Tiger Leaping Gorge

Tim and I delayed our trip to Tiger Leaping Gorge by a day or so, so we could spend an extra day with our mates Tess and Andy who we have been travelling on and off with since we left Vietnam.

However, when the day finally arrived, we were perplexed. If the entrance fee to get into the TLG was 50 yuan, how on earth could Mama drive you to the gorge AND get you inside for only 40 yuan?? I won't divulge, but it's ingeniously simple and just another example of how Mama takes care of her guests.

So after waiting as long as possible to get over our colds (thanks again for that one Andy!!), Tim and I set off for the gorge on a Sunday, along with another Aussie guy called Gene. We sneakily arrived at the start of the gorge trek at about 2pm and set off under clear blue skies.

Tiger Leaping Gorge is breath taking, in both senses of the word. The Jade Dragon Mountain backdrop is just beautiful (when it's not shrouded by clouds), and with the Yangtze surging along below us, it's a pretty difficult combination to beat.
We decided to (really) take our time with the hike, and do it over three days. This meant that for the first day we only walked for 2.5 hours, which in turn meant that there was plenty of time for food and beer at our first stop, the Naxi Family guesthouse. The room was pretty basic (and we didn't even try to use the showers once we heard what everyone else had to say about them), but the owners were lovely, and we had a great time chatting with all the other people who were doing the trek over dinner.

On our second day, Tim and I set off under threatening skies, ready for the most challenging part of the trek - the infamous '28 bends' (probably closer to 40). These bends in the path lead you up the mountain a further 1200 metres in elevation over about 4k's before leveling out for the rest of the time.
Having said that, I enjoyed the second days' trek much more, even though it took us about six and a half hours. It might have been because we had enough time to get a bit of a rhythym going... who can say.

That night we stayed at the Halfway guest house (which isn't), along with several other elderly couples we met previously at the Naxi Family guest house (I told you we set a blistering pace). For four years, Tim has been telling everyone about these incredible toilets, and even went so far as to tell other trekkers along the way to hold on until they reached Halfway. I think in the re-telling over all this time, the long drop became thousands of metres, the view down the valley became longer and grander, and I somehow always pictured western style toilets. So, I was not without some disappointment when I resurfaced from said loo, especially since I had been eyeing off bushes along the path for the last 2 hours. Granted, the view was still spectacular, but some things are probably better left unsaid.

One of the other things Tim remembered that drew us to this guest house was the warm family reception that he and Christa received last time. Unfortunately, this had also changed, as one of the cute little kids from four years ago had now turned into an annoying teenager that was rude to everyone there. After some words to the owner, and a free (and awkward) meal with the family, everything was apples again. I think the Chinese woman who translated parts of Tim's outburst got a free room for the night for her troubles, which she was embarrassed about. We have since heard from other backpackers that did the trek through the gorge, that most were unimpressed with the attitude they got from the other guesthouses aswell, so it wasn't just the Halfway house.

The next day of the trek was always going to be the easiest as it was either at the same level, or down hill... yay! We had to walk over a massive waterfall that covered the path at one point, and I was glad for the fact that there had been very little rain there recently. This last part of the gorge trek only took three hours and we even managed to over-take some people. Granted they were about 70 years old and had bad knees, but it made us feel good just the same.

It's such a shame that this beautiful gorge is going to be damned up... apparently they will start the first stage next month! The water level will rise another 400 metres and change the landscape forever, so I for one am very glad that I have seen it in it's original glory.

The scenery throughout the gorge trek was varied and stunning.

First stop: Naxi Family Guest house... a lovely stop.

Tackling the "28 bends" on day two.

Direct translation: watch out!

Tim on the trail on day two... it's a long way down!

Me with the Jade Dragon mountains in the background.

Unlike most farmers, this one's a stunner.

A typical little stone village along the trail.

Relaxing at the end of the trek.

Lijiang and Mama's

We arrived in lovely Lijiang on Tuesday the 22nd of March, just in time to extend our China visas which expired the next day (phew!).

