On Friday afternoon, some colleagues and I planned to hike up Nanshan Mountain Saturday morning. I’d done it before when I first came to Shenzhen and enjoyed it. It’s nowhere close to the wilderness experience of Mount Si (Seattle’s popular nearby mountain to hike) and it honestly feels funny to call Mount Si a wilderness experience. That’s how urbanized Nanshan is! Anyway, I got a text message the following morning that it was raining and that the hike had been cancelled for safety reasons. Safety? It’s a stairs and sidewalk the entire way. Well, I could understand not wanting to be rained on. So, I got up and looked out the window, but it wasn’t raining any more. “Dang”, I thought. I was looking forward to the hike. I’d gotten too lazy about staying in shape in China and was looking forward to this inaugural “get in shape” event, something I have to do if I want to go to the Alps this summer and not be the pokey one. So, while I was thinking about what to do, Joyce gave me a call and said she still wanted to go. So it was settled, Joyce and her husband Peter (from the Netherlands) and I would go “climb” Nanshan.

Are you into “mountaineering”? This way, then!

Though there’s nothing close to mountaineering here (it’s all 1st class!), it is a good workout. The ascent to the first point is up a long flight of stairs, a stairmaster machine set on “Psycho”, as Robert would say. I let Joyce and Peter know that I’d go on up ahead ’cause I was trying to get in shape and that I’d come back down and meet them when I’d arrived. So, I headed up. No breaks, a decent speed, not too fast. It didn’t take me too long to arrive, maybe 30 minutes? It’s over 1000 feet of elevation easy, but the stairs make it quick:

There are usually tons of people up here too. This time, while waiting on top, I started talking to a group of Chinese folks from the ZTE, or Zhong Xin, corporation. Their building is just down the street from ours. They were all part of an English group so most of our conversation was in English, but I tried out some easy Chinese now and then. They all wanted a picture taken so we posed here. There’s another foreigner in the picture. He was just kinda out on his own, so they invited him in the picture too:

Seemed liked we chatted for 20 minutes or so. Still Joyce and Peter hadn’t arrived. So, I headed down. I ran into them pretty soon and we continued up to the top where we took a short break. The rest of the hike hits two more summits, each with a small shelter. The second shelter is the highest and the biggest. There’s even a small staff up here who sell water, Chinese Gatorade (basically), and ice cream. We got some ice cream and took another short break.

(l-r) Joyce and Peter, A basketball team (I think). The coaches started barking out orders and they produced bricks in each hand. Then they started marching like soldiers down the mountain.

The hike between the two outer summits is nice. It’s a fairly thin ridge (no danger of falling of course) with views down to the suburbs of Shenzhen and the shipping yards below. Along the way are funny signs. This sign below says something like, “This forest is to be enjoyed by you, your sons, and your grandsons. May he who burns it down be punished for many years!” That’s not it exactly, but that’s the gist I got from Joyce. By the way, I’m just started to learn Chinese characters. Of course I couldn’t read something that complex yet.   OK, in addition to the signs, at the first shelter was a continuous recording, blaring out over a cheap loud speaker, that warned anyone who may be thinking about burning down the forest.

(l-r) Ridge running sidewalk, funny sign

Somewhere along the way, I took a big panorama shot. Below, you can see Shekou, the area where you catch the ferry, where Seaworld is, where most of the foreigners live. These are only the ‘burbs, far from downtown Shenzhen. In the distance, across the water, you can see hills. That’s the “New Territories” which belongs to Hong Kong SAR (Special Administrative Region).

When I did this hike the first time, I went in the opposite direction. I prefer today’s direction, from west to east, because the uphill is broken into manageable sections. Going from east to west, you’ll gain almost all your elevation in one seemingly endless set of stairs at the very beginning. When we got to the bottom, Joyce was wiped out. Not being able to control her legs very well, she had a humorous walk. I admit I was pretty tired too and the following day was a bit sore. I have to go every weekend so that all the soreness is worked out.   So, I’ll be back.