Mysterious Sue
Strata Poster
Back in August I had the delight of visiting China's industrial heartland - the city of Baotou, Inner Mongolia, and as any good coaster enthusiast would do, I spent all my spare time hunting for creds in the wilderness. On the way home I scheduled a few days in Beijing, as my flight connected through there anyway, and mopped up Happy Valley Beijing and two other parks around the city. Here's the lowdown and some pictures of dodgy creds, copyright infringement and a little bit of culture...
I was slightly nervous about Baotou because 1. I'd been told about the permanent yellow cloud of chemical waste that hovers over the city that makes it hard to breathe, especially in August, and 2. my flight connection into the city was 5 hours delayed due to severe flooding! My reservations were unfounded however, as the place looked quite clean and modern and more importantly, dry and lacking ominous clouds of death.
The first few days were taken up by work. I’m going to indulge myself a little and tell you about my time pre-creds, as it was quite exciting! I was there to give a paper at a conference and to visit a mine and some chemical plants across the city. This particular mine exploits minerals called rare earths and it's by far the largest one in the world. We were the first foreigners to ever be allowed to see the mine as normally it's guarded and shrouded by secrecy, so this was quite a big deal for me! The conference it turns out, was more of a festival - there were 2000 people, an opening ceremony for a new exhibition centre, all of the state officials were there, dancers and drummers and coloured rockets and a pop concert in the olympic arena (yes Inner Mongolian music is exactly what you'd imagine it would be) complete with fireworks round the edge of the arena arranged by the same company that did the Beijing olympic fireworks. This ‘festival’ was HUGE and I had to give a paper in front of EVERYONE! Needless to say I was umm... a bit nervous...
Typical China: you spend loads on an Olympic venue and then fill it with garden chairs!
...and I had to eat weird foods like sea cucumber
One day we got a police escort 150km up to the mine with army/police guards holding up all the traffic for us and placed sporadically along the road for most of the way! The charming girl on the bus (whose English name was apparently Steven) sung us traditional songs to while away the time. We also had a toilet stop half way up the mountain...in a sunflower field. When we got there, we were not allowed to take any photos, and they'd actually closed the mine for the day so that there was nothing in operation that we could spy on!
Only some of the journey had roads, the rest was very bumpy - this is the new road that was being built – we had to drive around it!
In the evening, I had to take part in a ceremony at dinner. Being a speaker and a girl, I was quite an honoured guest. Firstly this meant drinking HUGE amounts for VERY STRONG (but very nice) rice wine. I also had to lead the way up a red carpet to the stage, where someone wheeled out a whole roast sheep. I was told that I’d have to take the ceremonial knife, carve it into the head of the sheep (!), turn and bow to someone with some rice wine, drink it and then turn back to the group. I did all this and turned round, only to find that everyone else (ie all the state officials) were waiting to toast me with their wine, and I was supposed to have done the same! Bugger! Ohh well, they didn’t seem too offended that I’d messed up!
The carpet I had to walk up
The sheep I had to carve, covered in drapes
I also got to see some chemical plants in the town – some of which were new and clean, but others were, lets say, less than health and safety conscious – put it this way, I didn’t need to bleach my hair afterwards judging by the hefty scent of ammonia wafting out of the open tanks. One of the tourist attractions in town was a cultural theme park called Grasslands. I got to visit it and do some horseriding there . The guys in charge of the horseriding used no reigns and just grabbed onto the horse’s mane, leant forward and went for it. They thought my ‘sit-up-straight in the saddle and going up and down to trot’ idea of riding was very funny indeed!
Mongolian hot pot restaurant – you heat a soup over a gas ring in the middle of the table and then all dip your raw meat in it to cook.
You also get to pick which part of the seep you want to eat by circling it on a menu!
So, I finally got an afternoon off to hunt for creds. Taxis were CHEAP, but people don’t really ‘do maps’ in China and I didn’t really know the names of the places I wanted to go to. Armed with some google map images and a rough postcode I’d pulled down from RCDB, I had a go. The first place was the pretty Laodong Park – a town park with some pay-per-ride creds. Sadly no-one seemed to be operating the rides. There was someone mowing the grass around one ride but the state of some of them was putting me off from trying too hard.
Psychos were not allowed in the park. I wasn't owning up to anything!
Very tatty looking log flume
Cred or not a cred?
Prize every time
Zorbing in a pond?
Then I headed towards the place that looked like a proper theme park on rcdb. The taxi went on past something that I thought looked right, so I made noises, got out and headed back to investigate
Yep, I’d guessed right. The exterior had the feel of a ghost-town and there couldn’t have been more than 20 people in the whole park. Cue people pointing, taking photos and the general weirdness of ‘relatively tall western girl goes to theme park in the middle of nowhere’.
I paid my pound to get in (although the rides cost extra). The view as you enter is quite nice.
The entrance map is however, less than useful
Love the streetlights
Obligatory golden horse spinner, complete with the usual chain to hold in the restraint +1
A copy of whatever the looping ride was at the last park. I sat on the ride, let the ride op secure my restraint by wrapping round the seatbelt (always fills me with confidence), got told how to brace my head and feet in case of shocks, got a high five...then he presses the button to go and leaps into the seat beside me!!!!! Holy crap!!!
Throw the hoop over the bird in a cage game
OMG BEST SLIDE IN THE **** WORLD!!!
