Wuzhou and Guilin, where Star Wars was filmed in China

[Music] [Music] in this episode of travelogue I revel in the old-school charm of you Joe before visiting world famous young Shawn and I stumbled on the marvel of Asian human engineering the joint - of China's greatest waterways yet see and fell rivers the Pearl River known in Chinese as the children with this eastern western and northern tributaries is actually a vast river system the third longest river in China and the second largest by balling and sitting on a vital Junction in this river system as you Joe [Music] hello and welcome to this edition of travel law in this episode we travel along the Pearl River upward and today we reach the city of mucho who Joe really enjoys a unique location because it's at the confluence of three rivers namely we have a region River a Shin Jung River the two converging to form this shizhong River which is also the upper stream of the Pearl River now Ojo is also a city with the long history was founded two thousand and two hundred years ago and it's also known as the birthplace of one of the major languages in China Cantonese which is spoken by hundreds of millions of people both home and abroad and today we're going to stop by for a while to know more about the city and its history [Music] Kujo is situated in the east of guanxi just outside guangdong province incredibly eighty-five percent of all the water in guanxi a region roughly the size of the UK flows through here or just look behind me and look at all these old buildings you could be mistaken about the location about where we are we're not in Macau not in Singapore this is in mucho well you can clearly see the Chinese and the Western influence and the architecture design all these old buildings they started to have a style like this since the 1920s when the City of Culture was - a very important commercial hub at the time their trade connecting the provinces like pre Georgian and Guangdong and Hong Kong and Macau you could see at the time lots of overseas and joint venture companies station he had probably just along this street you can almost stew he and fill the hustle and bustle 100 years ago as one of the pearl rivers 3 main tributaries the she Jiang or West River was once a major commercial waterway a lot of wealth flowed along it into huge Oh most of the local merchants did the business from these kilo tenement buildings with shop fronts on the ground floor 11 quarters upstairs many of the locals still live in these chilo during its heyday lost century thousands of merchants profited from whoa Joe status as a treaty port open to foreign trade not far from here the British established a consulate a sign of the importance all the great powers once ascribed to who Joe's strategic location [Music] we've also found some iron rains over here actually you can crank them ever here on each pillar not just at this level but also at higher level so the question is what are they for here is a sculpture tells everything about the use of the iron rain now remember you Joe is a port city along the major river flooding has always been a major problem for the city so when it happens what do we do no matter what life has to go on no matter what happens so if there is a flood if the water level is this high or even that high there will be both on the street these rings or for tying up all these boats remember life has to go on you can do either do business with people living on the second floor all the residents will be using these ladders to go back to their own houses the people of lujo are so used to flooding that they've even given some of their traditional dishes names with the watery theme such as both porridge and flooded street in fact the city is home to a number of weird and wonderful sounding dishes such as paper wrapped chicken and turtle jelly [Music] time to eat look at the table hilts now this is tofu this is this is interesting this is tick feet this is rice noodles and this is a herbal jelly and this yes I I would like to draw your attention to this this looks like a buck it is indeed a bug I just double checked on it just done I checked my dictionary is called die piscis I have no idea what it means but we're going to eat it because I was just told this is one famous snack in the city of ojos take one take one one two three ago the Cantonese really do eat everything [Music] this is something else that's integral to Cantonese culture the lion downs has usually performed the four important celebrations and today's occasion has suddenly very special as two dragon mother's birthday the story goes that the local girl from a poor family saw the Dragon's egg in the she Jam River from it the Hat five snakes which put time printing powerful dragons [Music] now this is the dragon mother's temple first viewed in early some dynasty that is over 1100 years ago according to legend the dragon mother was born in the chain dynasty and today actually is exactly the 2307 thirsty of the dragon mother shift goddess and protected all sailors and all fishermen and whenever they set sail when they passed this location they would come here it would burn some incense to wish the best for the safety and for their prosperity the striking similarities between the sea goddess mother who's worshipped