Thousand Islets

Weekend of the 17th May we went to The Thousand Islets (Qian Dao Hu) with our Chinese friends Andrew and Stella. It is his home town and both he and Stella were happy to accompany us, particularly as Stella wanted to spend time with her mother in law talking baby talk. It is a beautiful area 2 hours south west of Hangzhou by bus - still in Zhejiang Province. It is/was a range of mountains that were flooded about 1958 and the islets are in fact the mountain tops. A huge undertaking. the villages and towns in the mountains are still on the mountain sides UNDER the dam.




Fishing is of course a big part of the economy here and there are many of these fishing boats to be seen with fishermen mending their nets and cleaning their fish. I hope you can see the fishing rod made of bamboo and the spinner wheel as well. it seems to work just fine as he had a good catch on his boat.















The town was fascinating even though it was quite small. it is built on the hillside and by going up a series of stairs you arrive at another level of the town. All along the stairs and the passageways up the hillside are vendors selling slippers and sleeve protectors and plastic goods and shoe laces etc etc etc.......




This is how the street vendors weigh the fruit you might purchase from them. Such a simple little device but it does the job







.........and of course wonderful hot freshly cooked street food.