2 . Recently, China has announced the list of the first five national parks. Each of them is divided into two parts — the core protection area and the general control area. In the core protection area, only research and surveillance (监视) in science are allowed. And the general control area is open to the public, allowing travel activities such as camping and hiking. In the future, national parks are expected to be natural classrooms. People can learn about different kinds of animals and plants through eco-friendly travel activities.

Three River-Source National Park on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau is the largest national park in China. Because it is home to the sources of the Yangtze, Yellow and Lancang rivers, people call it “China’s water tower”.

Northeast China Tiger and Leopard National Park is in Heilongjiang and Jilin Provinces. It covers an area of 14,100 square kilometers. It is our country’s biggest and only place for wild Siberian tigers and Amur leopards to live in.

Wuyi Mountain National Park in Fujian Province is a UNESCO natural and cultural heritage site. The forest makes up over 96 percent of the park. The park is the paradise of birds, kingdom of snakes and world of insects. You can also see the Danxia landform there.

Giant Panda National Park connects panda habitats in Sichuan, Shaanxi and Gansu Provinces. Inside the park are more than 1,600 wild giant pandas. They make up over 70 percent of the pandas in China.

Hainan Tropical Rain forest National Park is the largest tropical forest in China. There are more than 400 kinds of plants that can only be found in Hainan.

4 . 4 World-Class Ski Resorts That Don’t Cost Much

Purgatory

Purgatory Resort represents the classic Rocky Mountain skiing experience, with open alpine runs, powdery glades(雪道) , aspen groves(白杨林)and Colorado sunshine. New lifts and strategic snow-making improve the attractions of carefree runs and parents will welcome the wallet-friendly Power Kids policy: Children 12 and under ski free. Day lift tickets from $44 to $139.

Nelson

The small mountain town of Nelson, British Columbia, has its reputation for some of B. C. ‘s best skiing, with deep, dry powder blanketing its 2, 367 acres. Skiers can enjoy old style chairlifts, uncrowded slopes, 40 feet of powder annually and a lodge with food. The ski hill boasts no Wi-Fi, and in town the nightlife maintains Nelson’s unique identity. Day lift ticket from $74.

Bridger Bowl

Just sixteen miles north of Bozeman, Mont, is Bridger Bowl, a nonprofit resort rich in ski culture and loved by local families and college students. Its 2, 700 feet of vertical drop includes a mixture of a green hand and intermediate(中级的)glades, plus challenging pitches for excited seekers. All key ski-day needs are available. Day lift ticket from $70.

Mad River Glen

Ski-cooperative Mad River Glen in Waitsfield, Vt, is a legend in American ski culture. Unlike at many U. S. ski areas, daily skier numbers are limited and leisurely lifts let ascending skiers take in the view. The clean and tidy base lodge remains the major center to recharge and warm up, and retrieve belongings casually left on hooks all day. Day lift ticket from S49.

7 . When someone tells me that they’re going to spend just 3 days in Paris, I feel like they’re most likely not going to love it. I mean, it’s possible to have a great time if you do it right and put what you want to see at the first place. During such a short visit most tourists head to see the Eiffel Tower, Notre Dame, Louvre and some other tourist attractions, and therefore experience crowds, long lines and not the real local Paris.

Take your pick and spend some time actually enjoying these things instead of rushing through everything. I’m not telling you not to see these famous landmarks, but in order to fully feel the Paris atmosphere, you need to stay in the city longer. A stay in Paris just for a weekend seems far from seeing all the great things.

Almost everyone is dreaming of getting to the top of the Eiffel Tower. But the moment you start approaching the tower you might realize that it’s not very romantic, as it’s surrounded by a ton of visitors and annoying vendors (小贩). The place is crowded, and lines take forever no matter when you visit it.

It’s hard to find a romantic spot unless you book a dinner on top of the Eiffel Tower. It’s something you will only do once, as it’s not the best fine dining you’ve ever had — you’re doing it just for the experience. However, if you climb the stairs behind the Croatian Embassy you may be able to find a quiet spot overlooking the tower. The view is wonderful and definitely worth it, especially at night when the tower starts blinking!

I recommend you to see the city from up high from the top of the Tour Montparnasse, Arc de Triomphe, or even a carousel (旋转木马) in Tuileries, and actually have the Eiffel Tower in your view.

