Nov. 20 to 27, 2002 saw the 1st Nanning Tourism & Commodities Fair held, which attracted thousands of visitors and a great number of investors from countries and regions of Vietnam, Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan, and provinces of Hainan, Zhejiang, Guangdong, Yunnan, and Guangxi. The fair was composed of a wide variety of displays and exhibits, including an introduction to scenic spots and special tourist itineraries in Guangxi, sales of special local products, handicrafts and souvenirs from above-mentioned countries, regions and provinces, on-the-spot discussions concerning available tour package and economic and trade activities. The event offered a great opportunity for the traveling enterprises to communicate with and learn from each other, and was also a great show of Nanning’s rich tourism resources and colorful ethnic cultures, bringing both economic and social benefits.

 

 

Located on No. 41 Jiangbin E. Road and close to the pretty Yongjiang River, Yongjiang Hotel became the first four-star hotel in Nanning in November 1998. The hotel itself meets the needs of all guests for business, holiday and entertainment, etc.

 

Yongjiang Hotel offers 359 luxury and standard guestrooms and suites, a grand restaurant with more than 2000 seats, featuring meeting facilities, business centers, a multi-function hall, banks, an eating place of delicacies, bars, a fitness center and a beauty salon, etc. In a word, it is a well-equipped and fully-functional businesslike hotel.

 

 

Guangxi Minorities Cultural Relics Center is an extended part of the indoor displays of folk cultural relics in the Museum of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, covering an area of 24,000 square meters. It first became a sight-seeing spot at the end of 1988. In the Center there are Zhuang’s Pile-dwelling and theatre stage, Yao’s Bamboo dwelling, Miao’s Pile-dwelling, Maonan’s dwelling house, some folk mills of oil extracting, rice hulling and paper making, and some typically-ethnic production and living tools and handicraft articles displayed in the dwellings, etc. Along the roadside stands an enormous sculptured copper drum and Dong’s Roofed-bridge. The bridge is more than 40 meters long and 4 meters wide, with its piers built with bluestones, its deck paved with fir, its top roofed with tiles and its middle part built with pagodas and pavilions. All of the eaves, bridgeheads, railings in the long corridor are deliberately carved and engraved with many colorful patterns. The whole bridge is built without a single nail but is extremely firm. Beside the bridge is a 9-storey Dong’s Drum Tower.

 

 

In November 1994, the People’s Government of Nanning City invested 3.5 million yuan in building a garden flower fair in the north part of Yuanhu Road, with Nanning Bureau of Gardening Administration conducting the whole matter and Nanning People’s Park taking charge of the concrete construction and management. The market-building was completed in March 1995, and in April, Chaoyang Flower and Bird Fair moved to the newly-built fair. This fair features ethnic flavors and gardening traits, integrated with market, leisure and scenic spots for visitors to enjoy. The whole fair covers a total area of 12,300 square meters, with a building area of 1,985 square meters, a parking lot of 600 square meters, 103 fixed stores, 100 iron-built booths, and 5 offices for industrial and commercial administration, taxation administration and security affairs. The fair deals with businesses in flower and tree miniascapes, root carvings (mainly of eagles), fancy fishes, birds and so on. Altogether there are more than 50 trades. Others include fancy stones, antiques, sculptures, paintings and calligraphy, pets and even catering services. Its annual volume of business reaches 5 million yuan. It is indeed a garden flower fair with a certain scale and multiple businesses.

 

 

Nanhu Park (South Lake Park) is an old man-made flood-diversion lake. It was built in Jingyun Period of Tang Dynasty (71—711 A.D.) because Nanning (“Yong” at that time) was affected by floods. In 1956, the People’s Government of Nanning City opened up the 9000-mu Nanhu as a fish farm and scenic spot. In 1972, the Government extended Nanhu and built it as a park mainly with water sights, which covers a total area of 160.26 hectares, with a land area of 35.78 hectares and water area of 124.48 hectares, and green areas of 27.2 hectares. In the park there are museums of Li Mingrui and Wei Baqun, two revolutionary martyrs of Guangxi. Other attractions include a miniascape garden particularly with Guangxi style, a long orchid circle with strong fragrance, an areca garden always dancing with tree shadows, water amusement park, etc. Nanhu Park is a green leisure resort, composed of green lawns, sub-tropical plants and water amusements. It began to open to everyone free of charge in October 2002.

 

 

On Nov. 18 and 19, 2000, the 1st Guangxi (Nanning) Tourism and Gourmet Festival was held in Nanning Qingxiushan Scenic Area. It was co-sponsored by the Organizing Committee of Nanning International Arts Festival of Folk Songs, Tourism Administration of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region and Nanning Tourism Bureau. With the theme of “tasting delicious food in green city”, the festival consisted of a series of activities, including a large-scale tourism carnival named “Amorous Green City”, a food street with tasty food of all parts of Guangxi, a tourism promotion and tourist commodity sales exhibition called “Coming into Beautiful Guangxi”, etc. During the festival, an attraction was the sight and taste of “King of Zongzi”.

