Hiking Pics from the 2 Yuan Mountain-Take 2

Here was me in my quite refreshed-pre-5 hour hike mode...and as any good Chinese person would do, I took my turn posing in front of each and every monument & sight there was to see. So this is me in front of the fountain, where the tram let us off. There were SO many people there! I think a quarter of the population of Guanghzou must have been on the mountain on Saturday! I was amazed truly at how many people we saw!

about 2/3 of the way down, Tita & I stopped for some light snacks...there was a banana & orange break, but this break was for some really fantastic doufu soup! SO good. Tita explained that this is the step before it becomes doufu- to make it doufu they squeeze all the air out of it. In this "step" it's still very light and airy, like a light custard. This was in a sweet sugared soup, with sweet red beans. It was very tasty and refreshing to sit in the shade and sip on this soup!

Across the road from where we sat and ate our soup, there was a statue that everyone was going up and taking pictures with. So yes- here I am again, this time with the Pearl Girl. I typed out the story below since I think it will be too difficult to read the sign in the last picture.

A Story of the Pearl Girl

The Pearl Girl was a disciple of Grandma Huang Daopo, a famous textile worker in the Yuan Dynasty. The legend goes that after Huang Daopo had learned the skills of cotton textile from the people of the Li nationality in Hainan Island, on her way home via Guangzhou, She began to teach the local people how to weave. Among the students, one of the girls learned the techniques very conscientiously, and eventually got Huang Daopo’s skills completely. Before she left, Huang Daopo left a shuttle for the girl as a present. The shuttle suddenly turned into a pearl and inlaid between the girl’s eyebrows. Thus she got the name Pearl Girl.

Years later, the Pearl Girl was invited by the fairies to weave beautiful clothes in the Heaven because of her masterful skills in the textile industry. However the fairyland was was high aloof from the earth, thanks to the bright pearl on her forehead, it called in many shuttles to pave a path leading directly to the Heaven. The Pearl Girl walked up along the path, she realized her dream and wish at last.

From then on, it is said that if you hold a pearl in front of the statue of the Pearl Girl and walk along the shuttled road to the wish tree, and tie the pearl on it, waiting for the coming of a full-moon night, when the moon and the pearl shines together, your wish will come true.

So this was the tree for all of the wishes. You can see bits of red cloth in the branches- after we took photos we saw someone selling red strips of cloth with little sacks tied on the end to weight them down. We saw many people winding up and throwing their wishes into the tree. I was very excited until I realized the little weighted sacks contained only sand, no pearl. No wish for me, but it was very fun to watch the people throwing their wishes up into the tree all the same. It usually took a couple of throws to get it to 'stick'.
On the same side of the road as the little outdoor restaurant where we found the soup, there was a small lake. There was a wooden boardwalk running along one side where many people were throwing food into the lake for the fish. There were hundreds and hundreds of fish, and every time another handful of food went in, there was an all out battle for the fish to get it. It was really fun to watch, but it kinda made you wonder if they are really starving out there?