Yancheng Wetland National Nature Reserve Rare Birds

😭Departing from Nanjing for a trip This time I went to Yancheng for a micro-vacation It really exceeded my expectations! Sharing my one-day tour: In the morning, egg pancakes, fish soup noodles, and rice pancake wrapped around youtiao are essential After eating, spend the morning at the China Sea Salt Museum In the afternoon and evening, experience the beauty of ancient charm at Yanzhen Water Street~ . ✅China Sea Salt Museum (🎫Free, closed on Mondays 9:00-17:00) It's close to Yancheng Station, a place that fully showcases the charm of Yancheng culture, the museum records the history of sea salt, you can listen to explanations and look around, the architecture is very characteristic, the main building is composed of 'sea salt crystals', and it's really photogenic There's a small courtyard 🏡 next to the first floor where you can borrow books 📖 After visiting, sit on a chair and read a book 📚 It's really quite comfortable~ 🕹There are 3 free stamps (1 museum stamp + 2 Chinese character stamps, available at the information desk on the right side of the entrance) . ✅Yanzhen Water Street (🎫Free, lighting time around 18:00-22:00) Just a few steps across from the Sea Salt Museum! The night view here is quite nice, and there are performances to watch, with regular opera performances every night from 7:00-9:00. It's a great place to take photos with traditional Chinese style, with pavilions and towers standing by the water, and there are various food snacks and cultural and creative markets to browse, and you can take a boat ride at the Water Street boat dock 🛶 Enjoy the evening breeze, so chill~ There's also a landmark of Yancheng at the dock for a photo op! This one is really photogenic! . ✅Other recommended attractions to visit: Dutch Flower Sea, Dayang Bay, Chinese Milu Deer Park, Red-crowned Crane Wetland Ecotourism Area, Yellow Sea Forest Park, Zhuxi Ancient Town...

Standing atop the observation tower in the Red-crowned Crane Wetland Park, one can gaze far into the distance. Whether looking south, north, or east, the view is vast and boundless, with the 'Yellow Sea' stretching out, its gentle waves rippling. Bathed in sunlight, it is Yancheng's Ili, with grasslands, lakes, and rare birds flying by. Address: Yancheng Red-crowned Crane Wetland Ecotourism Area Ticket Price: 36 Visiting Time: 2~3 hours - Tips 1. There are quite a few mosquitoes, so be sure to protect yourself against them 2. Make sure to walk further in to reach the wetlands, only then can you see the scenes depicted in the pictures 3. Choose a good weather day for your visit

