On Morning 1 of our Harbin journey, we headed on a three-and-a-half bus ride outside of town to Yabuli, described as China's largest skiing resort. Because being outfitted is of prime importance, our first stop once arriving was a clothing rental shop, where tourists rented snowsuits and snow googles at day rates of 60-70 RMB each ($9-$10). There, we caught our first sights of the "dog sleds" we would see a number of other times during our journey. When I'd heard about the dog sleds, I formed an image in my mind of the sleigh teams in Jack London novels. Actually, what we saw was often a dog (a single dog) pulling someone around on a small bench. The dogs had to be pulled by a trainer on a leash, so it was kind of like watching a person pulling a dog pulling a bench. You get the idea. By the time all the outfitting was finished and we ate lunch at the hotel and we waited in lines for ski boots and skis, there was around two hours left of daylight.
My own basic ski skills were surprisingly rusty (I hadn't been on the slopes for about a decade). This didn't prove to matter much because none of the chair lifts at the resort were in operation. I was told this was because conditions were windy. So people could only ski as far as they were willing to hike up the mountain. I went up as far as I could but eventually conditions got too slippery to move upward (and there was only enough time to make several runs in any case). The slopes were very icy going down but I skied conservatively and managed to make it through the day without falling. Trainers could be seen providing lessons to newbies near the base for around 100 yuan/hour. Aside from these trainers, no supervisors or safety staff were in sight anywhere on the hills. I just took this day in (with all its quirks) as another part of my Chinese experience. Actually, I found getting out on the skis again to be great fun.
The following day, after riding the bus back to Harbin, we had lunch and then went out to the Songhua River, where we watched the winter swimmers bravely heading into the icy cold waters. A small section is carved out for them to swim in the river. It was cold enough outside that- in moments when no swimmer was in the water- you could view the open section already beginning to freeze over. Swimmers came out one at a time, diving into the water, then washing themselves off with a bottle of water afterward. Needless to say, these were people of hearty constitutions. By this time, our third day in Harbin, I was adjusting to the sub-zero weather and no longer felt cold, but nothing would have convinced me to strip down to swimming trunks and jump into that water. The river area had a nice tranquil feel to it and an ice slide was used by children riding down on cardboard slabs. I like Harbin. Along with Chengdu and Guilin, it is one of my favorite Chinese cities.
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