Day 14 – “I hear no music.”

Have you heard of the book Outliers?  Anyone read it?  I’ve only read one chapter.  I can’t find it in China.  The chapter that I read is about rice farming in China.  It talks about how labor-intensive rice farming is.  (the chapter also talks about math and how the two are related–something do do with persistence on difficult tasks)  I did not fully understand the magnitude of the rice terraces by reading this chapter.  The chapter does a great job of describing how difficult and time-consuming rice farming is, but I couldn’t reasonably understand this from a book.  I had to see it for myself.  And this is what I saw:

For as far as you can see there are rice terraces. I'm sure it looks much more spectacular during the flood season or during the harvest season. I was here during the dry season and it was still magnificent.

The most amazing part of the terraces was how they were “built.”  They aren’t like easy steps that you can just climb up.  They are incredibly steep.  And there are thousands of them.  The biggest question on my mind was “how in the world do you harvest the rice?” (second to that was ‘how do you flood the terraces?’)  Most of our day was spent hiking around the terraces (and in them–not the growing season) and marveling at this feat of farm engineering.  I included the “houses” in the photo so that you could have a size reference. (also because they were already in the way) 😉 

It was unbelievable and difficult to put into words how incredible it was! Even the pictures don't do it justice.

This was the view from "Music from Paradise". You can see our guesthouse on the far right of the photo. Yes, that is the same sweatshirt you see me wearing in EVERY picture. Don't judge me. One learns to pack very lightly when they are going on a "hiking" vacation. My bag was still too heavy.

One of the most entertaining parts of the terraces were the names that were given to the lookout points. 🙂 “Music from Paradise” had no music, “10,000 Steps to Heaven” (or something similar) and “Golden Buddha Peak”.  None of these accurately described what the view was like.  The best lookout was the Golden Buddha Peak because it was the highest one.  It was amazing at how quickly the time went by.  We made our way back down to Dazhai village (what were we thinking?!?–this meant we had to climb back up) to meet Tom who was joining us that afternoon.  We had been in contact via text messages about his arrival time (and about his adventures in Longsheng 🙂 we told him to insist that he get the bus to Longsheng because Heping was only a street and he might be stranded for an hour)  It turns out that it would have been faster the way we came had we gotten the local bus more quickly.  Good to know for next time. 

We enjoyed lunch in Dazhai village at the bottom of the mountain and perused the village during the afternoon while waiting for Tom.  We spent some time conversing with the locals (conversing = mostly telling them that I didn’t want to buy what they were selling) and trying to bargain the Yao women down from their ridiculously high prices.  I ended up buying some postcards (not from the woman who was relentless–this did not make her happy) Eventually I got her to smile. 🙂

I didn't manage to get her to smile until I was leaving the village. That's probably why she smiled. 🙂

Tom finally arrived (much later than we had planned) and we were on our way back up the mountain.  We didn’t need the cute-laughing-calves of steel-woman this time around.  We knew where we were going.  It’s amazing how much faster the hike goes when you aren’t carrying your HUGE backpack on your back.  I was impressed with Tom.  He put us all to shame.  When we got back to the hostel, we found ourselves in the restaurant again and ordered some beer.  After a little while we ordered some dinner and planned how I would get to Hong Kong.  I had tried to find a train ticket when I first arrived in Guilin but there were no tickets.  I had decided to just try to buy a bus ticket when I came back from the rice terraces.  Tom suggested flying.  I needed to be in Hong Kong on Wednesday for the FOC retreat.  (It was Monday)  This just happened to be the same day that Tom was flying back to Hong Kong and he suggested I try to get a ticket for his flight.  We tried to buy it that night on the mountain.  It didn’t work the first time.  It didn’t work the second time.  I went to bed that night without a plane ticket.  But the bed was warm and comfortable. 🙂

Day 15 – “Oh, Do you want us to book that ticket? Um, yeah.”

I got up early to catch the sunrise but there was too much fog to see anything.  Sad.  I crawled back in my bed for a while until breakfast.  This morning, Aga and Radek were taking the bus back to Guilin so that they could try to get a ticket to their next destination.  We said our goodbyes with the hope of seeing them again that night (if they couldn’t get their bus tickets).  If this happened, we planned to stay in the same hostel in Guilin.  It was also in the morning that I called Ctrip (Chinese flight website) to see if they had received any booking information.  All the woman said was “Oh, do you want us to book that ticket?”  🙁  Nope.  I didn’t.  Good grief.  After that fiasco I had a flight to Hong Kong the following day at 4:00ish.  Perfect. 

I stayed in the terraces with Tom to hike around most of the day.  This is when we climbed to Golden Buddha Peak.  Very Cool!   We had our big packs with us for the entire hike this day because we didn’t want to make it to the bottom only to go back up to get them.  It was pretty brutal but we took our time and enjoyed the views.  I’m still in awe of the engineering that went into the terraces. Amazing!  Most of these terraces were ‘built’ during the Ming Dynasty 500ish years ago.  It is very impressive. 

We eventually made it down to Dazhai village to catch the bus to Guilin via Longsheng.  When we visited with a woman at a hotel in the village she informed us that on this particular day there was a direct bus from Dazhai to Guilin.  Bingo!  The bus was at 4:30 and took 2.5 hours to get there.  Okay.  We got on the bus at about 4:20 and proceeded to wait for over an hour to leave. 🙁  Bu hao.  While we were waiting we questioned the driver of the minibus about the delayed departure.  He told us that we were waiting for two people.  He assumed that these other two people were with the group of three already in the bus because they had come together that morning.  The other three (all German) told us that the other two men had decided to stay on the mountain and wouldn’t be taking the bus with us.  Tom told me to tell this to the driver (because my Chinese is better than his.)  Hmm…. We’ll see what I can do. “Wo men bu xuyao deng biede ren. Tamen yao zhu zai zheli.” 🙂  This is what I came up with. I’m sure it is horrible grammar but I’ll give you a literal translation so that you can also have a laugh (as I’m sure the driver did too–although he understood exactly what I meant.)  It translates to: “We no need wait other people. They want live there.” (and then I pointed to the top of the hill.)  It’s not entirely awkward because a Chinese person will say “live” when they really mean “spend the night.”  I still love the caveman style of Chinese.  🙂

Eventually we made it back to Guilin and to the hostel.  As we were checking in we heard from across the room, “Hello, bamboo!”  This was Aga’s way of saying hello.  They were unable to catch the bus to their next destination and would have to do it the following day.  Lucky for us.  We got to hang out with them another night.

