Our Trip to China
29th June 2019
So we just got back from our month long trip to China. We spent nearly 5 weeks travelling around 4 different slopes delivering Instructor Training to 40 potential Chinese Instructors. Our non-stop trip took us to 4 different part of China. We visited Chengdu, Harbin, Chongqing and finally Qiaobo which is 2 hours outside Shanghai.
Here is a quick overview of our time there.
Chengdu Dry Slope
Our first stop of Chengdu is in the Sichuan part of China. Now if you’ve ever ordered a Sichuan Chicken from your local Chinese restaurant you know its hot - well that word describe ALL the food here - hot. Even breakfast is hot and choices are pretty much limited to either spicy noodles or spicy dumplings. Funnily enough, Sichuan Chicken is not a dish they serve here in Chengdu - it was just made up for us westerners ;)
Chengdu is massive, we must of been flying over the city for 30 mins before we actually landed at the airport. After landing and meeting my translator, we got into a taxi and headed into the city. I checked into a cheap Air B&B for the night, (Yes China does Air B&B) dumped my bags we went straight out and into tourist mode. The city is pretty cool and the central area is just like any other big city in the world….This isn’t my first time in China, but I forget just how big everywhere here is and the sheer number of people there are.
The next day was my only full day off before going straight into our first course at the JF dryslope which is about an hour drive out of the city - well it’s still in the city but the smaller part of the city (told you it was a big place). Being honest when they said it was a dryslope, I thought of my first days learning to snowboard at Telford and it sent shivers down my spine and gave me flashbacks of duct taping my fingers together and my jumper sleeves to my gloves so I still had usable fingers and some skin left when I went home. But this place was surprisingly different......
It’s a new surface, developed from an English product and revised and updated by the owner of this particular slope….and in true Chinese style, the place is HUUUUGE.
This is the biggest dryslope I have ever seen. We had numerous slopes of different angles. There were steep sections, permanent mogul sections, slalom course sections and the piece d’resistance – a full permanent air bag slope!!!
Even with all this going on they are still planning on expanding the slope.
The surface rode really well. I was expecting the feel of maybe snowflex but no. This surface has way more grip and with the above head sprinkler system that could be turned on whenever we wanted, the slope rode pretty fast. You could even get a really good edge in the stuff and I actually enjoyed riding on it when I didn’t think I would.
So after a few runs I decided I didn’t need my duct tape so headed to the local hotel to check in.
Now here is where it got interesting. The receptionist just looked at me and shook her head and said no foreigners allowed in the hotel….I thought she was joking but she definitely wasn’t. Luckily the translator was on hand and we found out it was simply because they didn’t have the correct permit to have foreigners staying in the hotel. So we went to another hotel and they said the same….and another hotel….and another hotel. In total we tried 4 different hotels in the area and none of them would accept foreigners.
The only option was the city chain hotels. These bigger hotels would allow me to stay. But this meant a pretty harsh 1 hour drive to the slope every morning and every night…and that was on a quiet day. This was going to be a loooong week.
It was! 5 days on the dryslope was pretty hard, the heat was high 30’s everyday and there was zero breeze – forget jacket and pants, I was down to leggings and shorts and a BASI polo shirt to at least look sort of professional. The only think getting me through the week - apart from drinking my own body weight in water - was at the end of the 5 days I would be going to see a panda. That was all the motivation I needed.
It was at the end of these 5 days of working 10-12 hours a day, eating spicy oily hot pot pretty much every night that, that my body gave up and I spent a day and a half on what I will call the Chengdu Instant weight loss program. However I still managed to get out to see some Panda’s – nothing was going to stop me from that…..I know they do bugger all except eat and sleep but they are still awesome to see in real life.
Luckily, I had 3 days after the Chengdu course where I wasn’t actually working, so I had some extra and much needed, time to sort myself out. When I was due to leave for Harbin, I was nearly back to 100% - albeit a lot slimmer.
Harbin – The newly named Sunac Mall
4 hours flying from Chengdu, took us to Harbin for our second course. We’ve been here a few times so know the place well and in the summers we pretty much have the slope to ourselves.
This is one of the biggest indoor slopes in the world and has everything you need. We have steep slopes, a park, more mellow slopes and even 2 chair lifts. There is a permanent lesson only area separate to the main slope as well. Snow is awesome and no one is around. We always have a good week here as its perfect for a training course.
Again long days as the slope doesn’t actually open until 11.30. So by the time we start it’s already 12 midday. 5 days here flew by and at the end of the week, we were out and onto another 4 hour flight back down south to the same Sichuan area but a different place called Chongqing.