Lijiang's old town is very picturesque, with beautiful old buildings and little streams criss-crossing the paths and running along beside the houses. However, every single shop in the old town sells either tourist crap, clothes, shoes or it's a restaurant... and it's choking with Chinese tour groups! It's really funny seeing all the tour guides walk along with their flags held high, and a gaggle of Chinese tourists obediently following behind, wearing their matching baseball caps. At night, they all converge on bar street (which Tim assures me, was NOT there four years ago) and have singing competitions with each other from one side of the street to the other... absolute chaos, but fun to watch!

Lijiang is criss crossed by rivers filled with gold fish.

The cobbled lanes of Lijiang with their tourist crap.

An unbeatable combination of cherry blossoms and Chinese lanterns.

A good a place as any to get down to the serious business of Chinese checkers.

We had several recommendations from travellers in Chengdu to stay in Mama's guesthouse when we get to Lijiang (one guy even went so far as to call it the best guesthouse in China!). They were full of praise about how awesome and cheap it was, and when they spoke about Mama, their eye glazed over as they retold how much she fed you and how sweet she was.

The only trick now is... how do we find it?! Mama's guesthouse is hidden away in a quiet corner of the old town, but thankfully she provides a great service where you can call Mama from anywhere in Lijiang and she will come and get you.

After a half-baked attempt to find the guesthouse on our own (via a warm beer), I was lucky enough to make the call to Mama (who endearingly, refers to herself in the third person). This is basically how the conversation went:

Me: "Ni hao?"
Mama: "Hello?"
Me: "Hello, we have just arrived in Lijiang, and we would like to stay with you."
Mama: "Hello?"
Me: "Yes, hello?"
Mama: "Hello? Mama here"
Me: "Hello Mama. Where is your guesthouse?"
Mama: "Mama.... where are you?"
(oh good, we're getting somewhere)
Me: "OK, we are near Misu Misu bar in the old town."
Mama: "Hello?"
Me: "Yes, hello? Can you hear me?"
Mama: "Police come there"
Me: "What?"
Mama: "Hello?"
Me: "What?"
Mama: "Police come get you"
Me: "Police?"
Mama: "Hello?"
(at this point, Tim was giving me this 'what's happening' look, and I gave him a 'I have no idea' look in return)
Mama: "Hello? Mama come get you!"
Me: "OK! OK, we will wait here."
Mama: "Hello? Police wait there." Then she hung up the phone.

Not one minute later though, she called back and spoke to the owners of the store that we were calling from, and they gave the phone back to me.
Me: "Ni hau"
Mama: "Hello?"
Me: "Hello Mama"
Mama: "One moment police"
Me: "OK" Then she hung up the phone. At least she knew where we were now.

Before I knew it, the store owners were passing the phone back to me again... it was Mama.
Me: "Hello?"
Mama: "Hello? One moment police, Mama come get you"
Me: "OK, we wait here"
Mama: "One moment police"

So, being pretty positive that Mama knew where we were now, we went into the bar for another beer while we waited. I spotted Mama in the crowd instantly... we even waved at each other through the bar window. She is an elderly Chinese woman with a warm face and a ready smile, and she bustled into the bar with one of her daughters/helpers and tried to take our 18 kilo bags off us.

As she was leading us through the maze of laneways, Mama asked us where we were from, then proclaimed that "now Mama have four Audalia's"... which I'm guessing meant that there were already another couple of Aussies at her guesthouse. After storing our bags in our room, Mama took Tim and I by the elbows and lead us to a table with four other travellers already seated and eating dinner. Pointing to one of the couples, and then at us, Mama proclaimed, "Two Audalia, two Audalia... four Audalia's" and sat us down. Bless her, she wanted us to sit next to someone that we had something in common with.