Day 13 – “You can’t get there from here.” Part II

Since I had prolonged my stay in Xingping, it was time for me to head out.  With Aga and Radek along, I took the direct bus to Guilin from Xingping.  (Where was this bus when I was trying to get to Xingping?)  Before we left, Norman gave us very specific instructions on how to get to our next destination.  He was adorable.  He told the bus driver to make sure we got off at the right stop and then wrote the next destination on a piece of paper in characters so that we didn’t have to try to get our meaning across.  Norman told us that we would have to walk about 1 km to get to the bus station.  (Oddly enough, Guilin has three bus stations–thankfully, Norman had written down the name of the bus station, so we could continue to show it to people and ask where it was). 

We finally found the bus station (it was about 1 pm) and got in line to buy bus tickets to Longsheng, my next destination, and the hub for people wanting to get to “Dragon’s Backbone Rice Terraces.”  We got to the window and the attendant insisted that we didn’t want to go to Longsheng and instead that we wanted to go to Heping.  Hmm… Well, I think I know where I want to go.  I kept saying I wanted to go to Longsheng.  He kept saying we wanted to go to Heping and continued to resist.  He still wouldn’t sell us the tickets to Longsheng. Who knows why…  Finally, we boarded a bus to Heping.  Maybe it was faster…who knows…

The ride to Heping was a bit terrifying.  We were driving through mountains on narrow switchbacks with drops off the edge.  The view was spectacular though! 🙂  Sadly, I took no pictures of this because I was hanging on for dear life.  When we got to the ‘pass’ the bus stopped at what can best be described as a very tiny ‘convenience store/truck stop’ thing.  I’m not sure, but I think we stopped to add water to the bus.  I don’t know what that means. Don’t ask.

We made it to Heping.  Heping is basically a street.  We weren’t actually sure how we were going to get to Dazhai (which was our final destination) from Heping.  There were some minibus drivers where the bus dropped us off, but they were charging an arm and a leg to get to Dazhai.  (We decided that if we had to use this as a last resort, we would.)  The man at the bus station in Guilin who would not sell us tickets to Longsheng insisted that there was a public bus that went directly to Dazhai.  This is where we waited for an hour for the public bus.  We still enjoyed our time waiting and continually telling the minibus men that we didn’t want their service.  They kept approaching us and asking if we wanted to go with them.  So, I offered them the same price as the public bus (7元) and then they left us alone. 🙂  Everything is about money. And if you are foreign and in China, it is assumed that you have money. 

The bus finally showed up but there were no seats.  This does not stop the driver from taking us though.  Remember that thing about maximizing profits?  If he didn’t take us he would be missing out on fares.  So, we were standing for the ride.  Now, we were still pretty high in the mountains and had to come down a ways to make it to Dazhai.  These roads were even narrower than the other roads…and I was standing…hmmm.  The view was once again wonderful but I was not enjoying the ride.  I was anxious to arrive and get off the bus.  We stopped once along the way to pay our “National Park Fee” (again 50元) so that we could enjoy the rice terraces. 

We made it to Dazhai.  There were many native women who were more than willing to carry my bags for me…for a price. 😉 I just kept saying “Wo men bu yao xie xie.” (我们不要谢谢–We don’t want, thanks.)  We had come this far on our own with our bags, what was another 30 minutes? 🙂 hehehe…..

I called the woman at the hostel to see if there was a quick way to get there. She told me to give my phone to someone to talk to her and then that person would lead us.  We did this and were then on our way.  The woman who was leading us was tiny. Seriously tiny. Except her legs. She had calves of steel.  Probably from climbing up and down the mountain multiple times throughout the day.  We were doing horribly.  I knew that the hostel was on a hill but I didn’t fully understand the magnitude of the hill.  Especially with a large travel backpack on my back and my day-pack on my front.  It as brutal.  The woman basically laughed at us the whole way up the hill.  It was a little humorous.  We were nearing the top (at least we thought) and decided to stop on a bridge for a bit to have a rest.

This is the tiny woman with the calves of steel.  I love her sweatshirt! Hilarious!  She kept asking to carry our bags.  Can you see why we kept saying no?  (She’s actually 20 years old! 😉 She just looks like she’s 65ish–hehe… We kept noticing that there were no school-age children in this village–only small children and adults/old people.) 

Finally we made it to the top (to Tiantouzhai) and after a bit of nonsense got checked into our rooms.  We then visited the ‘restaurant’ and enjoyed a lovely supper. 

I crashed that night after a really LONG day of trying to get to Tiantou village.  I think I fell asleep at around 9:30.  It was awesome.

See that building with the orange and red on it to the right? That was the guesthouse we stayed at. It was an awesome view from the room. 🙂

Day 12 – “You wanna pay HOW much to see a TREE?”

