The temperature in Harbin reaches forty below zero, both Fahrenheit and Celsius, and stays below freezing nearly half the year. So what does one do every winter in this city of far northeastern China? Hold an outdoor festival, of course! Rather than suffer the cold, the residents of Harbin celebrate it, with annual festivals featuring snow and ice sculptures and structures.



The winter celebration in Harbin draws hundreds of thousands of visitors every year – as does the web site of R. Todd King (www.rtoddking.com), with its many photographs of those festivals. This book, Hot Ice and Wondrous Strange Snow, collects all those Harbin winter festival photographs through 2007 and includes many of the host city itself. Enjoy the trip!