Adventure is out there!

Some days I go to do something and I just know that it's going to turn into a blog post later.  Today was one of those days.

Lora and I ventured out into the -20 F weather this morning with the plan of going to 中央大街(Central Street), buying some yummy bread, and seeing the Songhua River (since we've lived in Harbin for 5 months now and have yet to visit it).

We hopped on the 114 bus and made our way to the back where we were able to get a seat (hooray!) for our impending 1 hour bus ride.  We were soon joined by a group of Chinese high school students who also happened to be going to Central Street.  We discovered they're staying at our college to take the art gaokao exam.  We chatted with them throughout the bus ride, and parted ways after we arrived at Central Street, but only after they bought us ice cream.

Because ice cream is the first thing I want to eat when surrounded by ice sculptures....

Hanging out with the violin sculpture

Lora and I bought our bread and walked in the direction of the river.  Here's the entrance to walk down to it.

Towers of ice

A plethora of people

 We slipped out on to the river, and soon realized that we had no idea what we had actually planned to do on the river when we decided to come.  So we walked around for a while, turning away many people asking us to pay to ride in their 马拉车 (horse-drawn carriage), and not really knowing what we were supposed to be doing.  We finally decided to just go onto the river and start walking.  Lora and I trekked across about 2/3 of a mile of frozen river and made it to what we eventually realized was Sun Island.  As soon as we climbed the stairs off the river, I felt like we had stepped into another world.  It was incredibly quiet and empty, which is eerie if you live in China, because here you are always surrounded by noise and people.  We wandered around for a bit, enjoying the peacefulness, and the Russian architecture, then we decided we were getting cold, so we left.

I would be the one to find the music related statue

Lora and I booked it back across the river to combat the cold, had a lovely dinner at Pizza Hut (that place is fancy in China!), and went on a 20 minute expedition to find the bus stop where our desired bus was located.  We asked multiple people where our bus stop was, and literally chased after a bus for a while before we found it.  After our exhausting day of walking in the cold, I practically fell asleep as soon as we got on the bus, even though I was standing, and then actually fell asleep after about a half hour when I was able to acquire a seat.  Now it's not even 7 pm and I'm looking forward to 9 so I can justifiably go to bed! :)

If you care to see the Songhua River expedition in 'action', please enjoy these videos!