I was supposed to travel to the rice terraces on this day.  My traveling companions, Tom, Radek, and Aga convinced me to stay at This Old Place for one more night.  They didn’t really have to try very hard. 🙂  So, we began the day by taking the local bus to Yangshuo.  I had previously spent about 10 minutes in this city…enough time to get off one bus and get right on another.  Yangshuo is a pretty neat looking city.  Imagine the karst mountains from the previous post and in addition to the river, put a city there too!  There are TONS of foreigners here.  It is Backpacker Junction.  Also, coincidentally, it is the sister city to Rapid City, SD.  There’s your fun bit of trivia for the day.  You will all sleep better knowing that.  (by the way–I got that tidbit of information on the wikipedia website about Yangshuo as I was planning my trip)

We spent the first two hours walking around (all while being followed by a man wanting to rent us his bikes.)  And then we found it!!!!!!!!!!  A Chinese Puzzle Shop!!!  (For any of you that actually know me well, you will understand how exciting this was for me.) 🙂  I wanted to stay there the rest of the day and solve all the puzzles.  (They were all wooden-type puzzles (not jigsaw), some are blocks of wood, others are wood with strings, wood with metal…etc…) I was in heaven!  I didn’t actually get a picture of the shop. I’m regretting that as I write.  So, we did spend a bit of time here as Yours Truly tried to decide which puzzle to buy…because there would definitely be buying going on.  There were a few that were easier, so I didn’t buy those.  Then I found one that I fell in love with.  It is all wood and has many blocks that all have to fit inside a square.  Each block 5 cubic units in volume, but each one is a different shape.  (except one block which is only four cubic units and is in the shape of a square.) The goal of this puzzle is to put all of the pieces into the box so it fits exactly.  Needless to say, whenever I had ANY downtime for the rest of the trip, I was playing! 🙂

After the puzzle shop we found a place to rent bikes.  That was our main goal for heading into Yangshuo that day.  So, we bargained our price for the bikes…actually, the man wanted to rent us mopeds but I quickly vetoed that.  (No, I’m not a chicken.  Another Beijing FOC friend got rear-ended on a moped and broke his collarbone not to much before this day.)  I had a sweet mountain bike. (I’m sort of a bike snob now after using my sweet-awesome bike in Beijing) 🙂

We were off for the day. 🙂  We immediately biked out of town to find Moon Hill and the big Banyan Tree. 

Here is a photo of me (front), Aga (next), and Radek (back) on our bikes outside of town. It was a beautiful day for a bike ride!

We had lots of fun interacting with the locals while riding.  It was on this bike ride that we tried sugar cane also.  Eventually we made it to the Big Banyan Tree.  (Now, people, for those of you who have this at the top of your priority list when visiting China, I can tell you that you might want to skip it. Sorry to burst your bubble.) 

So, It wasn't just a tree. It was a whole park. You could do a bamboo raft ride by yourself if you wanted to. You could stand on a raft and have your picture taken. Many types of food were available on a stick. We were there for about 30 minutes. We saw some monkeys. That's all. A really big tree. A really big waste of money.

After the tree we pressed on toward Moon Hill.  This was another karst mountain but with a really big hole in it.  Again, we had to pay to climb it.  (What is it with these people and their entrance fees for nature?)  I wasn’t all that interested in climbing the hill.  I mean, I had just trekked the gorge, scaled another mountain to see the sunset, and would soon be trekking around the rice terraces. Do I really want to climb another one? Fine. It’s here. Why not?

This is Moon Hill. It wasn't as bad of a hike as the other mountain. We only climbed to the opening. It was okay.

After visiting Moon Hill we began our journey back to Yangshuo.  Along the way we had fun again.

"Hello, Bamboo!" This truck turned on a road next to us as we were stopped. About two minutes later, it turned past us again. 🙂

This was Tom the German trying to be cool. He's also sitting on the bar in one picture but this one is cooler. Also: do you see the red lantern-type things hanging in the trees? We saw these 'lantern' things the ENTIRE bike ride. I would not want to have been the person whose job it was to hang them.

After making it back to Yangshuo, we found a restaurant for supper, (and also ran into the German couple from the train) .  We grabbed some cheap Chinese beer for the bus ride back to Xingping.  When we got back to the hostel we taught Norman how to get on Facebook in China! 🙂 

Aga and Radek asked me if they could tag along to the rice fields the next morning! Great!  Tom said he would catch up to us the following day!  So, I still had my travel buddies for the next few days!

I was able to sleep in a little because the four of us had planned to take the bamboo raft at 10 am and then do the hike back.  This day was one of my favorite days of the trip!  Before we were able to board the ship (the raft) we had to walk a bit to the other side of the river.  Tada! We found the spot that is depicted on the back of the 20元 bill. 🙂 (although, on the money, there is much more water in the river.)

If the sky wasn't so hazy you would be able to see the skyline perfectly. 🙂

It was other-worldly. The temperature wasn't so cold and the sky got better as the day went on but it still felt like I was on another planet.

Tom is taking the photo. I'm peeking around in the back!

This man carries his cormorants with him. These birds are pretty special. They can dive underwater and stay there for a while fishing. The "fisherman" ties a string around their necks so the birds cannot swallow the fish. I like how he smiled for my photo! 🙂

The raft part of the trip was beautiful and peaceful.  There were many, many people on the river that day.  Most people were going downriver. We were heading upriver.  When we finally reached our drop off point we got off the boat and began our hike.  I was not a difficult hike. (not like the gorge)  It was relatively flat and the paths were mostly easy to find. 

We had a few minor obstacles:  water buffalo blocking the trail, many stray dogs, hundreds of people saying “hello, bamboo?” (okay, maybe only 15-20 but it felt like hundreds), and a chinese only menu at one of the villages. (I actually had to have the man read the menu to us so we could figure out what some of the food was.)  It was fun to converse with the locals without feeling like an idiot.  Tom, Radek, and Aga don’t speak Chinese so no one knew if my sentence structure was correct and the Chinese people didn’t care. 🙂

Here's what part of the trail looked like. Most of my journey was spent out of the cities. It was awesome!

