By Yan Wen

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Walk on New Year’s Day in Hangzhou

By Yan Wen

2015新年“走運”現(xiàn)場A red banner leads the walkers in 2015 New Year Walk.

Fitness walking has long been popular in Hangzhou and the ancient canal is more than 1000 years old. But an annual public fitness program that put the walk and the canal together started in 2007 after face-lifting projects removed some dilapidated waterfront houses and added long walkways, trees, flowers along the canal.

Since 2007, Hangzhou, the capital city of Zhejiang, has been holding a New Year’s Day Walk along the Grand Canal of China which zigzags about 39 kilometers across the downtown.

On New Year’s Day of 2016, people gathered at the Canal Cultural Square in downtown Hangzhou to take the first fitness walk in the year. Some of the walkers came from neighboring cities such as Jiaxing, Shaoxing, and Huzhou in the province. Some of them warmed up by doing shadow boxing or dancing before the gong sounded for them to go.

How many people showed up for the New Year Walk this year? Huang Ling, a deputy director of the sports authorities of Gongshu District, said it was more than 1,000. The organizer issues a public bulletin and the walkers will come. Nowadays, information spreads fast, far and wide through social networks such as Wechat. Some expats are eager to take part.

Fitness is a big concern of people nowadays. The sports authorities in Hangzhou encourage residents to walk for fitness. Many walkers can tell their stories of comeback to fitness from sickness. Qiu Hao used to suffer from overweight. He isn’t tall but he was 83 kilos. His friends advised him to do regular workouts and he chose fitness walking. He walked three kilometers along the canal after lunch and in the evening per day. After six months, he weighed about 72 kilos. He was honored with other 19 people as the outstanding walkers. ”Walking makes me fit and enhances my life quality. I feel happy about life!” enthusiastically commented Qiu.

Many young people walk not only for fitness but also for a lot more. Xiaotong, a 25-year-old designer with a local advertising agency, has been in a walking for fitness program for five years. He and his young colleagues at the agency walk together. He says walking enhances friendship, builds up a proactive attitude toward life, and improves relationships. They have a WeChat group to make walk arrangements.

The New Year’s Day walk owns its popularity partly to the historical and cultural sites of the canal. Gongchen Bridge is the city’s largest stone-arch bridge built in the last decades of the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644). It marks the southern end of the canal that goes all the way to Beijing in the north. Beixinguan Site marks one of the seven taxation offices of the Ming along the canal. Xiaohe Straight Street is where the busiest distribution center was in Lin’an, when the city was the capital of the Southern Song Dynasty (1127-1279). Xiangji Temple, built in the Northern Song Dynasty (960-1127), has a stone pagoda that goes back to the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911). It is the only one of its kind built in the Qing around Hangzhou.

The Hangzhou section of the Grand Canal of China began face-lifting in 2007 shortly after the application preparation for the world heritage site kicked off. A lot of projects combined to transform the canal and waterfront regions and provided space for local residents and tourists to stroll around. The landscape projects played a big part in getting the canal inscribed as the world heritage site in June 2014.

The walk for fitness on New Year’s Day along the canal in downtown Hangzhou isn’t the only regular annual walk event in City. There are many more. On the New Year’s Day, a lot of people walked around the West Lake. For three years, a walk for fitness program has been going on along Shangtang River, part of the canal system in Hangzhou. Banshan National Forest Park is the place for another big walk along the walkways in the park on the day that marks the beginning of summer in early May.