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Winter Travel / Festivals / Global Warming / → All Tags

Ridiculous Harbin Ice Festival Officially Open

In December, we were a bit worried that the Harbin Ice Festival would fall victim to global warming and be a bit smaller of a spectacle. How little faith we have in China: This year's 25th anniversary event even features an enormous Disney Land replica to go along with various snow-centric competitions and rides.

In addition to ice slides, mouse ear-shaped igloos, swims in a frigid river and skiing, fireworks light up the snow sculptures and ice pagodas that should be on view for the next month, as long as the winter weather holds. More than 800,000 visitors are expected.

As for those worries about global warming hurting the frost, it seems Harbin's still a few tons of CO2 short of a crisis: Wednesday's forecast high is 16 degrees, dropping to minus 6 tomorrow night.

Related Stories:
· China Builds Icey Disneyland [BBC]
· Ice Santa 1, Global Warming 0 [Jaunted]

[Photo: China.org.cn]

Santa Claus / Christmas / Winter Festival Travel / → All Tags

Ice Santa 1, Global Warming 0

You can't keep a good Santa down! Specifically, a Chinese city's giant sculpture of Santa, well on its way to being built this year despite ever-warming temperatures.

Despite the city of Harbin's proximity to Siberia, the region has been affected by the global (temperature) meltdown: For its annual ice festival, including the 78-foot-tall Santa, officials were forced to make snow just like a ski resort. CO2 trouble notwithstanding, this bad boy is going up to the delight of the 800,000 estimated visitors when the fest opens January 5.

Related Stories:
· Harbin Ice Festival Sweats Under Global Warming [Lost Weekend]
· Let it Snow: China Builds "World's Largest" Ice Santa [Reuters, via Yahoo!]
· Santa Isn't The Only One Who Digs The North Pole [Jaunted]

[Photo of a Harbin Santa in 2004: dennisyee]