It took us about four hours (including our lunch) to make it back to the hostel.  When we got back, I told the other three that I wanted to climb the peak for the sunset because this was my last night there.  They all had done it already but I successfully convinced them to join me.  🙂  This is what we saw:

Most of you have seen this picture because I sent it in an email. I still love it! It was an incredible view from the top of the peak. The hike up to the top was brutal and scary. I'm glad I did it though. My only wish was that the river had more water. This was definitely the dry season.

I want to go back! Who wants to come with me? 🙂

After coming back down from the mountains with our “torches” (this is what flashlight translates to…hehehe…), we spent some time in the hostel grilling some more ‘nian gao’ and enjoying each other’s company.  A great day in and around Xingping!

Day 10 – “You can’t get there from here.”

I was still on the train during this particular morning.  It was a 17 hour train ride from Kunming, Yunnan to Guilin, Guangxi.  I wasn’t able to sleep so long.  There is an unwritten rule on Chinese trains: When the lights come on in the morning, everyone must talk as loudly as possible and slurp their noodles even louder.  But I think this only applies to the Chinese people.  So, when the lights come on at 5:43 am, this means that I am officially awake. Even though there are only 24 people on the whole train.  (Ok–maybe that is a bit of an exaggeration…)  With the exception of this unnecessary noise, sleeper trains (hard or soft) are my favorite way to travel in China. 

I still had quite a few hours to go.  My train was scheduled to arrive in Guilin at about 12:30 pm.  (And it would get there at exactly this time. The ONLY thing that is on time in China are the trains. This is no joke.)  So, I spent some time listening to music, writing events from the past days, reading my BOOK, and daydreaming.  It was pretty fun to watch the scenery out the window.  This was my first time seeing the karst mountains.  I continued to stretch out in my bed and just relax. 

At about 9:30, a German couple sat at the table in the aisle next to my bed.  They were chatting away in German and playing a card game.  We mostly ignored each other until about 11:00. 🙂  I finally asked them if their stop was the same as mine. We figured out that it was, continued to make small talk for a bit and then went back to ignoring each other. 

The train finally arrived in Guilin.  I got off and went to see if I could buy my train ticket to Shenzhen (the city across the border from Hong Kong–I was due to arrive in HK the following Wednesday) for the following Tuesday night.  I was hoping to get another sleeper ticket.  At the counter, the man told me that there were no tickets.  🙁 Hmmm…. That’s not cool.  But, I didn’t let it ruin my day.  I just decided that if I had to take a bus, that would be okay.  Bus tickets are a little easier to get anyway. 

After trying to plan ahead (and not succeeding) I decided to work on getting to my destination for the evening.  Before I left on my trip, I found a hostel in a small town (not touristy) that I wanted to stay at.  It was close to the river and not at all like the hostels in the touristy Guilin or even Yangshuo.  Guilin is super touristy, Yangshuo is more of a backbacker haven, and Xingping is located on the Li River right between these two cities.  Some people say that Xingping is on it’s way to becoming the new backpacker place.  Maybe. Maybe not. 

While I was still in Guilin, I was trying to decide if I should go find a bus or if I should try to take a bamboo raft down the river to Xingping. 🙂  Bamboo raft was definitely my first choice!  So, I ran into the German couple who wanted to go to the same part of town as me and we shared a cab.  The bus that we wanted to take was not coming, so after 30 minutes of waiting, we caved.  They reached their hostel, I reached the “Tourist Wharf”.  I went to the window to see if I could get on a bamboo raft to Xingping.  The lady spoke very limited English so I asked her in Chinese.  She kept responding in English “tomorrow!”  “But I need to get there today.” “Tomorrow!” “Isn’t there another boat that goes today?” “Tomorrow!”  (This was like 1:00 pm)  Clearly, we were not getting anywhere, and, from the looks of it, I would not be taking the bamboo raft to Xingping.  So, I WALKED all the way back to the bus station (right next to the train station) to see if I could get a bus to Xingping. 

When I got to the window, I asked the woman about Xingping.  All she said (in English) was “No, Yangshuo.”  I took this to mean that I could get on the bus to Yangshuo and then, when I got there, I could take a bus to Xingping.  Okay, that’s closer than I was.  So, I bought the ticket, got on the bus and about five minutes later we were off.  (Yes, that is how fast things work in this country.  There is not really the concept of planning ahead.)  About 2 hours later, I was in Yangshuo at the bus station.  Now, to get the bus to Xingping you just hop on the local bus and pay when the bus is already enroute.  Okay. Whatever.  I got on the bus and there were a few empty seats.  I chose one next to a mother and her very small child.  Not the wisest choice but at least I had a seat.  The way buses work here is that in order to maximize profit, you cram as many people on the bus as possible.  The trip from Yangshuo to Xingping was supposed to take about 45 minutes, but because of stopping every 2 minutes to pick people up, it took about twice that. 🙂

I finally got to Xingping and found the hostel.  The name of the hostel was This Old Place.  It was pretty cute and very close to the river.  The views from the balcony were awesome.  It was here–as I was checking in–that I met Tom, who would become one of my traveling companions for the next week.  I was asking the Chinese girl behind the desk what there was to do at night there (because it was about 5:30 pm) and she said, you can climb the peak next to the hostel and watch the sunset.  (“You guys can go together!” she said to me and Tom. We looked at each other strangely and then he went climbing and I went for the shower.)  I wasn’t looking to doing anything strenuous at the moment.  I was looking for a shower and then something relaxing. I mean, I had just arrived at my destination after two days of trains and no showers.  I got to my room and discovered that there was heat! 🙂  So far, this was the first place I stayed that had heat in the rooms!  (Another thing you should know about China is that in the south, they don’t have heat and they don’t use insulation.)  I took my time showering and then found my way back to the lounge/common room area.  I ate some pizza (really good pizza) at the hostel, which was the only food they offered. 

