Thanks to TR, what a delightful surprise for the kids! Despite the cold night, the kids and Grace did not get enough of the ice, but we did have a train to catch. There were ice slides everywhere. If one has tough bottoms to withstand the abrasion and cold ice, the rides are free and unlimited.
The ice structures were monumental. Many tall and huge. Impressive!
The festival is staged by local govts. It is profitable from gate receipts alone. The local travel industry benefits too.
I asked our Harbin driver how many times he had visited the Ice Festival, if he had taken his 10yr old there yet:
"First time this year",
"Why???",
"Too cold"
90% of New Yorkers never visited the Statue of Liberty. I met an advertising guy last month who was born and raised in XiAn, but he had never visited the Terracotta Warriors in Xian.
It was 12deg below zero when we got there, but it did feel cold with 10knot wind swept over frozen Songhua River. So much so we had to 'break the ice' by taking a warm-up break inside a Nescafe pavillon for hot chocolate and coffee.
Price for a hot drink: Y30. A steal in a place like this!
I recall a cup of coffee inside Guangzhou airport going for Y50, and that was 5 years ago!
Hot drinks seem appropriate at such a venue with such a temperature, but there was 'Harbin Beer' and ' Coca Cola' pavillions too. I was told British drink warm beer, my Father in law too, but warm Coke? Or were they really chilled?
I never bothered to ask.
On the morning of departure by HaMu Express (Haerbin Mudanjiang Express), ticket touts at the bus terminal were pushing bus ticekts to us at Y150 (versus normal fare of Y87). We bought our tickets a few days before but some hopeful passengers galantly showed up at the terminal without a ticket.
The 320km journey started from cloudy MDJ and ended in snowy Haerbin in just under 4 hours. The expressway was at least half covered with snow, which got heavier as we approached HRB. It was obviously slippery with once head collision along the way.
Some photos captured along the trip:
1. Departing MDJ Train Station/Bus Terminal
哈尔滨牡丹江快客从牡丹江火车站出发
2. A Haerbin Express in opposite direction on partially snow covered 4-lane expressway
回牡丹江的哈牡快客。高速公路一半是雪
3. Head-on collision on fully snow-covered Haerbin-bound lanes
亚布里和哈尔滨之间车祸事故。这两辆车都往哈尔滨方向开的，怎么头碰头？
4. A village by side of Expressway.
高速边的小村。
5. A happy passenger unkowingly rubbing really black dust off her seat.
粉红的衣服下车时已变黑了。
from Kristine, Kimberley, Dawei, Grace and Kheng in frozen Heilongjiang in Far Northeast China
kaikai
Feb 8, 2010
Already, some 70-80 people were in front of us in the queue, some in the front queue were sitting on stools not captured by the lens. They looked professional, as black marketeers. When the booths opened at 7pm that evening, train tickets for Beijing bound train on Feb 18 would go on sale. Each person was allowed 2 tickets. Up for sale were 28 berths in partitioned cabins (Y540), 130 berths in non-partitioned cabins (Y340), 400 in upright seats (Y194), and 500 standing tickets (Y194 as well) in same rail cars as those 500 upright seats (more like a bench for 3 with back rest but no arm rest).
If what we witnessed on feb 7 (selling tickets for Feb 17) evening was par for course, the tickets would be completely sold within the hour. Other than the main train station, where one can queue inside warm hall but surrounded by 360degree cigarette puffs, there are 9 other ticketing agents around town, where one can queue outdoor in subzero temperature, until the ticketing agents open for business at 7pm. Choice here is either to queue to be nicotined to death or chilled to death as shown by the wild pheasants hanging outside local wet market!
The next day, some tickets would appear in black market. We know of someone who bought a berth in non-partitioned cabin for Y150 on top of normal fare of Y340. A berth in partitioned cabin is rumoured to go for Y300 on top.
Yes you guess it right, such ticketing practices breeds black marketeers. In a city where a bus driver earns Y90 a day, it is worth a full day wait at front of queue to turn his/her quota of 2 tickets the next day into Y300 to $600 profits. Such festivities continue daily for about 3 weeks. There is a big banner outside the ticketing hall declaring war on black marketeers, but someone near the banner tried to sell me tickets to Harbin......
An article in a magazine compared how India, which tickets on actual ID (as in plane tickets now) doesnt have queues nor black market. Sooner or later, this system will have to be adopted in China too.
As for us, our usual channels failed to access any tickets for us ex-MDJ. Railway ticketing authority for MDJ has just been shifted to provincial HQ in Harbin, plus for this festive season, 98% of all tickets are to be sold off those ticketing booths around town, Just 2% are kept for internal and hierarchy discretion.
After a roundabout chase around town for train tickets, 4 tickets in a partitioned cabin from Harbin to Beijing were just a phone call away to Grace's schoolmate in Harbin. We just need to catch a coach bus from MDJ to Harin train station for connection. Cost is same Y87 per person for bus or train, but bus is 90mins faster than train.
Our train will take just 10 hrs to reach Beijing, at average speed of 140kph, leaving Harbin at 930pm and arriving in Beijing at 730am. There is an even faster service taking just 8 hrs to cover the 1400km journey, but it leaves Harbin around midday which means we have to wake the kids up at uncivilised hours to start our return journey.
Our Festive train adventure continues!
And here's wishing you a VERY HAPPY AND PROPEROUS YEAR OF TIGER!!!!!!
Feb 6, 2010, MDJ River
