The word “Taiping” is virtually a cliché. As a place name, this is the local equivalent of Springfield in the USA; no less than 47 towns in China go by the moniker. Then the name pops up in Taiping Insurance, Haerbin Taiping International Airport, the Taiping Ocean; the Pacific as it is known in Chinese, and of course the Nanjing-initiated Taiping Rebellion (1850-1864).

“太平”这个词几乎是一个陈词滥调。 作为一个地名，这是美国斯普林菲尔德的当地等同物；中国不少于47个城镇使用这个绰号。 然后，这个名字出现在太平保险、海尔滨太平国际机场、太平洋；中文中所知的太平洋，当然还有南京发起的太平叛乱（1850-1864）。

Tops, however, for The Nanjinger now, is Taiping Lake in Anhui province, just a 3-hour drive southwest from Nanjing. Surrounded by mountains, it is hard to believe this body of water is a creation of humankind. While we only found this out after the fact, such has not diluted a very pleasant memory of a place that served as the perfect base for a road trip skirting the mighty Huangshan that is, understandably, one of the biggest attractions (metaphorically and literally) in China, surrounded, as it is, by one 5A-rated spot after the other.

然而，对于《南京人》来说，现在的顶级是安徽省的太平湖，距离南京西南仅3小时车程。 被群山环绕，很难相信这个水体是人类的创造。 虽然我们事后才发现这一点，但这并没有淡化对这个地方的非常愉快的记忆，这个地方是环绕雄伟大的黄山的公路旅行的完美基地，可以理解的是，黄山是中国最大的景点之一（隐喻和字面意思），周围是一个又一个5A级景点。

The mountains start not long after one turns on to the G3 expressway that links Beijing with Fujian province and, one day, ultimately and somewhat controversially, Taipei in Taiwan. Hence, it’s Jingtai (京台) moniker. Together with the mountains, comes the lush green that is a by product of those rainy mists that envelop Huangshan in any self-respecting painting of the beast.

山脉在人们转入连接北京和福建省的G3高速公路后不久就开始了，有一天，最终和有些争议的是台湾的台北。 因此，它是京台（京台）的绰号。 与群山一起，郁郁葱葱的绿色是那些雨雾的产物，笼罩着黄山的任何自尊野兽画。

The Taiping Lake Bridge appropriately marks one’s arrival at the lake, and is considered sufficiently worthy of note by Wikipedia to see it featured in the encyclopedia’s entry for the road that is just shy of 2,000 km long.

太平湖大桥恰当地标志着一个人到达了湖面，维基百科认为它值得注意，以至于在百科全书的条目中，这条道路只有不到2000公里长。

Thence, to our hotel. The onomatopoeiacally-named Pinecone hotel consists of many “cones” that rise majestically from the steep bluff on the lake’s southern shore. Built by the Greenland conglomerate (the people who brought us Nanjing’s tallest building, Zifeng Tower) and then leased to private landlords, these generous rooms of varying sizes (our family room was a whopping 70 square metres with an additional wraparound balcony a good 20 metres in length) are of the self catering variety, albeit without any cooking utensils provided. It’s bring your own, or go out. We didn’t know in advance and so, it was the latter.

从那里，到我们的酒店。 以同名命名的松果酒店由许多“锥体”组成，这些锥体从湖南岸陡峭的悬崖上雄伟地升起。 由格陵兰集团（给我们带来了南京最高的建筑紫峰塔的人）建造，然后租给私人房东，这些大小不一的宽敞房间（我们的家庭房面积高达70平方米，还有一个20米长的环绕式阳台）是自助式的，尽管没有提供任何炊具。 要么自己带，要么出去。 我們事先不知道，所以，是後者。

Yet, this was to be no hardship, as there are a plethora of restaurants nearby (but not walking distance) for lunch or dinner and the stunning Taiping Lake Crowne Plaza that sits on stilts as the breakfast option.

