I was feeling down a few days ago, so I went out to clear my head. It was a pity that I failed to visit Xiamen months ago. Well, let's go.

Arrived at Xiamen Railway Station at noon. Blue sky, clean air, and an empty station square—it's so comfortable here after hours on the train, one of my favorite parts of every trip.

Xiamen Botanical Garden ​

The first place I visited was Xiamen Botanical Garden. I was so excited to see the "Rainforest fog", but ended up a little disappointed. There were so many people in this part of the garden that I barely had time to stand still; I just got pushed forward by the crowd.

There were so many cacti, like I've never seen before. Some of them were cute, some were weird, and some were disgusting.

This huge stone looks like a face!!!

Garden bus staff kept urging, "The last bus is at 5pm, keep moving, there's no time." I was thinking that the garden would close at 7pm—I needed to be quick. So I went to Xishanyuan as the last part of my visit to the garden. It's a quiet place. With just a few people around, I saw a large grassland where people sat or walked on the grass. I thought maybe people didn't want to visit a normal park with a ¥30 ticket. Well, I love quiet grasslands. But I had to leave soon because it was getting dark, and I wanted to take the last bus down the mountain to save some energy for visiting the next place. I hadn't expected the garden to be so vast; you could stay there all day—just remember to bring your lunch and picnic in the grassland.

Mountains-to-Sea Trail ​

The one place I've wanted to visit for so long is the Mountains-to-Sea Trail. I saw it on the TV series "Reset". It's a 23km-long trail within the city. It's beautiful and amazing. A few months ago, I visited a similar trail in Fuzhou. If I moved to either of these cities, such trails would be one important reason.

I was a little scared to walk up, and I kept myself in the middle of the trail. I encouraged myself to stand on the edge of the trail, and after I did that, wow, it was worth it.

It was too late, so I stayed only an hour, then went back to the hotel. Before I left, there were still some people walking up, not bad.

Gulangyu ​

After a poor rest in the uncomfortable bed at the hotel, I bought a ship ticket to Gulangyu. I thought if I couldn't get a ticket, it would mean there were too many people. I was lucky. I left the hotel at 9am and realized it was almost too late to get on the ship. So I gave up looking for local food and bought a sandwich in a store. After taking the metro, I started running to the port. Ahead of me, there were some girls also running—same ship. One of them said, "This is youth".

There are two ports for visitors. One is busy, and the other is quiet. I chose the quiet one. After walking on the island, wow, it was so beautiful. Whoever lives here must be rich and happy. An hour later, I learned it was a concession; that's why it has such a Western style.

I walked around the island. The sky was blue, the clouds were white, the air was clean, the grass was green, the flowers were colorful, and the place was quiet. This is where I want to live. But after I reached the busy port, everything changed; never mind. There were so many people, and this is the low season; it will be even more crowded in the peak season.

Well, there were some special sculptures. I know there is a sight called "Zhuhai Fish Girl" in Zhuhai. I thought, this must be the "Xiamen Fish Girl" 😎.

I passed a red brick building and heard a tourist explaining the building—it's a shop and hotel now, built a hundred years ago. "Feel free to visit," they said. So I went in and took some pictures. Not bad, really.

I saw there was a garbage station, with so much trash on carts waiting to be transferred to the mainland. And some men were pulling the carts with gas tanks from the station to the shops, without machines, only human power. Although there is electricity on the island, these workers have to pull the carts themselves, because it's a pedestrian-only island (except vehicles for disabled people).

After leaving the island, there were still two hours before the train. So I took the metro to Haicang Bay Park. Only one station away, but it crosses the sea.