Tom eventually returned and sat down with me at the table.  We chatted for a bit.  I found out that he is from Cologne, Germany and is studying Finance in Hong Kong.  He was on a week long break from school and had also just arrived at the hostel that evening.  We continued chatting and eventually met Radek and Aga, a Polish couple teaching in Shanxi Province.  The four of us decided to share the bamboo raft up the river the next day (it’s cheaper with more people) and then hike the 20ish kilometers back to the hostel.  The rest of the evening, the four of us just hung out and had a beer.  (I discovered that I am unable to keep up with Germans and Polish people in beer drinking–oh, who am I kidding…I’ve never been able to drink very much!  This is a good thing.)

The fantastic four! From L-R: Tom the German; Radek; Me; Aga-Radek's wife. The four of us spent about a week traveling together. It was awesome! This picture was actually taken at the end of our travels together. This was right before Aga and Radek left on a bus and Tom and I got on an Airplane to Hong Kong.

It was that first night at This Old Place that we also met Norman!  Norman is the happiest Chinese person I’ve ever met. (Actually, he is probably the happiest person I’ve ever met.)  All of us spent that evening making ‘nian gao’, which is sticky rice smashed together into sort of a cookie.  You grill it and then add sugar.  It was pretty good. 

Norman, the happiest person I've ever met.

Day 9 – “I think this is my least favorite city in China.”

The train arrived in Kunming, Yunnan around 6 am.  I wasn’t ready to be awake yet and neither were my companions so we decided to head to a hostel and crash on the couches there.  It was a great idea!  At about 8, I woke up, ate some breakfast, and then decided to use my less-than-12-hours to explore Kunming.  I didn’t want to do anything touristy so Simon (the photographer) and Jayoung and I got on a bus to head to the Kunming Old Town.  The bus didn’t actually go to the old town so we ended up in a city market.  It was gross but many things were photo-worthy.  Like this:

These fish were all alive. Most of the animals available for purchase were still living. There must have been something special about buying a rooster for the New Year. Every family purchased a live rooster to take home.

Do you like your food spicy or not spicy? If you like spicy, this is the place for you! 🙂

This woman decided to take a rest in her basket! 🙂

I found these two little one in the large market. My favorite part of this picture is not the VERY LARGE knife that the girl is holding. But--the little boy's hand. Hmmm..... I wonder what happened to him. About a minute after I took his picture he started to cry. A lot.

This is sugarcane. I didn't try any in Kunming, but I did eventually try some in Yangshuo. It's not too bad. The vendor peels off the 'bark' for you and you basically chew on it for a while and spit it out.

We left the city market and found the Old Town (via taxi).  It was here that I decided to photograph some people.

These two women were having a very animated conversation. I couldn't tell if they were arguing or not.

I don't think this man was thrilled that I was taking his picture. 🙂

Okay, so this isn't people but I thought the colors of the seeds and nuts were beautiful!

It was fun to watch this man make this peanut-brittle type food. The white stuff is sesame (I think), and the stuff on top is peanuts and some sort of sugar mixture. After pouring it out, he spread it out and flattened it. It as fun to watch. It was also delicious. 😉

After most of the day walking around, we decided to try the bus back to the hostel. There was supposed to be a dumpling making party there. (This was Chinese New Year’s Eve afterall)  I was in line to get on the bus and the driver opened the door.  I felt someone take my phone out of my FRONT pocket on my jeans. (seriously?) So, I quickly turned around and angrily grabbed my phone from the man who reached into my pocket.  It was a close call and I was shaken up a little bit.  🙁  But, I was happy to still have my phone.  When we got back to the hostel, there was no dumpling party so I ordered some food for supper and just relaxed until I had to leave for my train.

Since this was New Year’s Eve, most people are at home with their families.  I was on a train (sleeper car–6 beds) with only one other person.  It was AWESOME!  Best Decision Ever.  I slept so well that night.  I heard snippets of fireworks going off around me as I was whisked away to another province.  🙂 

It was a restful night.

Day 7 – “I really hate that song.”

In order to avoid hearing “Dida” for 12 straight hours, I ventured out of the Old Town for a good part of the day.  If you walk straight north of the Old Town you run into Black Dragon Pond. (What is it with these people and their dragons and other mythical creatures?)  Black Dragon Pond was basically a large park that costs a ridiculous amount of money–unless you know how to bypass that.  Which I tried to do.  I got some advice from some other hostellers about how to do it.  Clearly, their advice was not good.  I ended up paying the price.  But, I did get to see this:

This is a view from the bridge that goes across the pool. Do you see those mountains in the distance? That's Jade Dragon Snow Mountain. I was on the other side of that while I was hiking the gorge! 🙂

The water in Lijiang is amazingly clean!  Rivers, Lakes, you name it.  Clean.  This was a pretty park.  I wandered around here for a LONG time (because I wanted to get my money’s worth). 

Another view from further across the lake.

I decided to have a little fun with my camera. 🙂

This is a shot into the river. The water was clear. The moss (or whatever it is) was green.

While I was walking through the park, I met an artist.  He was working in his little shop painting a peacock.  I tried to practice my Chinese with him but, sadly, I don’t know many ‘art’ words.  (or music  for that matter….hmmm……sad)  I answered the typical questions, “where are you from?” “oh, you teach in Beijing? where?” “Tsinghua!?!” (shouts to the back room to get his daughter to come translate…)  So, we continued our conversation (through his daughter) about how he’s this famous artist and sells paintings for a lot of money.  (he sold one for over 100,000元。They were pretty, but I didn’t want to pay 900元 for one painting.  (around $140)  After we exhausted conversation topics, I was on my way.  I enjoyed looking in the little shops and trying to converse with the locals.  (for some reason I didn’t have a confidence problem when I got out of Beijing–I don’t know why.  Maybe because of the fact that out of most of the foreigners that I met, my Chinese was the best.  It was kind of fun to be relied on…also a bit stressful at times.)  But, seriously, one of the best parts of visiting the park was avoiding “Dida”! 🙂

Here is the 'famous' artist. He was painting a peacock. It was actually pretty cool.

