Harbin 哈尔滨: A City of Ice and Snow.

A few posts ago I wrote about how cold it was getting in Yinchuan, and what it was like to be in a permanently freezing environment (Read it here). Then the week after I wrote that, 6 of us went to Harbin, and it turns out we didn't even know what cold was.

Harbin is one of the most north-easterly cities in China and if it is known for anything it is known for being really really cold. Every year Harbin is host to the Harbin Ice and Snow Festival, and it needs to be cold if huge snow and ice statues are going to remain standing for almost 3 months. When we decided to go, we knew it was going to be cold (we'd been keeping an eye on the weather reports for weeks) but nothing can prepare you for minus 30 degrees Celsius cold. I've been to Iceland so I had been in serious cold before; but in Iceland we never spent too long outside, in Harbin we were trying to cram everything into 3 days so we were outside all the time.

Saint Sofia cathedral

It's hard to imagine what that kind of cold feels like, but baring the cold was definitely worth it. The Ice and Snow Festival was unlike anything I have even seen, I never know such amazing things could be achieved with snow! 

Harbin itself is a really interesting city because it was once occupied by the Russians, and evidence of this occupation is still everywhere. There's a distinctly Western feel to a lot of the architecture and the food and people are heavily influenced by Russia. Harbin was also an important city at the beginning of the 20th century in accepting Western Culture in China, and building relationships between China and Western countries. My favourite part of this Russian legacy was Saint Sofia cathedral. I am a big fan of churches at the best of times, but with its green onion domes it's a stunning building.

Our second day in Harbin was dedicated to ice and snow. In the morning we went to Sun Island park, which plays host to a competition of snow sculptures made by the local university students - I guess, when so much of your city's industry is built around ice and snow, a degree in making pretty things with ice and snow isn't so weird.
We weren't sure what to expect from Sun Island but honestly I think it was the best thing we did in Harbin. Even though it was the coldest, and windiest day of the trip the amazing sculptures made up for being outside the whole time. My favourite part of Sun Island was the massive frozen lake that was covered in ice buildings, ice slides, and even an ice ship! Next to the lake was also a huge house make entirely of snow that must have been at least 4 meters tall. The whole place was really magical. A special mention has to go to the ice slide, where you can hire a plastic sledge, climb to the top of an ice castle and zoom down the icy slide until you slam to a stop in a pile of snow at the bottom - bruised elbows from bouncing around corners was a worthwhile sacrifice.

Photo credit: Martin Sinfield 

After the day playing on the ice, we spent the evening at the centre of the Harbin Ice Festival, at the Harbin Ice and Snow Amusement World. The Harbin Ice and Snow Amusement World is the tourist hub of the festival, a huge theme park made almost entirely of ice. Personally, I wasn't expecting it to be quite so commercial, but it was still pretty amazing. My favourite part was definitely the Giant Buddha made of snow, which reminded me of the Giant Buddha in Hong Kong. While looking at the Giant Buddha one of my friends suddenly screamed "it's a husky!" (in the most manly of ways, of course) and ran off into the crowd. Obviously we followed because, duh! Husky! What we found were not huskies, but were arguably something better...Arctic Foxes! For the bargain price of 20元 you could hold one and take photos of it; I think at one point I actually shouted at the man "Just take my money!" After the excitement of the Arctic Foxes wore off so did the thrill of the theme park. After all, we had been out in -30 degrees Celsius for the best part of 12 hours!

But although the main draw of Harbin was the Ice and Snow festival there were other things here that made it worth the visit.
We went to the Siberian Tiger Park, which was fun - even if we didn't realise the sun was going to go down quite so early! At the park you get driven around in a bus with caged windows to see the various types of tiger the park protects. It's amazing how close the tigers get to the van and it was definitely a cool experience - even if I am slightly disappointed that we got there too late to hold a tiger cub.

We also went to the Central Street, which almost reminded me of being on Carnaby Street in London. Lights in the trees, European architecture all around, ice-sculptures lining the street; it's a beautiful street to wander down in the evening or in the day time (we did both). And my god, the food! The combination of freezing cold and Russian influence meant that there was a lot of amazing street food. Huge sausages on sticks and the frozen fruit coated in sugar were definite highlights.

All in all spending the time and money going to Harbin was never going to be a mistake. What a way to start the new year! It was a completely unique experience that I think I would be hard pressed to find anywhere else. If you ever have to opportunity to go to the Harbin Ice and Snow Festival, all I can say is do it. You definitely won't regret it!

Hostel: Russia International Youth Hostel. Basic but nice. We split between 2, 6 bed dorms. The girls were lucky enough to have an en suite and space for a sofa; the boys weren't so lucky.