2025 Donna & Dana's China Trip : Day 15; Guangzhou (Sat; 12 Apr)

Tour 2; Day 2

The schedule:

Bullet train - Shaoguan to Guangzhou
Temple of the Six Banyan Trees
Chen Clan Ancestral Hall
Dim Sum Dinner

The day started more reasonably with our normal 7:30-ish buffet breakfast at the hotel then a bus ride to the train station to catch the bullet train back to Guangzhou. I've prattled on enough about the trains here, suffice it to say now that all aspects of bullet train travel were impressive.

We arrived at the Guangzhou train station after a non-stop, 141 mile ride in about 45 minutes to board the tour bus that took us to the Temple of the Six Banyan Trees. Construction of the Buddhist temple began in 537 CE and the Flower Pagoda, the main structure of the temple, was built in 1097, although it has been destroyed and rebuilt at least twice (1373 and 1900). Originally it was originally called the Baozhuangyan Temple but during the Northern Song Dynasty, a writer called Su Shi wrote the inscription Liu Rong (Six Banyan Trees) because of the six banyan trees he saw there and it has since been called the Temple of the Six Banyan Trees. Those trees no longer exist but there were at least two vey impressive banyan trees in the temple courtyard. The Flower Pagoda is interesting in several respects, one of them being that while it looks like a 9-story structure from the outside, inside it has 17 stories. Although the temple grounds were quite small relative to those we've already seen, there were several impressive structures. After about an hour and half it was time to meet back at the entrance and walk to lunch... uh, except "that guy" didn't show up and we all waited a half hour as the tour guide once again went to find him. There was some audible complaining amongst several group members when the tour guide returned with "that guy" in tow, he was oblivious to it all...

We walked to lunch at the HongMian Restaurant that was in the nearby Westin hotel. I noted that it was good, another Chinese banquet, but good nonetheless...

The next event for the day was a visit to the Chen Clan Ancestral Hall, also known as the Chen Clan Academy. This site was similar to those we saw in Shaoguan but I think larger and more extravagant, if that's possible. The hall was originally built in 1894 using money donated by various Chen lineages abroad as well as the 72 counties in Guangdong. It's original purpose was two-fold, a temple for worship of their ancestors and an academy to train their clansmen for the imperial examination during the late Qing dynasty. When the imperial examination was abolished in 1905 the academy became a practical school for members of the clan. During the Cultural Revolution the artwork of the hall was saved from destruction by installing a print shop for publishing works by Mao Zedong. The hall now serves as the Guangdong Folk Art Museum and is a 3.25 acre complex of 19 buildings with nine halls and six courtyards connected by symmetric corridors. The hall is notable for the extensive decorations both inside and outside along almost every beam, column, ridge and wall. The 11 pottery ridge crest is of particular note. There are also extensive wood, plaster and brick carvings as well as iron engraving. The CCAH was nothing short of, yes, spectacular...

After the CCAH it was on to the bus (that guy got the message, or, just happened to show up at the meeting spot on time...) and onwards for a dim sum dinner at the Panxi Restaurant. The restaurant was centered around an extensive water garden of sorts and our group had it's own room. The dim sum was was good and after we'd had as much as we could eat it was on the bus and back to the Voco Guangzhou Sifu Hotel.

The first night we stayed at the Voco we got in late, had to pack for the next day and get up early so we didn't check out the local area (which, from the bus did not look that inviting anyway...). This evening we got back at a reasonable time and found that the hotel actually bordered a very popular shopping street (for lack of a better description) so we ventured out to see what was what. It was actually quite nice. We walked around for a half hour or so then went back to get ready for tomorrow.

A good day all-in-all, so maybe there's hope for tour 2...


A Buddha welcomes us to The Temple of the Six Banyan Trees

This is the backside of the welcome Buddha

Other Buddhas as we make our way into the temple grounds towards...

... The Flower Pagoda

One of two banyan trees we saw...


... same tree, different viewpoint. That's Donna in the lower left taking the picture above. So, I guess that makes this taking a picture of taking a picture of a tree. The excitement never ends for the Taylor Fong-Taylor elder clan...

This is the other banyan tree. These pictures don't really capture the grandeur of these trees, as ususal


There several carved stone pieces displayed on the grounds, here are a couple...

At the base of the Flower Pagoda there were several of these cylinders (gold and black above) surrounding it. The cylinders were free to spin and several people, Buddhists I assume, would offer a gift (like a piece of fruit) and incense at the front of the pagoda then walk around the entire pagoda touching and spinning each cylinder.


We saw this fine example of a banyan tree on our walk from the temple to the restaurant

The HongMian Restaurant at the Westin hotel in Guangzhou

Typical banquet serving, there's room on the lazy susan so we're not even half way into lunch here...

Many of the dishes here (as well as the other places we ate at) were very artistically presented.

The main entrance to the Chen Clan Ancestral Hall


Some close-ups of the pottery along the entrance ridge


Wood carving just as you enter...

The ridge pottery carvings were along every ridge we saw. We took over 100 pictures here, most of mine were of the ridge carvings. The detail is amazing.