I decided to have dinner on the hill that overlooked Lijiang so I could try to get a sunset picture of the city.  Silly me–the hill blocks the sun. 🙂  Oh well.  It was here that I met my friend Nastia.  She was from Belarus and super friendly.  We ate dinner tonight and she came back to the hostel to hang out with us.  It was at the hostel where the owner had a “tea party” for us.  (not like Alice in Wonderland)  He did this whole tea ceremony for a group of four of us.  He made us two different types of tea and attempted to explain the significance and the difference between the leaves.  The tea was delicious. 

Here is the "tea party" crew. From L-R. Nastia-from Belarus, speaks Russian, very friendly. Yours truly. Simon-from UK, lives in Korea, photographer (awesome one!), possibly married to the woman on his left? Jayoung-Korean, follows Simon around, doesn't say much, again--may or may not be married to Simon? Yang Zijiang-Chinese, hostel manager, tea connoisseur, claims that his name is actually "Yangtze River" (which, if you look at it like a play on words, it is... Yang Zi Jiang--jiang=river in Chinese 😉 We just ended up calling him "River"--His English name.)

Another lovely day in Yunnan Province. 🙂

Day 8 – “Come on ride the train”

I finally reached the day that I would leave Lijiang.  I was ready.  If I hadn’t bought my train tickets so far in advance I might have left a day earlier.  This is one thing that I never want while traveling–to be ready to leave a city.  Well, you live and learn…  I spent the day wandering around, bargaining with the locals, meeting a friend (who I met on the hike) for coffee, Mama Naxi’s one more time for supper and then back to the hostel to share a cab with Simon (above) and his maybe-wife to the train station.  They were on the same train as me to Kunming. 

It took a whole week, but I finally added “train” to my list of ‘modes of transportation’.  🙂 

The train was pretty empty…not surprising, considering it was the day before the Spring Festival.  Most Chinese people were in their ‘hometowns’ for the celebrations.  There was one Chinese girl who was not.  She happened to be in the same train car as me.  And boy did she want to chat.  I wanted to sleep.  My train ride was only nine hours. I had planned to take advantage of those nine hours and sleep for 8.82 of them. She did not have the same plan.  I had a lower (which on a Chinese train means ‘bench for the people in the middles and uppers.’  How do I tell this girl that I want to sleep without actually saying it? (wow! how Chinese have I become?)  So, I started to stretch out a bit…didn’t take it.  I stretched out almost the whole way…she was still sitting there.  I finally had to ask her if I could use my bed.  She moved to the other bed to chat with the woman on that one! 🙂  I put in my headphones. 

I slept until about 20 minutes before the train arrived!

Day 6 – “Wow! That’s the cleanest public bathroom I’ve ever seen!”

Bathrooms in China are gross.  I’m okay with the squatting part of it but I dread using a public toilet because they are usually filthy.  This is not the case in Lijiang.  It was here that I found the cleanest public toilet I have ever seen.  I should have photographed it.

The morning after the hike I slept in.  Sort of.  I think because I’m old I’m not able to sleep in. I don’t know.  I slept until 7:30 on that morning. 🙂  But, I didn’t crawl out of my bed until about 9:30. So that was good.  It was here that I learned everything I’d ever need to know about Andrew.  I met Andrew on my first day in Lijiang. We spoke two words to each other at the desk of the hostel and went our separate ways.  I ran into him again on my second night in Lijiang–the night before he left for the gorge hike.  He was disappointed to find out that I wouldn’t be hiking with him and his two friends.  I’m sure he was fine.  He was the fourth member of our “dorm-style” room at the hostel. 

Remember how I said I opted out of the bar-hopping the previous night because I would rather sleep? (man, how old am I?)  Well, Susanne did not opt out and subsequently did not return to the guesthouse that night.  So we were down to three people in our “dorm.” Me, Andrew, and a Japanese girl. 

I woke up at 7:30 because the Japanese girl turned on the light and was making lots of noise. Andrew also woke up.  We used the next two hours to talk about the hike and get to know each other.  He was going to be meeting his two friends for breakfast that morning and invited me along.  Ok. Why not?  Breakfast was amazing! It was so amazing, I photographed it.

Breakfast included: toast (good toast), eggs ('shuang mian'--which roughly means 'double sided'), hashbrowns (in a cute little disk-like figure), bacon on top of yak milk cheese (mmmm.....), tomatoes and cucumbers, honey, jam, and ketchup. This was the "American Breakfast." Do you notice the 'coffee' cup in the photo? Yes, that was definitely hot chocolate with Bailey's Irish Cream! 🙂 Perfect. Breakfast.

I forgot to mention that breakfast didn’t actually happen until around noon.  We ended up waiting a while for Andrew’s two friends to finish getting ready.  After ‘breakfast’ we split up for the day.  Andrew was going to rent a bike and I was going to help Susanne find a scarf that she liked.  She wanted to go take a shower first so I was own my own for a while.  This was great!  Except for one thing….

