Yuhua Tai

In many ways modern Nanjing is similar to Shanghai. It has always been an important city in southern China and the 21st century will be no exception - it is currently the second largest economy in the area. The first things that strike you on arrival are the highways, the dust and the skyscrapers.

Strangely, there also seems to be an unusually high number of weddings taking place, with jewelry shops, limousine rentals and wedding dress shops all eager to do business.

Still, amid all the hustle and bustle, you can find, in certain quiet corners, while sitting in old tea houses, or looking at temples in the hilly forested landscape, traces of the jiangnan (regions south of the Yangtze River) - the concentration of all that was refined and sophisticated in China in ancient times.

The largest and most beautiful part of the city is the Zhongshan Mountain National Park. Around the Purple Mountain and covering 31 square kilometers, it is a national heritage site. The heart of the park, and the place most tourists head for first, is the Sun Yat-sen Mausoleum. This majestic piece of architecture is reached after climbing nearly 400 steps up 70 meters to the top where Dr Sun has his final resting place.

Lined by tall, stately trees, the mausoleum is awe-inspiring, even on public holidays when thousands of Chinese tourists make their way up the steps. In fact, it is almost like a pilgrimage where ordinary people pay their respects to the founding father of modern China.
The rest of the park contains a number of other interesting sites. There is the fifth century Linggu Temple, for example, or the World Heritage Site of the Ming Dynasty tombs. While each of these sites has its own charm, traveling around the park will remind you of the modern context in which they are set.

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