Two days later, Li Zhang said goodbye to his family and left the capital with wild dogs and a team of guards, this time the road to Quanzhou was far away, and it was more comfortable to take the waterway, of course, the premise was not seasickness, but Li Zhang didn't want to waste too much time on the road, after all, the waterway was still slower, so he finally decided to take the land route.

Li Zhang left the capital a lot of times, but in the past he mainly went to the north, basically never went to the south, the closest time was to Yongcheng, but although Yongcheng is closer to the south than Kaifeng, but geographically it still belongs to the north, speaking of which Li Zhang's ancestral home is still Hangzhou, but he only went to Hangzhou once in later generations.

There is no need to elaborate on the journey, and when Li Zhang and they arrived in Yangzhou, they had to cross the Yangtze River further south, there was no bridge on the Yangtze River in this era, although there were some places where pontoon bridges could be erected, but they needed to be in a specific section of the Yangtze River, after all, the flow of the Yangtze River was too large, and floods were easy to break out in the rainy season, so many places were not suitable for erecting pontoon bridges.

Of course, the most important thing is that the Yangtze River can pass large ships, and if a pontoon bridge is erected, it will affect the passage of ships, so in ancient times, if you want to cross the Yangtze River, you can only rely on boats.

Li Zhang rested in Yangzhou for two days, tasted the local food in Yangzhou, and also appreciated the Qionghua that was known as the first time to lead Yang Guang to the south to appreciate, but unfortunately it is not the season to bloom, but Li Zhang still bought a few, and then asked people to send back to the capital to make gifts for the Empress Dowager Li, speaking of which, the Empress Dowager Li's birthday is also approaching, but unfortunately he can't rush back to the capital this time to celebrate the aunt's birthday, so he can only send some gifts to express his heart.

Li Zhang, they abandoned the car and took a boat in Yangzhou, in addition to crossing the Yangtze River, they also had to take a boat to Li Zhang's ancestral hometown of Hangzhou, and then take a boat from Hangzhou to the sea, sail along the coastline, and finally arrive in Quanzhou, of course, from Hangzhou can also take the land route to Quanzhou, but although the south of this era has begun to develop, but all aspects can not be compared with the north, the road conditions are extremely poor, so it is better to take the sea route.

At this time, it is almost the New Year, if in the north of this season, maybe it is already snowing all over the sky, and most of the plants are withered, but although the temperature along the Yangtze River is also relatively low, it is still much warmer than the north, and the temperature is higher in the south, but compared with later generations, the temperature in this period is still lower, it is said that the Yangtze River also often snows in winter, not like later generations, the next snow can be on the news.

Li Zhang and the others' boats soon arrived in Hangzhou, where they needed to change boats again, because river boats could not travel on the sea, after all, most of the river boats were flat-bottomed boats, and this kind of boat could not withstand the wind and waves at all.

Li Zhang is well aware of the danger of going to sea in this era, and it is no exaggeration to say that people who go to sea in this era almost have their heads tied to their belts, and if they are not careful, they may be wiped out. For safety reasons, Li Zhang could not trust ordinary sea boats, so after arriving in Hangzhou, he found the local government to identify himself, and asked the other party to transfer a few ships from the navy to escort him to Quanzhou.

Hangzhou is also a famous port on the south coast, the most important thing is that this is the end point of the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal, that is, the river port and the seaport, can be said to be the most important transportation hub in the south, so it is also extremely prosperous, of course, it is still worse than Tokyo, but it is definitely one of the most prosperous cities on the south bank of the Yangtze River, and only Guangzhou can be compared with Hangzhou, it is estimated that it is precisely because of this reason that the small court of the Southern Song Dynasty will choose this place as the capital.

After the magistrate of Hangzhou learned of Li Zhang's identity, he was also very enthusiastic, after all, the emperor's cousin was a hot celebrity in the capital, and it was said that he could be on an equal footing with the prime minister Lu Yijian, so they could not afford to offend this group of magistrates, so they immediately prepared five naval warships to escort Li Zhang and them to Quanzhou.

Taking this opportunity, Li Zhang also went to the sailor camp in Hangzhou to observe, Hangzhou's port is mainly divided into two areas, one is a river port and the other is a seaport, the two ports are connected, especially the two sides of the river port are full of shipbuilding workshops, and many sea ships will come here for maintenance.

Li Zhang originally thought that the naval division camp in Hangzhou should be on the harbor side, but what he didn't expect was that the naval division battalion was on the river port side, although this did not affect some sailors to patrol the sea, but it can also be seen from this arrangement that the focus of the Hangzhou naval division was still on the safety of the canal, and the patrol on the sea was ranked behind.

"The sea is the future!" Li Zhang couldn't help but sigh secretly, and then wrote down the situation, after all, when he came to Quanzhou this time, in addition to investigating the case of the Dong family, the most important thing was to inspect the situation of the Great Song Dynasty Water Division, but this first stop in Hangzhou made him a little disappointed, even the water division still put the inland river in front of the sea.

However, now is not the time to change this situation, the naval division also quickly allocated five warships, these five warships are pointed bottom sea ships, speaking of which before the Great Song Dynasty, the Central Plains naval division mainly used a kind of warship called Lou Chuan, as the name suggests, that is, a kind of extremely high warship, because it resembles a building, so it is named Lou Ship, but the center of gravity of this kind of ship is too high, resulting in the ship is only suitable for navigating in inland rivers, if it goes to the sea, it can not resist the wind and waves at all.

The shipbuilding industry in this period of the Great Song Dynasty has been greatly developed, and there are special sea ships, and now Li Zhang's warship is said to be developed from a kind of warship called the sea falquer ship, this kind of sea falcon ship originated from the former Tang Dynasty, and later after many improvements, it also became the main warship of the Great Song Dynasty, each ship has 50 soldiers, and it is very stable when traveling on the sea.

Speaking of which, although it was the first time he went to sea in this era, he had also taken a sea ship in his previous life, so he was not very worried at first, but when he arrived on the boat, he found that this kind of wooden warship was completely different from the ferry he took in later generations, and it was even more bumpy at sea, not to mention him, and even the wild dogs were seasick and vomited.

Fortunately, I got used to this kind of thing of seasickness, and when Li Zhang vomited and had nothing to vomit in his stomach, he slowly felt better, and after a few days, he was able to eat something slowly, and his spirit recovered a lot.

This fleet of sailors was led by a battalion commander, the other party's surname was Hu, he was a short and sturdy middle-aged man, copper-purple skin, a big beard on his face, a big nose and a big mouth, he looked like a lion, Li Zhang also had something to ask this Hu commander, so after his body recovered some, he also found him immediately.