Yunnan 云南 Province - bordered by Tibet (NW), Myanmar (W), and Laos and Vietnam (S)

The main purpose of this part of my trip is to see and hike Tiger Leaping Gorge 虎跳峡。 It claims to be the deepest river gorge in the world.  I’m planning to spend 2-3 days hiking in the gorge and photographing the magnificent scenery.  Below are some pictures I found online. When I return, I will show you my own pictures!

There are two different paths to take: the high road and the low road. I plan to take the high road. If I'm going to make the trip all the way down there I'm going to make it worthwhile. Thankfully there are hostels on the mountain.

The mountains surrounding the gorge have an elevation of 18,000+ feet. On one side of the gorge is "Jade Dragon Snow Mountain" and on the other side is "Haba Snow Mountain" I wonder what the terrain will be like in the winter... 😉

I'm very excited to see mountains!!

After the hike in the gorge, my plan is to stay in Lijiang for a couple of days and explore the area. There are many other things to do there and I’m looking forward to getting lost in the area.  (Don’t worry, Mom, I don’t actually mean “lost”)

Guangxi 广西 Province-bordered by Vietnam (SW)

After my time in Yunnan Province, I will take a train from Kunming 昆明 (also in Yunnan) to Guilin 桂林 in Guangxi 广西 Province.  Guilin is a really toursity town, so I only plan to stay there long enough to either get a bus ticket to Yangshuo 阳朔 or take the boat tour down the Li River. I’ll have plenty of time to make that decision later.  Yangshuo/Guilin areas are known for their Karst Topography.   I’m very excited to visit this part of the world.  Below is a photo from my hostel in Xingping 性平 village, near Yangshuo.   (Interesting side note:  as I was doing some “research” for my trip–wikipedia saves the day again–I discovered that Yangshuo is a ‘sister city’ to Rapid City, SD.  Now I’m even more excited!)

Yes, that is a random, unknown person in the photo. It was the best one I could find.

After a couple days of hiking/biking/photographing the area of Yangshuo, I will take the bus (three different buses, actually) to the small village of Dazhai, which is about 4 hours north of Yangshuo.  Near Dazhai there are more (although smaller) mountains.  This part of the country is best known for its rice farming.  I will be staying at a hostel in the mountains surrounded by rice terraces.  It is called “Dragon’s Backbone Rice Terraces”. 

This is a photo from the hostel website. I don't know what the terraces will look like during this time of the year.

I kind of wish I were taking this trip in the warmer months so that I could see this:

I wonder how they thought of the name...

Or this…

🙂

When I’m done hiking in the rice, I’ll head to Hong Kong for the FOC retreat.  I’ll get to spend four days with the other Americans from all over China.  I’m excited to explore Hong Kong again, too. If you remember, the last time I was there was a very short trip.  I’ll see what kind of pictures I can get! 

Please pr-y for my safety, my health, and a working camera!  I’ll update when I return to Beijing sometime during the week of February 14th.  I will mostly be out of touch during the next three weeks!

Happy Chinese New Year! 新年快乐！Happy Spring Festival! 春节快乐！