Walk the canal path
Lijiang, Yunnan, China
About
Walk the canal path. To get to the Black Dragon Pool you can walk the canal path north near the main water wheel. It will take you to the south entrance of the park. The north part of the park is free and you can get there by walking around the south entrance and keep heading north. You should reach a street with the main entrance to the park. Keep going north and you will see a small bridge that leads to a large white building. The white building is the Dongba Museum, everything north of that is free. If the guards bother you at the gate, just walk back to the street and keep walking north and there will be another path to get in to the free part with no gates or guards to bother you. Further north of the park is a local college, and northwest of that is a small reservoir. The reservoir is a good place to take photos of the snow mountain when it is visible. On hot sunny days in the summer there will be lots of locals swimming there in the afternoon. At the local college you can find students to help you. The English building is the large pink one just right after you enter the south entrance. There is a student run café that is open in the evening from 6:30PM-10PM in the "butterfly" building, which is opposite of the English building. As of 2007 the school has an English corner every Thursday after lunch (~1PM), and after dinner at ~5:40PM. The English corner is so-so, but it is a great chance to ask students about where to go, and cheap transportation. Many of them are from other places in Yunnan.