If that wasn't the nicest introduction to a new town I've ever had, we then found out why people's eyes really glazed over... dinner at Mama's. For 8 kwai per head (not per dish), Mama will feed you until you explode with such a variety of tasty dishes my mouth is salivating as I write this. And she won't stop either... not even if you say you're full (this means nothing to Mama), she will only stop when there are at least 3 untouched dishes of food on the table. Breakfast is very similar. It only cost 2 kwai for the thick bread, fried egg and sliced tomato feast, which of course she keeps adding to until you plead with her to stop... and then she'll give you another portion of sliced tomato. If you don't escape from Mama's domain in time for afternoon tea, Mama will feed you more food (usually a banana and a piece of bread with tomato) and tea for free. We watched one Israeli guy tell Mama he didn't want any banana, and Mama wouldn't listen... she wouldn't have a bar of it, and forced it onto him ("Eat!"). Bless her.

At night, Tim and I would sit up drinking cheap beer with the other guests at Mama's - it has such a great vibe there. And of course, it's always entertaining to hear Mama have an almost identical struggle with the English language over the phone to some other helpless traveller trying to find her.

It truly is the best guesthouse in China, and it's made our stay in Lijiang so enjoyable that we hardly notice how touristy it is. The best thing about it... it's not in the LP guide. :)

"Way...?"

No way dude

If you haven't seen the film "Bill and Teds Excellent Adventure", or its sequel what ever it was called, then this post may be lost on you, but hey, at least you missed out on watching a shitty film!
When Chinese people answer the phone they pick up and say "Way", and they often use this phrase through out their conversation. Its kind of like "hello" mixed with "ah ha" mixed with "hmmm".

The up shot of this is that you often hear people saying "Way...... Way..... Way..... Way..... Way". The first time I heard this I was almost in tears, it sounds exactly like they have just received a call from Bill or Ted:

Way
No way dude
Way
No way dude
Way
Dude, no way
Way
Totally dude

Ripped Off and Jaded in Naxi-land

How horribly wrong the LP can be... especially in China.

For starters, it couldn't be done. If we wanted to go from Chengdu via Lugu Hu lake on the way to Lijiang, we would have to take all provisions, a tent and a sleeping bag... but then Lugu Hu is very sleepy and practically untouched. No one told that to the hundreds of Chinese tourists, and no one at the bus station got the memo either.

We caught an over night train from Chengdu to Xichang, got straight onto a bus, and arrived at Lugu Hu without starving or sleeping in the wild. Then we paid 80 yuan each (about AUD$16!!) to get into the bloody lake. This better be good.

No, no it wasn't. All the taxis at Lugu Hu town were price fixed to 20 yuan per person to go about 5 k's around the lake to the 'sleepy' little town of Lige... this was annoying right from the start as the 8 hour bus ride from Xichang to Lugu Hu was only 67 yuan each. To make matters worse, the taxi driver drove like a freaking maniac on the loose gravel, winding mountain roads (I think he actually sped up for the hair-pin corners), and when we pleaded with him to slow down he literally turned around in his seat to look at us and cackled like a mad man. Finally, he pulled over at a look out and got out of the car. We thought he was kindly stopping for us to a) kick him in the balls, or b) take a photo. No... apparently the car couldn't make it all the way down to Lige as it was too dangerous (Hello? Slow down!), but we can walk down this steep embankment here through all the nettle bushes, and walk the remaining 800 metres to the guesthouse... that's what all the tourists do!

The 'sleepy town' of Lige may well have been this way 4 years ago (although we seriously doubt this), but it was now a mass construction site of bland wooden "old Naxi" houses.

OK, where here now, what can we do? Well, we could get one of the Naxi women to row us in a little boat around the cove (not the lake mind you) for 10 yuan per person which would take about 20 minutes. Or we could pay 150 yuan to go to one of the islands in the middle. Or we can join in with a traditional Naxi dance for 10 yuan per person. Traditional Naxi dance my ass... they played a tape of their songs on the boom box, walked around in a circle with the gullable Chinese tourists... and checked their mobiles.

Lugu Hu wasn't even that pretty. The surrounding mountains had red soil and sparce vegetation, so for us it looked very much like Australia (not a bad thing, but we've seen it before... for free), but I can understand that for the Chinese tourists it's very different.

The one great thing about Lugu Hu was the company. We met a little ball of energy and enthusiasm called Jing, and she made our time there a lot more bearable. The other good thing about the whole Lugu Hu fiasco (apart from leaving it the next day), was the thought that we didn't wait until we had already arrived in Lijiang before taking a full 9 hours to get up there and find it was shit.

