During my trip to Anhui, I visited many cities, but what impressed me the most was a small county. I like its simplicity and tranquility, and I like its brick and tile with humanistic atmosphere, it is Shou County, Huainan City.
Many people have not heard of Shou County, which is the most underrated tourist county, 4 times in history, 10 times for the county, is one of the first three cities in Anhui to be selected as a national historical and cultural city.
It was already dusk when we arrived in Shou county, and as the taxi drove forward, a spectacular ancient city wall suddenly appeared in front of us, and the long wall stretched out into the distance, with no end in sight. This sudden shock was an amazing surprise, and I quickly looked up its information in the car and found that it was still an extraordinary ancient city wall.
This section of the ancient city wall began in the Song Dynasty, has a history of more than 900 years, and is the best preserved ancient city wall of the Song Dynasty in China. The economic sluggishness of the county town has protected the city wall to some extent, so that it can be well preserved to this day.
The ancient city has only four exits, guarded by four ancient gates, and due to the moat, only two gates can be driven out of the city. So the ancient city became a peach blossom island, and the people in the city lived in the closed peach blossom island, maintaining a distance from the outside world.
The ancient city wall of Shouxian was repaired during the Ming and Qing dynasties, and the whole was reinforced once in modern times, but the main structure of the Song Dynasty is still there, which is extremely rare among many ancient city walls in China, and because of this, it was included in the "China Ming and Qing City Wall" project of the Preparatory List of Chinese World Cultural Heritage.
I wondered why a small county town would build such a complete wall. Friends told me that don't look at the current Shou County is not well-known, but it is famous in history.
Shou County, also known as Shou Prefecture, is the hometown of Chu culture, and the Battle of Shuishui, which has been recorded in history, was born here. Due to the key geographical location, Shou County has served as a companion capital several times, which is a must for the warriors, and the purpose of building the city wall is to defend the military.
Today's ShouXian has lost its function of war defense, and its economy is not very developed, like a forgotten place. There are no high-rise buildings in the ancient city, basically two or three-story buildings, which look like bustling townships, and there will always be some inconspicuous but hundreds of years old monuments sandwiched between the buildings.
The next day at breakfast, I found that the hotel is full of elderly people over 70 years old, asked the front desk staff to learn that the original hotel access to the pension industry, every year there are many elderly people to this pension.
ShouXian has low prices and a slow pace of life, especially in the old city, where the attractions are very close and you can get there while walking. There are very few young people in the old city, often mainly middle-aged and elderly people, as well as some tourists who come to visit.
After breakfast, I went to the city wall and found many people running and fitness here. Shouxian ancient city wall has a good point, that is, you can climb for free, there is a square built on the edge of the city wall, where everyone runs and dances, forming a public activity center.
Prices in Shouxian are very low, meals are cheap, and local tofu is famous because Shouxian is the birthplace of Chinese tofu. The local tofu is fine, white, fresh and tender, and the dishes made are delicious and nutritious, and are popular with tourists.
There is a dessert in Shouxian called "Big Rescue Drive", which is a local specialty, made of lard, walnut kernels and various rock sugars, golden in color, crispy and delicious, and the price is very cheap, 1 yuan a piece. In the summer, you can also try the local powder skin, which is as thin as a cicada wing and delicious.
Overall, Shouxian's tourism strength is underestimated, there are not many tourists, the pace of this county is slow, the folk customs are simple, after retirement, you can rent a house here to retire and live a life that is not disturbed.
Author: Lin Qinglu, a well-known traveler and travel experience teacher, practices life in the mountains and rivers