Jinjiangshan Gongyuan (Beautiful River-Mountain Park)

    Yesterday we went to the beautiful Jinjiangshan park.

This park was a quiet, clean oasis away from the dirtiness of the city. Dandong, like a lot of big metropolitan cities, is dirty.  Adding to the dirtiness of the city is the norm of littering and allowing dog's to poop on the ground, which is a common practice here. I'm also wondering if the severe humidity (we've arrived during the raining season) is adding to the uncleanliness feel. I digress, Jinjiangshan is located on the west hillside of the city. Getting there was a breeze as we've learned to take our guide books with us to help identify to the cab drivers where we need to go. We always have to take two cabs wherever we go so the task of flagging down two cabs and having both of them understand where we need to go has been fun! So far, we've not been separated.

    Jinjiangshan park has an exercise loop that encircles petting zoos, a tiger park, an amusement park for kiddos, meditative areas, pagoda's with 360 views of the area, and more. I could not get over how peaceful it was. I imagine the Banek's will be spending a lot of time there!

    Our favorite part was the petting zoo complete with pigs, zebra's, emu's, monkey's, alpaca's, and more. Mya was in heaven because she got to not only feed the pigs but also scratch their bellies with a back scratcher. Luka was both scared and excited all at the same time when a monkey jumped on his shoulder. Lise loved the amusement rides and has begged us to go back there. Here are some pictures from the day: Jinjiangshan Park.