Nanchang around 9pm. Cary managed to find us at the station, so he and I got tickets back to Jiujiang together. Nathan headed off to meet Nick so they could share a cab ride back to their campus together, while Cary and I went to McDonalds for some dinner. Cary and I caught our train and spent the ride playing Cribbage. I still don't quite get it.
I finished up my lesson plan around midnight-thirty and crashed into bed by 1am.

Today my kids were great! I made up a lesson plan where I spoke as little as possible and they spoke as much as possible, and it went amazingly well. The 10am class was a little painful, and most of the boys in the 2:30pm class didn't do their homework (to punish them I made them stand up and come sit in the front of the class, which actually forced them to participate). This is a good lesson, but kind of tiring for me since I have to stand up there like a cheerleader trying to get them to talk. It takes about half an hour, but they do open up eventually. We'll see how tomorrow goes.

Pictures for Sanqingshan can be see here.