[NB: when we arrived in Lijiang, we found a 2003 edition of the Rough Guide which detailed exactly the situation in Lugu Hu, and if we had read that we wouldn't have bothered.]

Chengdu, the City of a Thousand Burning Arseholes

We ended up spending a week in Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan Province, and I have to say I love the place. It is by far the best Chinese city we have visited.... So far at least. Its clean, nice to walk around, has good public transport, lots of parks, and has somehow managed to retain much of its character despite the swinging wreckers balls.
We spent much of our time there just wandering the streets, sampling the Sichuan Cuisine, famous for being the spiciest food in china (no dissagreements from the FlashPacker camp!). Many of the natives of Chengdu struggle to eat some of the hotter dishes!
Both Traci and I love hot food, the hotter the better in fact, and we love the taste of chilies (I am of the firm belief that fried eggs only exist in this universe as a tobasco delivery vehicle). Understandably we often struggle to find food that's spicy enough, but Chengdu was a different story, and not because of chilies (believe it or not).... Its the pepper!
Sichuan pepper not something we have ever really cooked with, and when it is served in Chinese restaurants in the west they only use a little, so neither of us was wary of the handfulls that are added to everything.... Not at first that is!
The burning sensation you get from Sichuan pepper is completely different to a chili burn, and it lasts a whole lot longer.
Its a bit like when you sit on your leg for too long and it goes to sleep, then you finally straighten it out and it starts tingling all over... Its a bit like that, except 10 times stronger and all over your face.... And it doesn't go away.... No matter how much beer you drink.

The Chinese name for Chengdu is "Perfect Metropolis", but I think the title of this post is a better name.

We both knew the reputation Sichuan cuisine had, what we didnt know was for was how varied it was. On almost every street corner was either a restaurant or street food vendor, and we rarely saw the same thing twice. Food was plentiful and cheap.... The beer was cold (I almost fainted, this NEVER happens in china - unless the ambient temperature is cold that is).... Flashpacker paradise. Multiple Foodgasms at every turn.

I cant give you an exhaustive list of all the things we ate, so here's a typical day:

Breakfast is the most difficult meal when traveling in Asia, as they usually eat the same kinds of things for breakfast as they eat for dinner (well, last nights dinner to me more accurate), and it gets a bit hard to stomach day after day. Chengdu was different though. They make little egg muffin thingies with spicy pork: a hungover persons best friend... They use a special flat hot plate with cylindrical shape depressions in it (a little like a muffin tray) in which they fry an egg, take it out, then pour pancake mixture into the bottom, replace the egg, add pork, spring onions and spices, then pour more mixture on top. The result is a perfectly round muffin with egg and pork in the middle. Magic!

For lunch you can have a Chinese style pizza, with a rice flour dough base and spicy pork sausage and herbs on top - another Sichuan speciality.

Dinner was always the best though; Sichuan Hot Pot. You sit at a table with a hole in the middle, into which is placed a "hot pot" (a metal bowl filled with a mixture of stock, peanut and sesame oil, chilies, Sicuhan pepper and other herbs and spices). A gas burner underneath keeps it bubbling away nicely.
You are then free to wander up to the food counters and pick what you want to put in it, and there is a lot to choose from; skewers of Pork, Beef, Seafood, Veggies, Fruit, and Tofu of so many varied styles shapes and flavours that your eyes will pop out of your head (if the variety doesn't make your eyes pop out, the pepper certainly will).
You cook your selection in the hot pot, and throw the finished skewers into a bucket by the side of the table, which the staff count up at the end and charge you accordingly.
Between Traci, Martin (our Aussie travel companion) and myself we managed to get though 176 skewers one night.... The total cost? 17 Yuan.... that's right, the skewers are 1/10th of a Yuan each. That's about AU$3 between us.
The only problem is the amount you have to spend on beer to stop your head from exploding (Traci swore her inner ears were burning at one point).

Actually, that's not the only problem.... Its a meal that you certainly remember the next morning.... Or even until the next evening.