Yancheng, formerly known as Yandu, is a prefecture-level city under the jurisdiction of Jiangsu Province and a city in the central area of the Yangtze River Delta. It is located in the eastern coastal area of China, in the eastern part of Jiangsu Province, and borders the Yellow Sea to the east. The entire territory is a plain, with high terrain in the northwest and southeast, and low-lying areas in the middle and northeast, divided into the Huanghuai Plain, the Lixiahe Plain, and the Coastal Plain; it is a transition zone from the North Asian subtropics to the warm temperate climate. Yancheng has been established since the sixth year of Emperor Gao of the Western Han Dynasty (201 BC), and it was originally named Yandu County. In the ninth year of Emperor An of the Eastern Jin Dynasty (413 AD), it was renamed Yancheng County. Yancheng is home to the only World Natural Heritage Site in Jiangsu, the Yellow (Bo) Sea Migratory Bird Habitat. The city has convenient transportation by sea, land, and air, and has basically formed a three-dimensional transportation network integrating highways, railways, aviation, sea transportation, and inland water transportation. Nanyang International Airport, Dafeng Port Area of Yancheng Port, Binhai Port Area, Sheyang Port Area, and Xiangshui Port Area have become national first-class open ports, making it a prefecture-level city with both an airport and a seaport as first-class open ports. It is the intersection of the national coastal development and the Yangtze River Delta integration strategies. The city has hundreds of kilometers of tidal flats and wetlands, with two national nature reserves for red-crowned cranes and elk, and a Chinese sturgeon nature reserve under construction. Topography: The entire territory of Yancheng is a plain, with high terrain in the northwest and southeast, and low-lying areas in the middle and northeast. Most areas are less than 5 meters above sea level, and the maximum relative height is less than 8 meters. It is divided into three plains: the Huanghuai Plain, the Lixiahe Plain, and the Coastal Plain. The Huanghuai Plain is located north of the Subei Irrigation Main Canal, and its terrain gradually decreases to the northeast and southeast, roughly centered on the abandoned Yellow River. Origin of the name: Yancheng was established as Yandu County in the fourth year of Emperor Wu of the Western Han Dynasty (119 BC). At that time, there were salt fields everywhere here, and there were salt rivers everywhere. 'Du' means the river for transporting salt. In the seventh year of Emperor An of the Eastern Jin Dynasty (411 AD), it was renamed Yancheng County, and the name 'Yancheng' has been used to the present day. It is named after the 'salt fields around the city'. Customs and folklore: In the rural areas of Yancheng and Funing, there were historical activities of boy servants making incense and performing witchcraft. The content includes: praying for a good harvest and holding a green seedling meeting, an adding seedling meeting; extending blessings and eliminating disasters and holding a peace meeting, a Mars meeting, etc. With the changes of history, the content of these performances has been continuously enriched, and after a long period of evolution, it has gradually developed into a incense play. The incense play is a local small play closely related to folk ghost and god beliefs, also known as Sanhuozi, Sankexi, etc., which was finally formed around the first year of Tongzhi in the Qing Dynasty (1862). Its singing tune is composed of the 'Incense Tune' popular in the territory and the 'Huai Bounce' from Huaiyin, Baoying and other places. At the same time, incense play artists often team up with door ballad artists, so there are many tunes in the incense play that come from door ballads. Theater art: Huai opera, also known as Jianghuai opera, is popular in Jiangsu Province, Shanghai City, and some areas of Anhui Province. In the middle of the Qing Dynasty, in Yancheng, Funing and other places in Jiangsu, there was a popular form of storytelling developed from farmers' haozi and field songs 'Leilei Tune' and 'Planting Seedlings Tune', which was a single singing or duet singing with only bamboo boards as the rhythm. Later, it was combined with the folk god-offering 'Incense Play' to perform, and it was called 'Jiangbei Small Play'. Later, it was influenced by Huixi and Jingxi, and gradually enriched in singing tunes, performances, and repertoire, forming Huai opera. Early Huai opera mainly used 'Old Huai Tune' and 'Kao Ba Tune', and the singing tune was basically a linked structure of tune cards, and no orchestral instruments were played. Around the 19th year of the Republic of China (1930), Dai Baoyu, Liang Guangyou, Xie Changyu and others, based on the 'Incense Tune', began to create some new tunes accompanied by erhu, because the erhu was played with a bow, so it was called 'La Tune'. This greatly improved the performance art of Huai opera, and the mobile area gradually expanded from Yancheng, Funing, Huaian and other places to Jiangsu Province. In the first year of the Republic of China (1912), Huai opera artists He Kongde, Chen Dasan, etc., brought Huai opera to Shanghai for singing. Later, the famous actor He Jiaotian created the 'Chain Sentence' singing tune, which further enriched the 'Free Tune'. The traditional repertoire of Huai opera includes: early life small plays 'Tongue-to-Tongue', 'Foot Travel', 'Clever Grandma Scolding Cat', etc., big plays 'Nine Lotus Thirteen Heroes' (that is, 'Qin Xianglian', 'Lan Yulian' and other 9 plays with the word 'Lian' and 'Wang Erying', 'Su Diying' and other 13 plays with the word 'Ying') and 'Legend of the White Snake', 'Yue Fei', 'Thousand Miles to Send Jingniang', 'Zhuangyuan Robe', 'Official Ban Min Lamp', etc.

This is a bird-watching sanctuary~ A paradise for red-crowned cranes! World Natural Heritage - Yancheng Red-crowned Crane Nature Reserve! Seeing them, you will think of the girl who dedicated herself. The red-crowned crane, an endangered bird species with only over 3000 left in the wild worldwide, migrates from the north to the tidal flats and wetlands of Yancheng, Jiangsu every autumn and winter, which is also an excellent bird-watching season. The red-crowned crane is a national first-class protected animal and an endangered species in the world, known as the 'king of birds' and 'bird of happiness'. Yancheng Red-crowned Crane Wetland Ecotourism Area is a paradise for red-crowned cranes. Every year, hundreds of red-crowned cranes fly here from the northeast or Russia to spend the winter, forming a spectacular scene of crane dance. In addition to red-crowned cranes, there are other rare wild animals here, such as black-tailed gulls, elk, river deer, white-naped cranes, gray cranes, etc., forming a rich and diverse ecosystem. Opening hours: all year round 09:00-17:00

Red-crowned cranes, migratory birds, are national first-class protected animals and globally vulnerable species, with only over 2,000 individuals remaining. Each year, nearly 1,000 red-crowned cranes choose to winter in the Yancheng Nature Reserve, which is the largest overwintering site for red-crowned cranes in the world. The Yancheng Nature Reserve faces the Pacific Ocean and is a transitional zone from the North Subtropical to the Warm Temperate Zone, and from the Palearctic to the Oriental Region in terms of climate and faunal distribution. As a result, the area is rich in species, with 450 plant species, 379 bird species, 45 species of amphibians and reptiles, 281 fish species, and 47 mammal species. Among them, there are 12 species of national key protected wildlife of the first class, including red-crowned cranes, Siberian cranes, whooping cranes, Oriental storks, black storks, scaly-sided mergansers, Relict gulls, great bustards, golden eagles, Eastern imperial eagles, white-tailed sea eagles, Chinese sturgeons, etc. There are also 67 species of national key protected wildlife of the second class, such as hooded cranes, common cranes, black-faced spoonbills, whooper swans, spoon-billed sandpipers, mandarin ducks, grey-faced buzzards, spotted seals, etc.