济南的景点 (Jĭnán de jĭngdiăn) Jinan's scenic spots (Day 2)

亲爱的日记，

The last two days have really been a lot of fun for a couple of different reasons.  First, I think I am slowly starting to get over jetlag.  Next, the weather hasn’t been nearly as hot as that first day out on the town (still pretty hot, though).  And finally, I feel as though I’ve had enough time to bond with my friends here in Jinan, which makes all the cool stuff we’ve been doing together allthemore enjoyable.  I’ll start with yesterday (Sunday, 06-21 (Happy Father’s Day, Dad!!)) in order to keep things in chronological order.

Yesterday, we spent most of the late morning and afternoon at 趵突泉 Bàotū Quán or something akin to “jumping, rushing springs,” which is the most famous spring of the more than 70 located in the area.  Here is some info on 趵突泉 Bàotū Quán from Wikipedia: 

The Baotu Spring (Chinese: 趵突泉; pinyin: Bàotū Quán, sometimes translated as "Jet Spring" or "Spurting Spring") is a culturally significant artesian karst spring located in the city of Jinan, Shandong Province, China. It is mentione

d in the Spring and Autumn Annals, one of the Five Classics of Chinese literature and was declared the "Number One Spring under the Heaven" (Chinese: 天下第一泉; pinyin: Tiān Xià Dì Yī Quán) by the Qing Dynasty Emperor Qian Long.

The spring itself and the large park surrounding it were stunningly beautiful and very well maintained.  There were all kinds of old buildings and gazebos to walk in and out of, as well as large Koi fish ponds wherever you looked.  The water in all of the ponds was crystal clear and was apparently fed in directly from the various springs.  Between the spring water and fish food for sale at various gift shops, those sure were some lucky fish!

After seeing all there was to see at 趵突泉 Bàotū Quán, Wu Juan, Xiao Peng and I made our way back to a large food court for lunch.  We had Chongqing style hotpot with some sort of sucker fish (perhaps bullhead), baby bokchoy, bean sprouts, as well as chili peppers and Sichuan peppercorns (which make your mouth numb).  It was really a delicious meal.

Once we finished lunch, it was back to the hotel for a long read and the usual mid-day nap.  For dinner, Wu Ying rejoined us having recovered from a bit of heat stroke (中暑了 zhòngshŭ le, new vocab word), which I could definitely relate to given the previous day’s heat.  We went to a place that featured Sichuan style cuisine, particularly Wonton soup, only in Sichuan dialect they are called 抄手 chāoshŏu.  I can’t wait to bust that one out once we arrive in Chengdu!  Unfortunately, no pics of the since I forgot all else once we began eating.  For the sake of not posting 30 pictures all in one post (很花时间!), I’m going to call it quits for now and will be back with m

ore about my experience at 千佛山 Qiānfó Shān “Thousand Buddha Mountain” tomorrow.

Thanks for reading!

Andy