 

 

Located in the southern suburbs of Nanning City, Liangfengjiang Scenic Area was approved as a national forest park by Ministry of Forestry on Sep 9, 1992. It is the first national forest park in Nanning City, covering an area of 4813 hectares, with 3398.3 hectares covered with trees. Built in 1965, it was named Liangfengjiang Botanical Garden and later Nanning Tree Garden. In the park, there are 1294 species under 122 families of sub-tropical trees and endangered species, 85 of them recorded as state-protected species.

 

The park is an ideal place for an outing. Its winding brooks, pretty hills with zigzagging and shadowy paths always attract a great number of tourists. In 1994, a new scenic spot named Hongniling was built, covering an area of 35 hectares. It focuses on entertainments and attracts more visitors.

 

 

According to the gardening and landscaping census conducted by Nanning Bureau of Gardening in 2000, there are 139 old trees and 2 famous trees in Nanning City, belonging to 11 species under 7 families, such as kapok, banyan, camphor, longan, carambola, etc. The number of banyan is the greatest. Among them, 134 trees as old as 100—300 years are listed in Category II of the State Protection List and 5 trees of more than 300 years old in Category I. The oldest tree is a banyan in Pingyang Village, Nahong Town, which is as old as 350 years. It is 28 meters high, the diameter of the tree-trunk is 4.15 meters, and the range of tree-crown reaches 1890 square meters.

 

 

Standing about 7 km. in southeast Nanning City, Qingxiushan Scenic Area covers an area of 791 hectares and consists of 18 hills like Qingshanling, Fenghuangling, Foziling, Leipiling, etc. at an altitude of 74—288.6 meters, sloping down from the northeast to the southwest. The Yongjiang River flows around it from the southern foot. The scenic area, claimed the biggest one in Nanning City, is known for its chained hills, evergreen pines, clear spring waters and fanciful rocks.

 

Qingxiushan has a long development history, thus preserving quite a few historical sites and poems written by celebrities and scholars and engraved on walls. In 1989, it was approved as a scenic and historic area of interest at a provincial level by the Government of Guangxi, and in 2000, upgraded as a national 4A scenic area.

 

Qingxiushan is also called Taiqingfeng, commonly referred to as Qingshan. The inside of Qingxiushan is the central sight-seeing place of the whole scenic area. According to historical records, in the Eastern Jin Dynasty (317—420), a Taoist named Luoxiu ever tried to make pills of immortality on Jieqingya of Taiqingfeng, and during the dynasties of Tang, Song, Yuan and Ming, temples of Baiyun, Wanshouchan, Dugu, Qingshan, Miaochao and Zhuweian were built in succession. In Jajing Period of Ming Dynasty, when Dong Chuance, head of the Ministry of Punishments, was sent in exile to Nanning, Xu Pu, garrison commander of Zuojiang, and Fang Yu, governor of the prefecture, often accompanied him to visit Qingxiushan and built Hut of Baiyunjing, Dongxu Pavilion and Dongquan Pavilion for him. Around ten poems and essays written by them singing the beauty of Qingxiushan were handed down, including Notes of Qingxiushan, Song of Qingshan, Meeting at Hut of Baiyunjing and so on. In Ming Dynasty, Xiao Yunju, an official in the Ministry of Official Personnel Affairs (later as minister of the Ministry of Rites), built Longxiang Pagoda, Xiji Pavilion, Liangyun Pavilion, rebuilt Qingshan Temple and compiled Qingluo Prose, which was a collection of poems and essays describing Qingxiushan. Later, some poetic prose was written. However, all of the above mentioned temples and garden structures were destroyed due to the war.

 

After liberation, Qingxiushan was remodeled as Qingshan Forestry Center. In February 1983, all walks of life in Nanning appealed to the People’s Government to restore Qingxiushan Scenic Area, and in December that year, Nanning Bureau of Gardening put forward Report of Measures and Comments on Preparation to Build Qingxiushan Scenic Area. In April the next year, the proposal of rebuilding Qingxiushan Scenic Area got passed at the 5th session of Nanning’s 7th People’s Congress. On October 13, 1985, Preparatory Department of Qingxiushan Scenic Area was set up, and in 1986, with funds allocated by the People’s Government and donated by all walks of life, the rebuilding work was started. More than 30 scenic spots were built and renovated, including Longxiang Pagoda, Fenghuang Pagoda, Dongquan Pavilion, Tianchi Lake, Yaochi Lake, Forest of Steles, Peach Blossom Garden, Palm Garden, Cycad Garden, Sino-Thailand Friendship Garden, Garden of Rain Forest, and so on.