I'm sick today, so I'm going to update the blog; yep, it's about time.
A few weeks ago (Sun, July 18)Julien, Trever and I all went to this amazing water park called Hanxi Changlong (Chimelong) Water Park; it's actually one of Guangzhou's biggest attractions, and only one metro stop away from ShiQiao! The park is one of two parks at Hanxi Changlong, the other is Chimelong Paradise, where all the roller coaster rides and lumberjack shows are. The park opens at 9:30am, and we arrived at 10. There were almost no lines in the morining! So we hit up as many as possible in those first few hours, especially one called the Behemoth Bowl, where you sit in a raft for 4 people and go around this toilet bowl. That was probably my favorite ride. The lines were the biggest in the afternoon, which was a good chance for the Chinese to get a good long look at us 3 odd-looking foreigners. In one line this one girl was poking Trever's blue-and-green eyes, and called them, "piaoliang," or pretty. Then when the line zig-zagged back again, she did so once more, etc. On another line, Julien rubbed his super-hairy chest and a bunch of Chinese people cheered.
The lockers cost a 20RMB (~$3 USD), with a 20RMB deposit, which isn't cheap by Chinese standards, but they're a necessity; but what surprised us was that the inner tubes cost at least 20RMB, as opposed to coming with the package when you enter the park. They were worth it; the park didn't have merely a lazy river, it had an Action River! The river had a few different themes (one for each section of the river), one of which was a "winter-land," with Christmas decorations and ice-cold water dripping on you, and another was a wave-pool like area of the river.
The water park also had 3 speed slides, which were among my favorite rides. We met a Russian guy, on vacation from Vladivostok, in line. From the line we could also see the brand new, high-end White Tiger (the mascot of Changlong) Restaurant, with a banner advertising such things as "Fresh Sesfoods." Sesfoods! Really, China, no spell check?
For dinner we had fried noodles and spicy squid-on-a-stick, it was all quite delicious! After sundown the wave pool had a concert (the stage sticks out into the wave pool), but the three of us took advantage of the lack of lines to fit in some more rides before the park closed. We met and rode on the "Tornado" (another huge raft ride) with some Columbian people. And by that time I had realized that the sun had completely burnt me to a crisp! I am still peeling just a bit to this day. Altogether, we were there for 12 hours. It was a great fun day!