in Fujian and Taiwan and our dragon mother who's venerated throughout the Pearl River Delta though her name sounds intimidating she's a benevolent deity with a huge number of followers [Music] you can see how to let this temple is people are here to sent that best wishes by burning the instances all the best [Music] we continue our journey along the Pearl River upward and today we reach ping Liu County now remember earlier I mentioned in you Jo that cui Jian River shrinking river converge to form XI John River which is the upper string of the Pearl River and now this is the beginning of cui Jeong River again if you look at the map you'll see clearly we have three rivers here that is Lee Jong on the other side is Lee Jung and right over there as charge on these three rivers converge to form cui Jun River now once again ping Liu County is also an ancient city it was first founded nearly 2,000 years ago despite being little more than 100 kilometers away from scenic grilling one of China's most popular tourist destinations ping Liu County is still relatively unknown tourism is the industry they're trying to develop for its local economy and a right over there just opposite the river we can see a new Harbin B&B when that is finished we can expect cruise ships coming from the upstream young Shore which we will be visiting next all the way here and all the way down to you Joe and that's a cruise line of hundreds of kilometers if you like a bit of peace and tranquillity this is definitely the place to come room Ching sitting at the confluence of two rivers was originally established as a boat during the Song Dynasty and it used to be very lively by all accounts though you wouldn't know it judging by what you see today [Music] what we're visiting a nation village a nine hundred year old village but what is greeting us first are all these massive trees they're set to be over 1,000 euro and what is unique about these trees you can see all these branches forming a notch so this is a passageway leading all the way to the ancient village to the ancient street in fact the village is well preserved it seems frozen in time it's huge mansions and intricate wooden carvings hark back to a golden age of Commons a time when merchants from nearby Fujian and Guangdong provinces flocked here to do business the houses are typical of southern China simple and elegant still today the villagers draw the water from wells [Music] times may have changed in the wider world but live here continues to defy modernization [Music] coming up next I pay a visit to one of China's most iconic landscapes the magical cost mountains of young Shah [Music] and now as drive away from Rong Jing as well famous young short as dramatic cost landscape has for centuries made it a popular tourist destination in a recent times young Shula provided a stock backdrop one of the Star Wars films naturally this has always been a place where artists have found inspiration [Music] since on the dear Oklahoma Chioda event Oh chicken divan while you bouncing one 2010 so we shop now put on with a function with a chocolate on a funky tray that is for the silhouette up photo modes of shin-chan ah Todd Lincoln great Android meet any teru teru kataoka well what you do the girl totem ah mm party ma han-shan de oh I check it Sevilla to us and the next time ARMA pursues how about you go down yesterday oh Santa maybe four to ten you can cover John Horner [Music] our Penta is a master of the intangible cultural heritage of fam maker there are countless different ways to make a fan but here they prefer to use locally sourced bamboo and a high quality chuan people [Music] Polti clean our water hydrogen tamil sanjana [Music] China probably has the longest history of fan making in the world originally fans were purely functional but they quickly became collectors items of the famous poets and artists started describing them though fans can be made of some pretty expensive materials silk mounted on ivory for example they're real worth as traditionally determined by the awkward the best fan pentas can express their creativity and displayed their skills and poet free calligraphy and ink painting chilled Oliva Moody the photographer God [Music] wife-to-be Tillamook one this is a ready fan landscape painting and Chinese calligraphy not far from young sure as the town of shink it's raining and it's raining hard and I guess this is just understandable because weather may be just like this with such a huge net worth of all rivers weather can be sunshine for a moment and could be raining like this so I need to find shelter from the rain and I walk into a shop and this happens to be a shop selling all these locally made organic foods there's a heat variety of shops in chinking and no amount of rain is going to put off the many tourists who've traveled from far and white to come here even senior Sen and former US President Bill Clinton have stroked down these cobbled lanes [Music] drawn by shavings relaxed pace of life many out of talent have also set up shops here [Music] your career yeah hi Daniela done yet there's aa doctor non-intrusive answers at the venue huar uaaah Raja Lila yo you have slicing no they're sinking just some poor season so much on you got sloshed you know younger younger cuidado Sancho Sancho