The city of Harbin is well known around the world for its cold and icy winters, and also what they bring – the annual and gorgeously artistic Harbin Ice and Snow Festival. It opens grandly every year in the coldest month of the city, on January 5th. A beautiful city made of Ice and Snow rises up every winter and illuminates the lives around it, especially at night. As one of top tourist places in China, the city sees 10 – 15 million visitors who are coming to participate in the Harbin Ice and Snow Festival. Let’s take a look at what makes it so popular and why you must take a part in it.
Firstly, it makes for a fun family vacation
Harbin Ice Festival is very family friendly. There are many things for both adults and kids to do and see like competitions, tournaments etc. The city itself is a popular winter destination in China due to the magical Harbin International Ice and Snow Festival which beautifies the snow-covered city with artistic sculptures made of ice taken from famed Songhua River known for its crystal clear ice.
It looks like Alice’s Wonderland
The whole place becomes enchanting and magical with cities, structures, art pieces and sculptures made of 180,000 cubic meters ice and 150,000 cubic meters snow which are spawning across 800000 sq. meters. Its grandiosity is only increasing every year. Harbin Ice and Snow festival looks something that is made by Elsa when she was tripping on acid. It is artistic with giant sculptures and art pieces which look giant crystals rather than ice.
It looks even better at night
Its beauty only magnifies at night with colorful light that illuminate into the icy crystal sculptures spellbinding onlookers. If you’re someone interested in night photography, you should book cheap flights for January 2020 and travel to Harbin for taking amazing long exposure shots. The Harbin International Ice and Snow Festival is a celebration of Harbin’s culture, fashion, sports, art, tourism and trade. After sunset, the wonderland comes to life with vibrant colors and light effects controlled by an automated system that illuminates these masterpieces from inside and out.
You can make ice sculptures too
Not only you can find large scale art works which can be climbed or entered but also you can make your own ice sculptures as well. There are multiple competitions and art tournaments for both professional artists and students. Children can take part in many fun art and sport events and tournaments. At Sun Island, Zhaolin Park and Central Street, three different events that popular in their own leagues take place with several thousands of people trying to compete with each other by outdoing each other in making bigger and better art works.
There is also skiing
Apart from art and sculpture competitions, there are also sports at the Harbin Ice Festival 2020 like skiing and swimming. Meanwhile, the Songhua River Ice and Snow Happy Valley, a new event that focuses on various ice and snow physical activities for the whole family like skating, ice football, sledging and bicycling on the frozen Songhua River. But the highlights are the Skiing festivals and winter swimming games. The skiing competition takes place at Yabuli Ski Resort which is a thrill in-and-of itself.
Perfect place to spend Christmas and New Year
Although the main Harbin Ice Festival starts in the first week of January, the other Ice and Snow based events actually start quite early. In fact, you can spend both Christmas and New Year ice sculpting at the Sun Island and Zhaolin Park. The 46th Harbin Ice Lantern Art Fair starts on Dec 22, 2019 and lasts till February – which brings out the best of this festival. The local culture is a unique blend of white Russian and Chinese cultures and so the festival features many Christian based images in its collection like a giant artwork of Santa riding a sledge pulled by the mythical Chinese dragons.
Harbin Ice Festival is a quintessential example of how you can encourage art through tourism and vice versa. Harbin is not only China’s coldest city but also growing rapidly as one of its most popular tourist destinations because of this art and winter festival. Travel and participate in the ice festival by booking cheap flights to Harbin at iEagle.
