igoiseeishoot: Evening in Lijiang Old Town

11 September 2024

After a day out exploring Jade Dragon Snow Mountain, Blue Moon Lake and Baisha Village, we spent our evening exploring Lijiang Old Town again. Since we had already explored the town a day before, we were quite familiar with the layout of the town.

At night, Lijiang OId Town is splendid and bustling from 6pm to 11pm. It is also more crowded compared to the day time.

LIjiang Town is pretty in the evening with the red lanterns lit.

We made a beeline for the Water Wheels and Yulong Bridge area located in the Northern part of town since we hope to take photos of the sunset with Jade Dragon Snow Mountain in the background.

After squeezing our way through the crowded streets, we came to our destination but we were a little late. The sun had already set. Nevertheless, the night scenes at this part of town did not disappoint. The sky was clear and the moon was out which adds the night scene.

View of the river running into the northern part of Lijiang town.

Water Wheels at Lijiang Town with the moon above.

View from Yulong Bridge.

We went to an area with many Western fast food restaurants such as McDonalds, KFC, and Starbucks. It was interesting to see how these Western establishments fit into the traditional decors of the repurposed old houses in the ancient town.

Couple enjoying a walk in front of KFC and McDonalds.

Starbuck cafe with the bright moon in the sky.

We went to have a drink at Chagee which is a popular local teahouse chain. Chagee recently opened a outlet back in Singapore and people had to endure long queues to try their milk tea.

Almost empty Chagee teahouse compared to the long queues back home.

We also stopped by this highly reputed silver store called Bai Sui Fang Silverware to shop for a silver-lined water bottle. This store is located near Sifang Square and was recommended by our guide when we told him we were interested to shop for some high quality silver products.

Bai Siu Fang Silverware store.

We spend the rest of our evening exploring the quieter part of the old town which includes the Mufu (木府) Palace. We even saw a local lade walking her per cat on a lease, like a pet dog. So cute.

Statue of a horse laden with tea, depicting the importance of this former trading town and a stop for traders carrying goods on the historic Tea Horse Road.

Cat on lease being walked like a dog.

Mufu Palace (木府)

At the Lijiang Museum that we visited a day earlier, we had learnt that the Mu clan of the Naxi ruled Lijiang as vassals of the Ming Empire and then as vassals of the Manchus of the Qing Empire.

The present building is a modern reconstruction, but it gives an idea of what their palace and castle once looked like. We did not enter the palace and just view it from the outside.