One of the most popular city walk routes in Shanghai is Fuxing Road in the downtown area of the city. With trees     1     (give) shade from the sunlight, the street is home to many historic buildings of special     2     (significant) to China. Among them is the former residence (宅第) of a famous Chinese architect.

Zhuang Jun (1888-1990),     3     name was also spelt as Chuang Tsin, was one of the first professional architects in modern China, and     4     (create) a series of landmark buildings in Shanghai and other major cities across the country. He also compiled (编写) the first English-Chinese dictionary of architectural engineering terms in     5     1950s.

The residence was designed by himself and constructed in 1921.     6     (locate) at 45 Fuxing Road West in Xuhui District, it is a brick-concrete three-storey garden house. It occupies a long and narrow L-shaped area of 306 square meters, consisting     7     two sets of units. The outer wall is light yellow, while the corners     8     (decorate) with tooth-shaped red bricks. Two fireplaces were built in the sitting room     9     the guest room.

Zhuang and his family lived in the house for decades and he died there in 1990. The house was listed as a     10     (culture) relic preservation site of Xuhui District in 2017. Today it is still a private residence and visitors can only appreciate it from the outside.

9 . Combining a vertical (竖的，直立的) farm and office space into a single 51-storey idea out of Chinese tales, an Italian architect is completing the Shenzhen skyline with a shocking farmscraper (农场摩天楼).

Jian Mu Tower was designed for a leading Chinese supermarket to be a place where renter can grow, sell, buy, or consume produce in the same place they work.

Lying in the south Chinese city of Shenzhen, the Turin-based Carlo Ratti Associati Company has showed plans to build a 650-foot tower in which 100,000 square feet of the glass outside (外墙) is used to produce food — 590,000 pounds of it per year, which would also contain around a million square feet for office space, a supermarket, gardens, and food court (美食街).

Hydroponic (水栽法的) gardening involves using nutrient-rich water rather than soil, and allows plants to be grown in tubes piled up vertically. Working with ZERO, an Italian-based company that specializes in new approaches to agriculture, Jian Mu’s farm is made full use of to produce everything from salad greens to fruits, while remaining efficient and sustainable. An AI scientist would watch most of the hydroponic systems, water and nutrients, planning planting and harvest cycles, and other matters.

“Small-scale urban farming is happening in cities all over the world — from Paris to New York to Singapore. Jian Mu Tower, however, takes it to the next level,” writes Ratti, who is also a professor at MIT. “Such approach has the potential to play a major role in the design of future cities, as it engages in one of today’s most urgent architectural challenges: How to integrate the natural world into building design.”

10 . Landscape architect Kotchakorn Voraakhom has designed a new green roof on the Rangsit Campus of Thammasat University, about 25 miles north of central Bangkok, Thailand. Her imaginative work challenges the common thinking that urbanization has a negative impact on the planet, whether flooding, excess (过度的) energy use, disrupted (扰乱) biodiversity or the heat island effect.

The 236, 806-square-foot structure, which opened in December 2019, includes a flood water management system and Asia’s largest rooftop organic farm. It combines modern landscape architecture with traditional agricultural knowledge, creating a green and friendly environment.

The green roof, containing an H-shaped landscape, looks like a futuristic hill with a brick building beneath it. The hill features a complex pattern of zigzagging terraces (之字形梯田) of planted beds, leading all the way down to the bottom. When rainwater hits the roof, it flows down the zigzags while being absorbed by the soil in the beds, The excess water is directed into four storage ponds — with a capacity of up to 3 million gallons. The process slows down the flow speed of rainwater runoff compared to a normal concrete rooftop. This keeps the area from flooding during heavy rains.

The roof’s terraces are filled with organically grown crops, including a drought tolerant variety of rice, many local vegetables and herbs. The farm can supply the canteens on campus with a large amount of rice, herbs and vegetables a year. The food waste is composted (把……制成堆肥) to fertilize the farm, and water from the storage ponds is used to water plants, creating an entirely localized and circular system.

The farm serves as an outdoor classroom and a source of local jobs, too. Farmers offer workshops on sustainable agriculture and nutrition as part of the university’s sustainability curriculum. “Students and community members are invited to participate in seasonal seeding, harvesting, and so on,” says Voraakhom. “The urban farm is training a new generation of organic farmers with real-world skills. It also promotes a sense of community.”