Yesterday I had the pleasure of visiting the famous West Lake area of Hangzhou with my colleague Gené van Heerden and four of her marketing students, who kindly gave up their Saturday to show us around this very scenic spot.

Because there are quite a few photos in this post, I have made them into thumbnails. If you click on the thumbnails you should get a popup window with the full sized photo. You may need to disable popup blockers for this site. If you have problems please let me know via the comments.

Here's some examples of some of the scenery. These popups are quite large but most of the rest on this page are a lot smaller. There's a couple more picture postcard shots at the end of this post

West Lake is justifiably renowned for its beauty, and despite the pressures of Hangzhou's 6.4 million people on its doorstep, still seems to maintain an air of tranquility and calm. This is in part due to the almost complete absence of motor boats on the lake, and also due to the network of causeways that allow people to stroll and cycle away from the busy roads that run close to the lake shore.

This map gives you some idea of our tour. After a short taxi ride from downtown Hangzhou, we started walking on the Baidi causeway to the "Broken Bridge", so called because it looks broken after snow fall in Winter.

Left is Broken Bridge. Right is a picture of our trusty tour guides. Clockwise from kneeling we have How, Ruud, Alice, and Star.

We found an interesting art place that was in an historic building. It was full of beautiful traditional Chinese paintings, and we interrupted the local artists who were just having their lunch. They seemed genuinely very enthusiastic about their work and showed us their line sketches of the area. These were strictly not for sale.

In China it is very easy to take pictures of cute kids, and there were plenty of them on this walk. So I have thrown in a couple for good measure. I also took a picture of a Chinese couple who obviously were very keen on pink. Enough said. Hunger soon took hold and we went in search of food back on the main road. This took a rather bizarre course, as myself and Gené were quite happy with the local food, but the students were really hanging out for KFC. Personally speaking, I would rather drain used sump oil from my car and try to gain nutrition from that than eat KFC, but I respected their needs. In the end Gené and I smuggled our Chinese food into KFC while our trusty guides ate the new found Chinese delicacy.

After lunch, we explored the myriad of botanical gardens that were on our side of the road, where a maze of gardens and sculptures revealed themselves to us. There was an interesting range of sculptures from traditional Chinese statues to Henry Moore-esque modern art. I found the Shepherd Boy and sheep installation quite intriguing, and the girls were obviously quite taken by one of the sheep, shown below. Gené seemed to find the old Chinese scholar quite tactile too. Arriving back at the road, we caught a taxi to the nearby Qinghefang Street. This is one of the oldest streets in Hangzhou, and has some old buildings and interesting shops. There is a variety of places selling all sorts of goodies from silks and leather goods to good old Chinese plastic tack and generic souvenirs (including items from Nepal and Africa). There were some shops selling colourful clothing which was a visual treat in itself, as these photos show.

There was a tourist "attraction" which enabled a passing sucker to dress up in traditional costume. I thought this would provide an excellent opportunity for me to do what I do best, act like a complete plonker. Donning this Chinese Emperor's outfit rapidly brought a huge crowd of onlookers who were obviously enjoying every minute of my ritual public humilation.

One of the more interesting emporia on this street was a traditional Chinese medicine pharmacy and clinic. There was also the added bonus of free green tea to all and sundry who came into the shop. This had a special meaning for us, as we'd narrowly avoided paying around $20 for a cup of tea in an "Authentic Chinese Tea Shoppe".

Next stop on our hectic schedule was to visit the iconic Leifeng Pagoda. We decided to leave seeing inside this impressive building until next time, but it was very enjoyable walking around the grounds and gardens as the sun was setting. Leifeng Pagoda has significance because of the Legend of the White Snake in which a snake demon called Bai SuZhen takes on a human form. She falls for a scholar called Xu Xian and have a child. Well, to cut a long story short, Bai ends up imprisoned in Leifeng Pagoda for eternity.

Unfortunately, some Japanese pirates in the Ming Dynasty destroyed most of Leifeng, and it was not until 1999 that the Pagoda was rebuilt to its former glory.

Here's a couple more large popup "picture postcard" shots. One shows Leifeng Pagoda in the background. We finished off our tour by taking a slow amble down the beautiful Sudi causeway back towards the downtown area of Hangzhou. As the sun was setting, it was hard to get any more photos. However, it was a very peaceful stroll, and thankfully getting cooler after what was a hot and sticky day.

Thanks to Star, How, Ruud and Alice for being such excellent hosts, and to Gené for being such great company.