Chongching
4 hours later I turn up in a place I’ve never heard of before. But this place is full of history from the Yangtze river to the seat of china’s government in the 40’s, until it was bombed to hell by the Japanese….it’s an interesting place.
Where I was staying was even more interesting! I didn’t arrive until 10ish in the evening and the walk to the hotel was surreal to say the least. Luckily I had the next day to check out what the hell was going on and if you look at the pictures (gallery link below) then you’ll see what I mean by surreal. I was staying in Liangping - a 40’s theme park style version of Chongqing – known locally as Movie city. They have created a tourist area where you can spend the day in a recreated 1940’s downtown Chongqing. All created to match what was there before it got destroyed. People even dress up for the day. Honestly its really hard to explain, you have to see the pictures. It was weird but kind of cool at the same time.
The slope itself is called Jihua park and is about 5 mins away from the hotel. It’s an indoor snowdome and although bigger than what we get in the UK it was small by Chinese standards at only 200m. The whole area is dedicated to all sorts of activities. Not only did we have the slope, but one of the biggest indoor climbing walls in the south. They have 2 indoor surf wave machines, sky diving, indoor caving or spelunking as I think the pro cavers call it.
As a facility it was great, but no one was here using it. Crazy empty for most of the time. Maybe we were in low season, but the place was like a ghost town…well ghost sports centre.
Again this was my home for the next 5 days. The problem with this place is the whole slope is only 12 degrees in steepness so it’s actually pretty challenging to mix your snowboarding up as you always felt you needed more speed. The actual lesson slope was pretty useless for teaching snowboarding on too - which was I never saw a single snowboard lesson take place the whole time I was there. If they pushed a bit of snow around they could solve this pretty easily.
At the end of the 5 days and before flying out to Hanxhou, I was invited to spend a night in the city centre and see the famous old town….and what an awesome city to visit. The pictures say it all. We had some really nice food overlooking the river and when it got darker the city really comes to live. Neon everywhere. Some of the places we walked around could of been taken straight froma the set of the original Blade Runner movie.
Again though crazy busy with people and for someone who lives in a small village in the mountains, I don’t think I will ever get used to this.
The next day I was flying out to Hanxhou - not far from Shanghai - for our last course. So after a couple of beers and some food and a good 3 hour walk around Chongqing, I was in bed ready for my early start.
Qiaobo Snow Slope
Our last indoor centre and probably the most run down indoor slope I’ve seen in China. There are reports of the worlds biggest indoor slope being built in Shanghai just 3 hours away, which is the market for this slope – so I think they have stopped spending money on this one!
I literally had no time to think on this course. I landed at Hanxhou Airport, had nearly a 2 hour drive to the hotel, had some food and went to bed to get ready to start the course the very next day.
This slope has been around for 10 years and it looked like it. It reminded me of Tamworth back in the day, same snow, same travellators, same everything. Obviously Tamworth has spent a lot of money on a refurb over the years but if they hadn’t, then this is what it would look like. It was a pretty rough slope. Over the five days I was there, they didn’t groom it once or even shape the kicker. The last day was pretty busy with a Chinese holiday and we even started walking up the slope because they only had one travellator running. They didn’t both turning the other one on for some reason!
I was pretty happy to finish this course and head back to Shanghai where I’d be taking my flight home the next day.
Overall we had a good time in China. I love its quirks, and I love the danger of teaching there. What I mean by that is ANYONE can turn up on the slope and just give it a go - no lesson no problem, here’s your kit go for it!. This was so evident on the last slope in Qiaobo. Every time we walked across the bottom of the slope to use the lift we all had to look up the hill just in case a rogue user was straight lining it down the hill without the ability to stop.
I’d see them swap from ski’s to snowboards and vice versa just to try it. It’s bloody crazy but it seems to work and people just get on with it.
I also like the food most of the time, apart from when they try and give us westerners the random bits. There are still a lot of things I refuse to eat. Brain being one of them, along with fried duck or rabbit head, chickens feet, cows stomach to name but a few. I’ve added hot pots to the list after Chengdu.
Also, I think the people are some of the friendliest in the world. The students on the course have so much respect for us as teachers that they are really committed to learning and work the hardest of any students I’ve ever had.
The work itself is hard and the days are long, but the above makes up for all that.
With nearly 5 weeks living from a snowboard bag in various hotel rooms, eating out every night and every day - it was really nice to get back home and sleep in my own bed and cook my own food.
We are due back for 2 weeks in December working in Wanlong, where the Olympics will take place as part of Beijing 2022 and another new place for us called Beidahu. Both in the mountains.
For more pictures of our trip - check out our Gallery by CLICKING HERE
