China Tour 2018

BEIJING 5/7 – 5/11

  • Beijing, the capital of the People’s Republic of China, was the first stop on our engineering abroad tour. Many of us took a flight from Newark Liberty International Airport (EWR) and flew into Beijing Capital (PEK) Airport – we landed in Terminal 3, which is one of the largest airport terminals in the world.  The airport itself was magnificent, and marvel of its own.  One of our first major stops was the Forbidden City, which house emperors for a couple hundred years – it was amazing to observe the immense size of the palace, as well as the design (and the fact that this place was built hundreds of years ago).  Another highlight of Beijing was venturing out to see a portion of the Great Wall of China.  The views in every single direction were breathtaking (even though it was quite a climb to the top)!  Lastly, one of the most fascinating elements of Beijing was the architecture and the layout of the city.  The most interesting building was the CMG headquarters, often called the “Pants Building” – what was so fascinating about this building was that constructing this structure was only made possible recently by improvements in finite element analysis technology.  Beijing was certainly a fun destination to begin the trip and was rich of history and culture I’m glad I got to experience.

XI’AN 5/13 – 5/15

  • Our third stop on the trip was visiting the city of Xi’an. Xi’an is one of China’s most famous inland cities but is well known to tourists for its Terra-Cotta Warriors museum.  The Terra-Cotta Warriors museum is fascinating itself, but my favorite part of visiting this city was getting to bike the City Wall – 8.7 miles long, this wall was built in the 14th Century, with the purpose as a military defense system.  It has been refurbished many times, but it is a great way to cover a lot of ground in a short amount of time.  Another interesting part of Xi’an was getting to tour the Muslim Snack Street – tons of exotic food vendors lined up on the sides of a pedestrian streets, with bright, colorful signs.  Xi’an is also famous for its noodles, particularly its cold noodles, and its pork-burgers – the food here was some of the best in China.

YANGTZE RIVER CRUISE 5/15 – 5/19

  • In the middle of our tour, we took a cruise along the Yangtze River – our boat was called the Century Legend. This is the longest river in Asia and is home to breathtaking scenery as well as The Three Gorges Dam.  This recently constructed dam was built for several reasons – to control flooding downstream (which has been catastrophic some years in the past), to provide hydro-electric power (this dam provides 1/9 of all of China’s electricity), and to increase shipping capacity along the Yangtze (primarily between Chongqing and Shanghai).  Other highlights of this river cruise were getting to explore (on planned excursions) some of the gorges via smaller boats, performances, and visiting the Shibaozhai Pagoda (full of many different Buddhist statues and exhibits, including the temple of hell).

CHONGQING 5/19 – 5/22

  • Our final stop on the river cruise was docking in Chongqing in the morning, and this city was very different than the previous ones. Many foreigners know of Shanghai and Beijing, but Chongqing happens to be one of the largest metropolitan areas in the world as well – I was surprised with the cities geographical layout of steep cliffs, windy, narrow roads, and how the buildings were adapted to the landscape.  Highlights of Chongqing include the colorful lit up buildings at night, the zoo (seeing the giant panda), and eating hot pot.

SHANGHAI/SUZHOU 5/28 – 6/2

  • The last city we visited in China was Shanghai, the largest city in the world – about 24 million people call this city home (three times the population of New York City). This was by far the most developed, wealthy, and foreign-friendly cities.  Because this city is so large and populated, traffic and pollution were a problem, but the sights of the city made up for this.  We had a chance to visit the Shanghai Tower, the second tallest building in the world, topping over 2,000 feet (and home to the world’s tallest observation deck).  The view was incredible at the top of the building. Additionally, our hotel was located a walk away from The Bund – a view of the CBD skyline at night across the river that is absolutely stunning.  One of my favorite parts of visiting Shanghai was getting to experience the metro (subway), high-speed train (day trip to Suzhou, where we visited the gardens the city is famous for), and the magnetic levitation train to Pudong Airport.  The Shanghai maglev is the fastest operational train in the world, reaching 268 miles per hour.  Shanghai was definitely my favorite city we visited, and I would love to visit this city again because there is so much more to see.

Submitted by William Snyder

wms5142@psu.edu

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