the sanitarium is my funding I'll come here tada tada ha should I do something that is easy that oh ha so you also know that our diversity GTG oh honey Oh chilly Kenyatta Yong Seon JA to nix any single so yeah if you're hungry after all the window shopping there are plenty of restaurants and snack shops here to set your appetite I recommend trying these some Padang they're a bit like caramelized rice crispies [Music] first we make it's all so warm [Music] on the one hand you've got young sure a long-standing backpackers Haven as a firm favorite on every China itinerary this is even the sizable expat community there on the other hand you've got shipping which is quiet well relatively quiet [Music] [Music] [Music] of course the main reason people visit young sure as for the mountains as remarkable how they almost seem to grow out of the Lee Jung River take a look at the note and look behind me there's the scene taken from this area from this pot for the 20 yuan note now if you look at the landscape it's a typical scene you'll see in the area of gray lien or young sure and not just a beautiful landscape if you look at the different layers of darkness and brightness that is also I guess the inspiration for a lot of Chinese ink painting artists [Music] these days the number-one recreational activity on the Lee Jeung river is rafting lee jong river just look around here this is what this area is famous for the landscape the river now here is the little picture of the huge network of rivers this is Lee Jung it goes on to join Lee Jung River and charge down river to form we jump river which in turn joins Shin Jung River to form this G Jung River which is the upper stream of the Pearl River now not just the landscape and the river there is also an ancient town nearby we're also going to spend some time in that town [Music] [Music] [Music] and coming up next I visit an incredible feat of human engineering which helped connect all of China's main river systems [Music] traveling upstream via the lead young river we now arrive in Schengen County this is the arm the canal the Lincoln now connecting the two rivers Sean John River and Lee John River this canal was speed on the orders of the Emperor over 2,000 years ago linking these two rivers made it possible for him to send troops from the north of the country to Crowell Rebellion's and the south over the years the waterway developed into a major trade artery but these days there's noticeably less traffic [Music] or taking a walk here does remind me of some small villages by the Yangtze River and I guess you know when you have a river lifestyle will be similar you know have water you have houses you know people living by the river maybe one thing is different too food must be different upon one place to another and here is it a tablet saying this is there is a local specialty called grayling rice noodle and they say this is the birthplace of quilling rice noodles the dish has supposedly been around since the Ching dynasty over two thousand years ago that makes it virtually the same age as the canal [Music] despite his great age the recipe has barely changed bouncy rice noodles in a savory broth topped with pork peanuts pickled vegetables add a ton of condiments well I have to say it's quite tasty kind of different from what I had before are there in Beijing or removing some other cities because that's pretty much a national national noodle national taste but how good it is I can only say they're all good including this one it's not to imagine what Shingen would be like without it's remarkable canal what makes it such a masterful feat of engineering as the fact that two rivers and connects flow in opposite directions while the Shenyang river is heading north the légion river has flowing south [Music] I'm literally walking on a 2003 hundred euro water project just incredible this was food 2003 hundred years ago because it's some kind of flooding season lots of water otherwise it will be all dry I can easily walk over there even during the heaviest flooding the end to lock the stones flaps that make up this dam won't be breached now this is an ancient dam that was first food 2003 hundred years ago with this dam the order of the Shandong River which is a branch river of the Yun sir of the is divided into two part and this part 30% in its quantity and its water volume is directed into the Li Jiang River through a canal called Lincoln al now what is even more significant is with this water project the two water systems are connected that is the answer of the water system and the Pearl River water system and later even with the Yellow River water system with another canal called the Grand Canal so with the whole water project water transport was made available even in ancient China in the next episode of travelogue Kiran journeys to Sandy County on the upper reaches of the Pearl River there he'll experience the world of the three people an ethnic minority whose name literally means water [Music] [Music]

Channel: CGTN

Views: 25,899

Rating: 4.8670359 out of 5

Keywords: CCTV, CGTN, CCTVNews, News, ChinaNews, WorldNews, Politics, TravelogueChina, Travel, TravelVlog, Guilin, Wuzhou, StarWars, TravelChina, GuilinChina

Id: SVhxh8MAum0

Length: 29min 19sec (1759 seconds)

Published: Sat Dec 16 2017