{"id":2620,"date":"2015-01-27T19:02:39","date_gmt":"2015-01-27T12:02:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/gordonandjudy.com\/?p=2620"},"modified":"2015-01-27T19:09:34","modified_gmt":"2015-01-27T12:09:34","slug":"harbin-on-ice-12415","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/gordonandjudy.com\/?p=2620","title":{"rendered":"Harbin on ice, 1\/24\/15"},"content":{"rendered":"

We get all geared up ready for a bitterly cold day, and head downstairs for breakfast.\u00a0 <\/span>We almost burned up while we ate.\u00a0 <\/span>We were wearing so many layers.\u00a0 <\/span>We met our guide at 9:00, and headed out on our tour of Harbin.\u00a0 <\/span>The first stop was downtown and St Sophia Cathedral.\u00a0 <\/span>It\u2019s a huge Russian Orthodox Cathedral in the center of town, a remnant of the strong Russian influence in northern China.<\/p>\n

\"IMG_3525\"<\/a> \"IMG_3534\"<\/a> \"IMG_2178\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Next stop was the Siberian Tiger Reserve.\u00a0 <\/span>The guide told us there were over 1000 tigers at the site.\u00a0 <\/span>We loaded a bus and drove all around the property, and in and out of several large compounds, each full of tigers.\u00a0 <\/span>The highlight for me (and not so much for Judy) was the feeding of live chickens to the tigers.\u00a0 <\/span>Our bus parked in a large open area. Tigers began to wander toward us, and then a jeep covered in protective bars wheeled up and tossed a couple of live chickens out so we could watch the tigers catch and eat them.\u00a0 <\/span>It\u2019s not something seen at many US zoos.<\/p>\n

TIGER RESERVE VIDEO LINK<\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.dropbox.com\/s\/zjzm0kpjkencraz\/15.1.24Tiger1.MOV?dl=0<\/a><\/p>\n

\"IMG_3541\"<\/a> \"IMG_2156\"<\/a><\/p>\n

We killed some time in \u201cPolarworld\u201d, watching a Sea Lion Show, and a Beluga Whale Show.\u00a0 <\/span>The whales performed what I would describe as synchronized water ballet with their trainers.\u00a0 <\/span>It was beautiful.<\/p>\n

We were killing time until dusk so we could hit \u201cIce and Snow World\u201d just before dark.\u00a0 <\/span>We had some time and I requested we have a chance to go down to the frozen Songhua River and watch some of the activities.\u00a0 <\/span>We weren\u2019t disappointed.\u00a0 <\/span>There were cars racing on the ice, hockey, snowboarders pulled by large kites, and several other assorted ice activities.\u00a0 <\/span>The river is huge and it was frozen solid.<\/p>\n

THREE LINKS TO FROZEN SONHUA RIVER ACTIVITIES<\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.dropbox.com\/s\/14gch662qxsh2vf\/15.1.24.Songhua1.MOV?dl=0<\/a><\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.dropbox.com\/s\/p3hjorvs1df2nb5\/15.1.24.Songhua2.MOV?dl=0<\/a><\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.dropbox.com\/s\/ndov73dk0vdx5u6\/15.1.24.Songhua3.MOV?dl=0<\/a><\/p>\n

\"IMG_3552\"<\/a> \"IMG_3549\"<\/a> \"IMG_3545\"<\/a> \"IMG_2185\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The climax of the day was the visit to \u201cIce and Snow World\u201d.\u00a0 <\/span>This was the main reason we traveled to Harbin and we weren\u2019t disappointed.\u00a0 <\/span>It was amazing.\u00a0 <\/span>There were so many amazing structures built and sculpted from ice and snow.\u00a0 <\/span>The site is huge and takes some time to walk through.\u00a0 <\/span>The temperature was near zero F.\u00a0 <\/span>Thankfully there wasn\u2019t any wind.\u00a0 <\/span>We spent an hour and a half checking it out, and then met our guide and driver.\u00a0 <\/span>It was a really fun visit with some amazing sites.<\/p>\n

VIDEO LINK TO \u201cICE AND SNOW WORLD\u201d<\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.dropbox.com\/s\/eh6uvbxivv2nyf3\/15.1.24.Ice%20World.MOV?dl=0<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"IMG_2020\"<\/a> \"IMG_2010\"<\/a> \"IMG_1993\"<\/a> \"IMG_1991\"<\/a> \"IMG_1987\"<\/a> \"IMG_1981\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We get all geared up ready for a bitterly cold day, and head downstairs for breakfast.\u00a0 We almost burned up while we ate.\u00a0 We were wearing so many layers.\u00a0 We met our guide at 9:00, and headed out on our … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/gordonandjudy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2620"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/gordonandjudy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/gordonandjudy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gordonandjudy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gordonandjudy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2620"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/gordonandjudy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2620\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2622,"href":"http:\/\/gordonandjudy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2620\/revisions\/2622"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/gordonandjudy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2620"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gordonandjudy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2620"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gordonandjudy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2620"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}