然而，这并不困难，因为附近有很多餐厅（但不是步行距离）供午餐或晚餐，还有令人惊叹的太平湖皇冠假日酒店作为早餐选择。

Day 2 was to be action packed, with our initial stop of Hongcun Village, famed as the set for Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon. But we would first have to get there. The back road from Taiping Lake started out innocently enough, not dissimilar to many in the countryside around Nanjing. Then the mountains become bigger, and they are closer together too. Breath-taking views are complimented by the little villages that dot the valley floors, bathed, at this time of year, in a patchwork ablaze with yellow rape flowers.

第2天是充滿動作的，我們的第一站是洪村，洪村以《臥虎藏龍》的布景而聞名。 但我们首先必须到达那里。 太平湖的后路一开始就很天真，与南京周围农村的许多小路没有不同。 然后山脉变得更大，它们也更靠近了。 令人歎為觀止的景色被點點在山谷底部的小村莊所補充，在每年的這個時候，沐浴在燃燒著黃色油菜花的拼湊中。

The road itself was by now serving up its own kind of beauty, with large sections little more than bedrock. With those behind us, next it was the hairpin bends that serve for a mountain pass, covered with a dense foliage the morning spring sun would barely penetrate.

这条路本身现在已经提供了自己的美丽，大部分路段只有基岩。 在我们身后的人，接下来是用于山口的发夹弯道，覆盖着茂密的树叶，早晨的春天的阳光几乎无法穿透。

Hongcun village is 900 years old, and the reason for the crowds and the filmmakers, is that much of it is still as it was in the Ming dynasty. Many of the traditional courtyards remain, still lived in and tended to by a resident population of approximately 1,500, many of whom rent out their upper rooms to intrepid travelers seeking a genuine taste of ancient China that is becoming increasingly rare.

洪村有900年的历史，人群和电影制作人的原因是，大部分仍然和明朝一样。 许多传统的庭院仍然存在，仍然由大约1500名居民居住和照料，其中许多人将上层房间出租给寻求真正品味的古中国味道的无畏旅行者，而古中国正变得越来越罕见。

Back on the road, and in the knowledge our time was limited, we were still not going to come all this way without at least a look at Huangshan itself. With the attraction’s southern entrance, the Chinese have done themselves proud; the mountain rises majestically behind, while the gate itself makes our Nanjing’s Purple Mountain look positively scruffy by comparison.

回到路上，知道我们的时间有限，如果不至少看看黄山本身，我们仍然不会走这么大路。 随着景点的南入口，中国人为自己感到自豪；这座山在后面雄伟地升起，而相比之下，大门本身让我们的南京紫山看起来非常邋遢。

Then, on, to the Jiulong Waterfalls. A pleasant walk aside the river’s lower reaches and minor falls gives way to a 400-step, steep climb to a summit offering a picture postcard view of the falls’ force majeure. A significant positive is, while Hongcun was teeming, visitor numbers to these falls were reduced to levels best described as “acceptable”.

然后，前往九龙瀑布。 在河流下游和小瀑布旁愉快地散步，让位于400级陡峭的爬坡，通往山顶，可以看到瀑布不可抗力的明信片视图。 一个重要的积极因素是，虽然洪村人海，但这些瀑布的游客人数被减少到最能描述为“可接受的”水平。

With that, it became time to hit the hairpins once again, and now they meant business. Thankfully, local people in this neck of the woods are better drivers, and know how to handle the switchbacks with unnerving confidence. This correspondent can also say with confidence that life expectancy on these roads for the average Nanjing driver might not go beyond many minutes.

有了这个，是时候再次击中发夹了，现在他们意味着生意。 值得庆幸的是，这个森林的当地人是更好的司机，知道如何以令人不安的信心处理回转。 这位记者也可以自信地说，普通南京司机在这些道路上的预期寿命可能不会超过几分钟。

We close, as we opened, with a comparison to the USA. For our jaunt to Taiping Lake and its environs served to illustrate that China, like its sister across the Pacific, has, awaiting to be discovered, an almost inexhaustible supply of road trips that offer majesty, beauty and insight that few other countries can match.

当我们开业时，我们以与美国的比较来结束。 对于我们前往太平湖及其周边地区的游览，说明了中国就像其跨太平洋的姐妹一样，有待发现的几乎取之不尽的公路旅行，这些公路旅行提供了很少有其他国家能比擬的威嚴、美丽和洞察力。