[First up, full disclosure.  I’m getting this into iWeb on Friday the 21st.  For some reason, it doesn’t seem that iWeb wants you to retroactively post a blog entry.  You can change the date, but it seems that that always forces the time to midnight, and then the entries don’t sort properly.  So, if you want to posta  couple of updates for one day, like I want to for Wednesday the 19th, you’re SOL.  Maybe I’m missing something.  I’ve faked up the date entries on the log pages, but the overview and archive tell the true story...]

 

Yesterday afternoon, Max, Bruce, Delia and I went to the ancient town of Tongli.  This is basically a 10-minute drive from the hotel where we are staying, and is one of several historic towns in the area.

 

Tongli has been on its present site for over 1,000 years.  The buildings, though, are more recent.  Most of them are “only” 400 years old.  In other words, older than the USA by rather a lot.  Around that time, it was definitely good to be one of the couple of really rich families in town.  Heck, not much has changed.

 

This was a fun trip.  It was a little depressing that so much of the village is totally given over to tourist shops selling either kitsch or knockoffs of name brands (Louis Buitton handbag, anyone?).  But, the actual historic sites were really beautiful and neat.  We didn’t manage to see nearly everything, since the morning was spent at the factory.  But, I don’t think I could have taken much more sightseeing with a 17” PowerBook slung to my back!  I had to go get a massage at the hotel to recover (90 minute massage for about $35!).

 

More pics are on the China pictures page, but I will say that these visits really reinforced my desire to have a house with an interior courtyard.  These estates were all built that way, and the tranquility and quiet inside when the street outside was really pretty busy was impressive.  Of course, these were huge estates, but even some of the small interior spaces were really beautiful.

 

As I mentioned before, in this area, they really like the dramatic rocks that are apparently naturally occurring, so they tend to feature interesting specimens either in the landscaping, or in a couple of cases indoors on a little stand.

 

All in all, the landscaping and layout was very pleasing.  I took lots of pictures.