Couldn’t get the shuttles as no one was around
Same with the jungle mouse
And thank god this monstrosity appeared to be SBNO
Next time I return to civilisation and tackle the crowds of Beijing...
I was slightly nervous about Baotou because 1. I'd been told about the permanent yellow cloud of chemical waste that hovers over the city that makes it hard to breathe, especially in August, and 2. my flight connection into the city was 5 hours delayed due to severe flooding! My reservations were unfounded however, as the place looked quite clean and modern and more importantly, dry and lacking ominous clouds of death.
The first few days were taken up by work. I’m going to indulge myself a little and tell you about my time pre-creds, as it was quite exciting! I was there to give a paper at a conference and to visit a mine and some chemical plants across the city. This particular mine exploits minerals called rare earths and it's by far the largest one in the world. We were the first foreigners to ever be allowed to see the mine as normally it's guarded and shrouded by secrecy, so this was quite a big deal for me! The conference it turns out, was more of a festival - there were 2000 people, an opening ceremony for a new exhibition centre, all of the state officials were there, dancers and drummers and coloured rockets and a pop concert in the olympic arena (yes Inner Mongolian music is exactly what you'd imagine it would be) complete with fireworks round the edge of the arena arranged by the same company that did the Beijing olympic fireworks. This ‘festival’ was HUGE and I had to give a paper in front of EVERYONE! Needless to say I was umm... a bit nervous...
Typical China: you spend loads on an Olympic venue and then fill it with garden chairs!
...and I had to eat weird foods like sea cucumber
One day we got a police escort 150km up to the mine with army/police guards holding up all the traffic for us and placed sporadically along the road for most of the way! The charming girl on the bus (whose English name was apparently Steven) sung us traditional songs to while away the time. We also had a toilet stop half way up the mountain...in a sunflower field. When we got there, we were not allowed to take any photos, and they'd actually closed the mine for the day so that there was nothing in operation that we could spy on!
Only some of the journey had roads, the rest was very bumpy - this is the new road that was being built – we had to drive around it!
In the evening, I had to take part in a ceremony at dinner. Being a speaker and a girl, I was quite an honoured guest. Firstly this meant drinking HUGE amounts for VERY STRONG (but very nice) rice wine. I also had to lead the way up a red carpet to the stage, where someone wheeled out a whole roast sheep. I was told that I’d have to take the ceremonial knife, carve it into the head of the sheep (!), turn and bow to someone with some rice wine, drink it and then turn back to the group. I did all this and turned round, only to find that everyone else (ie all the state officials) were waiting to toast me with their wine, and I was supposed to have done the same! Bugger! Ohh well, they didn’t seem too offended that I’d messed up!
The carpet I had to walk up
The sheep I had to carve, covered in drapes
I also got to see some chemical plants in the town – some of which were new and clean, but others were, lets say, less than health and safety conscious – put it this way, I didn’t need to bleach my hair afterwards judging by the hefty scent of ammonia wafting out of the open tanks. One of the tourist attractions in town was a cultural theme park called Grasslands. I got to visit it and do some horseriding there . The guys in charge of the horseriding used no reigns and just grabbed onto the horse’s mane, leant forward and went for it. They thought my ‘sit-up-straight in the saddle and going up and down to trot’ idea of riding was very funny indeed!
Mongolian hot pot restaurant – you heat a soup over a gas ring in the middle of the table and then all dip your raw meat in it to cook.
You also get to pick which part of the seep you want to eat by circling it on a menu!
So, I finally got an afternoon off to hunt for creds. Taxis were CHEAP, but people don’t really ‘do maps’ in China and I didn’t really know the names of the places I wanted to go to. Armed with some google map images and a rough postcode I’d pulled down from RCDB, I had a go. The first place was the pretty Laodong Park – a town park with some pay-per-ride creds. Sadly no-one seemed to be operating the rides. There was someone mowing the grass around one ride but the state of some of them was putting me off from trying too hard.
Psychos were not allowed in the park. I wasn't owning up to anything!
Very tatty looking log flume
Cred or not a cred?
Prize every time
Zorbing in a pond?
Then I headed towards the place that looked like a proper theme park on rcdb. The taxi went on past something that I thought looked right, so I made noises, got out and headed back to investigate
Yep, I’d guessed right. The exterior had the feel of a ghost-town and there couldn’t have been more than 20 people in the whole park. Cue people pointing, taking photos and the general weirdness of ‘relatively tall western girl goes to theme park in the middle of nowhere’.
I paid my pound to get in (although the rides cost extra). The view as you enter is quite nice.
The entrance map is however, less than useful
Love the streetlights
Obligatory golden horse spinner, complete with the usual chain to hold in the restraint +1
A copy of whatever the looping ride was at the last park. I sat on the ride, let the ride op secure my restraint by wrapping round the seatbelt (always fills me with confidence), got told how to brace my head and feet in case of shocks, got a high five...then he presses the button to go and leaps into the seat beside me!!!!! Holy crap!!!
Throw the hoop over the bird in a cage game
OMG BEST SLIDE IN THE **** WORLD!!!
Couldn’t get the shuttles as no one was around
Same with the jungle mouse
And thank god this monstrosity appeared to be SBNO
Next time I return to civilisation and tackle the crowds of Beijing...
