June 29, 2006
Qiqihar is 'famous' for the nature reserve 30 kms south that provides breeding grounds for over 260 species of birds, including several species of cranes. The red-crowned crane is especially famous because in some East Asian cultures it has been revered as a symbol of longevity. We found this ironic, since it's estimated that there are now only about 1900 of the red-crowned cranes in the wild.
Despite the low number, the reserve, which we visited yesterday, does have several of the endangered cranes. The area through which people are allowed to tromp is fairly small, but they have a tower with really powerful binoculars and a very nice woman who finds interesting things for you to see and then brings the unwieldy lenses into focus. We saw a (presumably) female red-crowned crane sitting on a nest built at least 5 feet off the ground and another (again, presumably) female out feeding with a chick. The chick was really cute--very fuzzy and only about a fifth of the size of its parent, which stood about 4.5 feet high. They're huge birds and there are several warnings not to get too close to any of them for fear of crane attacks.
The reserve, and Qiqihar in general, have been very pleasant and have made a nice break from the bigger, more hectic cities through which we've been. Qiqihar has under a million people (downright tiny, in China!) and is amazingly flat! This is of interest because our hotel room was on the 13th floor and we could see for miles and miles. Not that there's too much to see; it's largely an industrial, though pleasant, city.
Our hotel room is in the past tense, because we've checked out and are 'killing time' until the overnight train to Beijing leaves at 4:50 (2 hours to go!). We arrive tomorrow morning at about 8:30, which makes me slightly nervous. Beijing is enormous and there's a ton to see. We haven't decided how long we'll be staying, but sometime next week we'll be heading to Datong in Shanxi province and then eventually over to Xi'an in Shaanxi province, home of the stone warriors. But first there's the 16 hour train ride to experience!
-Leah