You should know that if something in pop culture catches on in China they will overplay it.  (movie, song, you name it…)  This is why Titanic is still super popular (especially the Celine Dion song), and also why the Chinese people love the song “Yesterday Once More” by the Carpenters.  They also think that every foreigner knows all the words to that song.  It’s so strange.  “Country Roads” also…  There is this really beautiful song called “Dida” (which I was told is by an artist from Yunnan Province–they are proud of their girl!).  I think I would really love this song (maybe even buy the CD) if I didn’t hear it for the next 8 hours straight. (and the entire next day) EVERY single little shop that had music playing capabilities was playing this song.  It was even one man’s job to sit in his store and play his bongo drum (poorly) to the beat of the song.  This is not a joke.  At first it was kind of nice.  But with every repeat of the song I hated it more and more.  I’ve included the song for you to enjoy.  The artist’s name is KanKan.  I hope you don’t hate it like I do.  ipernity KanKan – DiDa – by Anton Hazewinkel (Sorry. You have to click the link and then save the file in order to play it. I know no other way.  Seems like an awful lot of hassle to hear a song that I hate. I’m just saying…)

At about 2, Susanne and I began the search for the perfect scarf.  In Lijiang there were so many people weaving scarves.  They are pretty cool and each one is unique.  (Yes, I bought one too)  She clearly had in mind what she was looking for, and they clearly did not have it.  She finally settled for a lovely multi-colored weaved scarf.  (I bought mine the following day–it’s black and white) 

The whole time we were walking around the shops in the Old Town, my foot was killing me.  I had taken care of the aforementioned blister but my other foot was hurting badly.  I told Susanne that I needed to go take care of my foot.  She was fine with that because she needed to go pack up her stuff and get ready for her train out of town.  We were both fine with hanging out in the hostel.  I don’t know why I thought I needed to walk around the town all day.  I had just climbed up and down a mountain.  When I got back to the hostel, I discovered that my little toenail was cutting the second to last toe and my toes were both bleeding.  This actually happened on the second day of the hike too.  I don’t learn, do I?  I stayed off my feet for the rest of the night (well, most of it).  Andrew and company asked me later if I wanted to get a beer.  I joined them for a beer at a local western restaurant run by two foreigners. 

All in all–a really relaxing fun day!

Day 5 – “What is this ‘happy’ you speak of?”

After a blissful night’s sleep on top of the mountain and banana pancakes for breakfast, we decided to hit the trail.  But first we needed to admire the ‘sunrise.’  Sunrise here is much later than in eastern China (because all of China is one timezone. Don’t ask.)

View from our hostel. 🙂 It was awesome!

For a while the trail was a slow descent with beautiful views.  The views really kept getting better.  The trail creeped around the mountain, always with the sheer drop to the river on the right.  This day was harder for me just because of the fear of heights thing…  Around each corner there were new surprises.  One particular stretch held a special challenge for me.

Yes, this is a waterfall cutting right through the trail.

So, I had two options: I could walk on the very edge where there was about a 6-inch wide dry patch, or I could get my feet a little wet and stay away from the edge. (do you see the water cascading over the edge...yikes!) My shoes got a little wet. 🙂

I did eventually make it past the waterfall (which was my favorite and least favorite part) and we continued on.  The people at the hostel told us that it would take about two hours to reach the low road (the road for cars driving through the gorge).  I kept thinking in my head, “we are really high. How in the world are we going to reach the road in such a short distance and such a short time?”  Ummm…let’s go STRAIGHT DOWN!  Shortly after the waterfall there were the second 28 bends (not actually what they were called but basically straight down rock climbing–with a little bit of back and forth.)  I hated this part.  I was definitely using my hands more.  And I was developing a rather large blister near my right big toe. 

After our 1.5 hour descent (yep, it was actually quicker) we stopped along the road to wait for two of our travel buddies.  We decided that we would leave them a note at the guesthouse and continue down the road another 30 minutes to the place where we planned to eat lunch.  This place is known for it’s “Happy Tea.”  Actually, it’s not really ‘known’ because the owner would probably be in Chinese jail somewhere.  Some of my companions wanted to eat there so they could try happy tea.  I opted out of “happy tea” because, believe it or not, I don’t actually want to be deported.  On the menu you could add “happy” to anything for 6元. That’s about $1.  It was crazy.  It was here that we rented a minibus back to Qiaotou.  Funny–it only took about an hour to drive through the gorge! 

Upon returning to Qiaotou, we said goodbye to two friends who were continuing on to Shangri-la.  The rest of us were heading back to Lijiang to enjoy Mama Naxi’s family meal at one of the hostels. The meal was delicious and the company was great!  I opted out of the after-supper-bar-hopping idea in favor of some good sleep!  Definitely a wise choice! 🙂 

This was actually taken during the hike on the first day. 🙂 This was day three of getting sunburned. The river was beautiful!

Day 4 – “Is that a bird in the car?”

The plan was to catch a minibus at our hostel at 8:30 to take us to the village of Qiaotou.  Of course, we are in China and plans never work the way you want them to. 

I had gotten everything ready the night before so that I could enjoy my sleep, (I’m on vacation after all) and also be ready for the 24 km hike I was about to embark upon.  I set my alarm for 8:00.  I actually woke up at 6:15. 🙁  One thing I did not like about the hostel where I stayed was the lack of “check-in” time.  There actually was a check-in time but it wasn’t really followed. If your train arrives in Lijiang at 5:45 am, you can go right to your hostel and check in for the following evening.  This is madness.  The woman from the desk (the crabby one) came into the room, turned the lights on, and made the bed (didn’t think to have this done the previous day?)for the newcomer.  Honestly, had it been me who was arriving at 6:00 am, I would have been grateful for the early morning nap in a bed (more on this later…)  It actually wouldn’t have been so bad if the girl who checked in that morning would have actually used the bed that the attendant so noisily prepared.  All this girl did was put her stuff in the room and go sit in the common room.  Okay…venting over…

We caught the minibus at 8:40 (it was late) and there was another person in it. Great! Another woman to hike with.  This woman (we guess) was approximately 65 years old.  The driver told us that he had to make another stop.  Okay…a little later start than what we wanted. I takes about 2.5 hours to drive from Lijiang to Qiaotou where the trailhead is.  The way this trip is headed, we’d be lucky to start the hike before noon. 

