Traveling in Yxian (黟县) County – part three, Xidi (西递)

In this, the third post about my traveling in Yixian County (in Anhui province, China), I want to share photographs taken in the ancient village called Xidi (西递).

(Xidi from the roof tops)
According to Wikipedia Xidi was first built during the Huangyou era (1049–1053) of Song Dynasty Emperor Renzong. (source)

Xidi is a UNESCO world heritage site and I rank it as the second most famous village in Yixian County. It is very photogenic and I enjoyed my visits to this village. I visited it in 2014 and 2015 to attend the annual Yixian photo festivals.

The well preserved and impressive entrance gate is a well-known landmark. Because of its popularity (and also because so many people come to Yixian to attend the festivals) it was a very big challenge to get a reasonably good photo of this entrance gate.

I had to revert to my old trick of using ND filters to slow down the shutter speed enough to blur all moving objects (people).

(Xidi ancient gate)

The opening ceremony of the 2015 photo festival took place right in front of this entrance gate, and that basically ruin any chance of photographing this beautifully preserved architecture during the 2015 festival.

(2015 Photo Festival opening ceremony)

There are about a 100 Ming and Qing houses, all still occupied - either as houses for the local residents, as restaurants for the tourists or as curio shops.

(Entrance to an antique shop)

(The Restaurant)

(A rainy day)

(Well preserved architecture)

(Drying maize)

While walking in the (crowded) streets I found this artist busy painting a village scene (these ancient villages are very popular as inspiration for paintings).

I decided to photograph him, but had to wait for about 15 minutes before the crowd actually was giving me a clear view of him.

(The artist)

In the meantime, because I was standing still, I have drawn my own crowd (photo taken by my daughter - Leana Blom)

(Drawing a crowd)

If you did not read my previous two entries about Yixian, then please click on the links below to read them as well.
Part One: Xiuli Studio Village
Part Two: The 2014 Photo Festival (This article also contains a map to show the positions of these villages relative to each other.)