Breakfast was in the same huge dining hall as last night’s dinner and was filled with just as many delicious offerings. Chinese breakfast is very similar to Chinese lunch and Chinese dinner. All the varieties of noodles, dumplings, vegetable dishes, dim sum, soups and meats seem to be offered at each meal. Congee seems to be the one dish that only shows up at breakfast though I may be wrong about that. I kept going back for the freshly squeezed grapefruit juice.
We wandered out onto the grounds after breakfast and discovered a huge park with winding creeks filled with coy and a pagoda lined pond. The setting was gorgeous. On the far side of the pond was a choir practicing some traditional music. The effect was quite magical. I really wish we could have stayed at this hotel longer but Tony hustled us off to our next outing.
We travelled by bus to a local silk spinning mill. Today’s guide was Christina and we all fell for her. Christina was younger than May – probably in her early forties. She spoke slowly and clearly but she also spoke to us – not at us. It was really refreshing. We learned that an ancient queen had discovered the silken threads of a worm that had fallen into her teacup and from this experience emerged the ancient art of producing silk. After a discussion on the life-cycle of the silkworm we were led into a room where we were shown how the silk threads are used to make a duvet and then all the beautiful silk coverlets that the factory produces for the duvets and pillows. There was a concerted effort to get us to buy – with all kinds of enticing “deals”. The duvets were absolutely beautiful but I’m at the stage in my life where I am getting rid of things not accumulating more. And I don’t think my taste in beautiful duvets would match my daughters’ so I didn’t cave and buy some for them.
From the silk factory we headed to the Lingshan Grand Buddha where we were led into the ancient Buddhist monastery for our lunch – again, in buffet style. All the dishes were vegetarian. I quite enjoyed the meal but it was getting on for two in the afternoon so I was quite hungry by the time I got to eat.
From here we took a cart ride to the base of the giant Buddha statue. In the plaza below the hill on which the Buddha stood there was a 1400 year old ginkgo tree that still sports greenery.
A number of us climbed the numerous steps up to the base of the Buddha in order to touch his feet for luck. Afterwards we watched a water show where the baby Buddha emerges from inside a metallic lotus blossom – all set to traditional music.
The Buddha was on the edge of the city of Wuxi where we stayed in another five-star hotel. We were treated to an excellent meal at a restaurant before we were taken to our hotel. The problem was that the lunch had been so late in the day that we had little room for the supper. We did manage to stuff a good amount in though and once we were settled in the hotel, a group of us met in the lounge to round out the evening with a beer.