Earlier this week, there was a Chinese holiday (Tomb Sweeping Day; 清明节) and since I have no ancestors' tombs to sweep here, I decided to go and visit Hulishan Fortress here in Xiamen (厦门). Hulishan is located on the coast, near Xiamen University. The fort was originally built beginning in 1891 and finished in 1896. It was built 25 meters above the sea and beach and made of sand, clay and glutinous rice (I looked for the rice since I was a bit hungry, but didn't see any so it seems that the renovated fort is rice-less).
Toward the end of the Qing Dynasty (1644-1912), China realized (albeit a bit too late to save the last imperial dynasty) that it had fallen way behind the Western powers in terms of technology and needed to modernize. To protect the southern coast, China bought German-made Krupp cannon, including two that are reportedly the largest coastal cannon in the world. One of these monster cannons remains - 280 mm, 14 meters long and weighing 60 tons.
Here's a slideshow of photos from Hulishan.
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