Travel Story--Wuzhen Water Town, China

China's rivers run west to east, so moving goods from the south to the north and vice versa was difficult before trains and highways. The emperors solved the problem by connecting the rivers with a canal, the Grand Canal. When completed, it ran from Hongzhou in southern China (close to Shanghai) to Beijing, more than 1,000 miles.

In the 20th century, the Grand Canal fell into disuse and the once-prosperous towns along it shrank.

Lately, tourism has revived those towns. A number have been repaired and renovated as tourist attractions. Some have local crafts, others have traditional plays or music, all have restaurants and gift shops and boat rides. Most are very picturesque. I have been to four of them. Here I'll describe the one I most recently visited, Wuzhen.




Wuzhen is about 80 miles from Shanghai, or a 1 3/4 hour drive on good roads.

There was a big parking lot full of tour buses, but also a fancy gate.

Inside we toured a Qing Dynasty house. It gave a look into what life was like for the wealthy more than 100 years ago: lots of rooms and corridors, living areas for different parts of an extended family. Some fine furniture and art were among a variety of interesting old pieces. I especially like Chinese lattice work and window decorations (below).

We saw a couple perform on traditional instruments, ate lunch and walked back through a lovely garden. 

Strolling along the canal, we saw lots of weeping willows (Salix babylonica, willow family, Salicaceae). Weeping willows are native to eastern Asia and have been cultivated for several thousand years. 

Weeping willow along the Grand Canal, Wuzhen

Looking like cottonwood seeds, the weeping willow seeds swirled on fluffy clusters on the sidewalks of Wuzhen.  The similarity to cottonwoods is from relationship: both are in the same plant family . Being dioecious ("male" flowers and "female" flowers on different trees) and making large amounts of wind-carried seeds is common for the family. In the United States, weeping willows are introduced, so they may not reproduce well, either because we don't plant the two sexes close enough to reproduce or because the growing conditions don't favor reproduction, saving us the clouds of seeds I saw in Wuzhen. Weeping willows sprout easily from cuttings though.

Weeping willow seeds on the sidewalk i Wuzhen

In flower along the canal was wisteria (probably Wisteria sinensis, pea family Fabaceae) a very popular vine in China. Some of them were impressively big and old.

wisteria

There were also planters of colorful annuals, the same plants you see around the world: pink petunias (Petunia, tomato family Solanaceae) from South America, marigolds (Tagetes, sunflower family), from Central America and begonia (Begonia, begonia family Begoniaceae), from South America.

Of course we took a boat ride down the canal

Reading about Wuzhen online, there were many other activities available. My photos somehow make the town look empty, but there were substantial crowds on this April Monday. But not so many I couldn't get these lovely photos.

Comments and corrections welcome.

Kathy Keeler, A Wandering Botanist

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