We arrived at the next hostel to pick up an unknown amount of people.  And we waited…and waited…and waited, until finally a group of five people crawled into another minibus and one more in our minibus.  All were going to hike the Tiger Leaping Gorge! There was Sarah: an MIT grad who majored in atomic physics and is currently doing research in China while improving her Chinese.  She was pretty cool. There was Mary: the previously mentioned 65-year-old-ish woman who is on a trip around the world to “say goodbye”…whatever that means. (no one asked…) There was Susanne: very young girl from Holland taking a “gap year” before going to college.  Mom–could you imagine me traveling around the world when I was 19? Ha!  There was Kendal: a 30-something teacher who runs her own tutoring center on the east coast. There were Jamie and Rachel: cousins (one American, one Canadian) who decided to spend 2ish months traveling around Asia.  This means that there were seven (I know…awesome!) women that were going to do the hike together.  Remember how I thought I would have no one to hike with…? Yeah. Slap me.

On our way out of Lijiang, our driver said he needed to give his son a ride somewhere. Okay. Whatever. We’re already running behind. It’s not like we need to make it to top before sunset or anything. So he stops to get his son and his son’s entourage (which included one large bird).

This is the rather large bird that found its way into our minibus. The driver's son was soon to be married so our only guess was that the bird was a gift for his future wife's family. Maybe you have a better guess. I was very happy after the bird found its way OUT of the vehicle. I like birds. When they're outside. 🙂

After all that nonsense was over, we found ourselves (finally) on the way to Qiaotou.  We arrived at a bridge.  This isn’t just an ordinary bridge.  I’m sure it has some special meaning in Chinese. The bridge belongs to no one. But–the side of the river that we are on belongs to Lijiang. The side that we want to be on belongs to Shangri-la. (If you’re wondering about that name…google it sometime. It was named that after the famous book Lost Horizon called it that.  These people love their attention for it! The city’s real name is Zhongdian)  So, when one side of the bridge belongs to one county and the other side belongs to another county, the only acceptable (and clearly the most obvious) way of doing things is to switch vehicles before crossing the bridge.  Lijiang cars do not drive in Shangri-la. Shangri-la cars do not drive in Lijiang. This is just the way it is. Please don’t ask. Good grief.

We made it to Qiaotou about 10 minutes later and found ourselves behind a 20-man (with suits and lanyards, of course) blockade.  These men had one important job: make sure the foreigners pay. (“Can you wear a suit? Can you smoke? Can you stop American women from hiking without paying? Hired!”–at least that what we assumed the interview sounded like.)   Hehehe….  We were told (THAT VERY MORNING) that there was not an entrance fee to the gorge because of the construction going on at the bottom.  (Apparantly, if you were willing to risk your life amid the dangerous rock blasting, you deserved to hike the gorge for free.)  This was not the case for the seven hikers that day.  We had to pay.  I’m going to call it a National Park Fee.  It makes me feel better.  More likely it would be going toward the wages of the men who created our barricade that day. 🙁 

I’ve rambled on and on, and I haven’t even gotten to the hike yet.  Need a bathroom break? Okay. I’ll wait.

We began the hike with three people following us.  Two were pulling donkeys with them.  We didn’t really know why they were following us until they started saying “Hello. Want to ride my horse?” (donkey=horse in this country)  (Another thing you should know about China is that when someone is trying to sell you something but they can’t speak English they will say, “Hello” followed by the name of the item they are selling. For example: “Hello, banana!” “Hello, scarf”–more on this later) So, since the donkey-keepers could at least make a (sort of) sentence…we let them continue following. It was definitely good to have them behind us when the direction of the trail was a bit iffy.  They saved us a bit of time during the beginning vague parts of the hike.  If you recall, time is something we are lacking in a bit today. 

So, finally, we are hiking the gorge!  It was my main reason for visiting this part of the country. I was loving it. I saw this:

We were barely into the hike (probably a couple kilometers) and no one could resist taking photos. It was absolutely gorgeous. Amber--stop taking pictures. We have to make it to the Halfway House (yep, that's the name) by sunset.

And this…

Amazing! So good to be in the mountains!

This picture was actually very close to the halfway point. (I just put it here for wow-factor)  “Jade Dragon Snow Mountain” (that’s right, all the mountains are called one mountain) is a very famous mountain in China and stands at just over 18,000 feet. 

There was one part of the hike that was pretty brutal.  It was called the 28 bends. (it was more like 35 or 40 though…)  This is where you cover a great deal of elevation in not so much distance.  Back and forth, back and forth almost straight up.  We began the bends (or so we thought…) only to find out 30 minutes later that we were just beginning the bends! AAAHHHH!!!  Yes, there was a sign telling us that we were about to begin the 28 bends.  Okay.  I can do this.  Susanne and I had gotten Snickers to eat when we reached the top.  That’s motivation, right?  So, we climbed and climbed and climbed and climbed and reached the number…. 1!  Well, this is interesting.  They didn’t actually count each bend but a group of bends… Aiya! (that’s the Chinese version of ‘good grief’ and I find myself saying it more and more…)  It did eventually get better and we stopped thinking about the numbers.  We finally got to the number 16 and decided that since we were ‘half way’ we could make it!  The next number we saw was 22.  24, 25, 26… And finally, we were there!  It was a good feeling.  The rest of the day’s hike was actually pretty easy. Good thing too, because we had to cover 16.5 kilometers on day one!

This is what the trail looked like for part of the hike. (With a steep drop at the right...)

This is what another part of the trail looked like. Again, with a sheer drop to the right.

...and a view from the edge of the cliff. 🙂

We made it to the Halfway House just as the sun was setting on the mountains across the gorge.  It was “gorge”ous!  Halfway House, our hostel for the night, was awesome!  The view from the squatty-potty was incredible.  The shower was HOT, the bed was very warm, the beer (definitely deserved) was cold, and the company was unbeatable!  I slept so well that night!

This was the view of the sunset on the mountains! Mmmm..... Totally worth the climb!