Panda-monium in Chengdu

The famous Giant Panda.

Finally, after much confusion as to which time of day they are the most active, we went to see the pandas at the Giant Panda Research and Conservation Park with Tess and Andy.

They are mesmerisingly adorable. We arrived during their morning feeding time, and all watched on as they happily munched on kilos and kilos of bamboo. Due to the fact that they only absorb 5% of the nutrients from the bamboo stalks and leaves, they sleep for most of the day, and nearing the end of feeding time (about 10am) some of them were starting to doze off.

Well, they were trying to anyway. There were a couple of Japanese and Chinese tour groups who were yelling and clapping at the pandas to either, a) get their attention, if they were awake, for their photos, or b) to wake them up if they were dozing. This is despite all the signs in both English and Chinese saying to be quiet... we were so annoyed with some of them by the end, that we were all shushing them and pointing to the signs. There was another tour group full of Germans, and they were very respectful and quiet, but not their guide. He would yell at the top of his voice in German at every opportunity (ie. "PANDAS HABEN SECHS FINGER") and scare the pandas away! Grrrr...

Despite the annoying tour groups, we had a great time and I even got the chance to hold a baby red panda! He was only 6 months old, and happily sat in my lap for a couple of minutes while I fed him slices of apple. The handler was encouraging me to touch and kiss the little thing (as if I needed to be told!), but I spent all of the time trying to remember as many details as possible. I would have loved to hold one of the baby giant pandas, but it costs an arm and both legs - the red pandas only cost 50 kwai to hold, and it was worth every jiao!
The red pandas were much more alert and inquisitive as well... they were very interested in Tess' chocolate wafer biscuits!

Getting stuck into breakfast.

They peel the bamboo with their front teeth, and munch with the back ones.

Getting sleepy now.

They're even cute when they have their backs to you!

A baby giant panda learning how to climb.

Slowly...

... slowly... (almost there!)

(oof!) ... there we go!

Now it's making it's way up a tree...

... just in time for breakfast.

One of the baby red pandas.

How cute is he?!

He really loved the apple treats... seriously, how cute is that? :)

They were very interested in Tess' chocolate wafer snack too.

The Magical Mystery Washing Ladies Of Zhaoxing

The last hour of our bus ride to Zhaoxing (see "Worst Bus Ride in China - two") was spent negotiating the winding road to the bottom of the valley in which the village is nestled.
From reading www.chinabackpacker.com, we knew that this would be how our journey would end; we would come over the top of a pass and drop down into a subtropical valley, but we had no idea which pass would be the last one (well actually, for quite a while we thought that every pass would be our last one and that we were going to go over the edge of the "road" and off a cliff, but then we realised that either way we would end up at the bottom of a valley, and gave up thinking about it).

The last pass.

We had been over one hell of a lot of mountain passes, and each time we went over the top of one we were wishing that it would be our last, (not literally that is, although we did use our video camera to make our last wills and testaments), so when we saw the bottom of a lush valley, with a beautiful village at the bottom surrounded by sunlit rice terraces, we decided that no matter where we were, we were getting off. Fortunately it was Zhaoxing.


We stumbled off the bus with shaking legs, kissed the ground and slapped the driver (I'm still not sure which one would have been cleaner to kiss), told each other we were just joking when we made our last wills and testaments - 'course we were - and walked shakily into the first beer outlet we could find.
Zhaoxing really is a beautiful place, and it was such a relief that the place we had spent so long traveling to was looking like it was going to be worth the effort.
As you can imagine from our accounts of getting there, it is really quite an isolated place (as much as anywhere can be in china that is). It is pretty much in the middle of the Dong Autonomous Prefrecture, which is the region of
northern Guizhou that the majority of the Dong people live, and because of this, still retains much of its traditions and culture.
We wandered around trying to find some accommodation, and finally found a cheap place which promised hot showers and the possibility of washing our clothes, now long overdue, then dropped our bags off and went for some food.

The main street of Zhaoxing.

A Dhong taxi.

An old style shop.

Whiling the day away, watching life go past. I imagine things have changed a bit in his time.

Art is another thing the Dhong aren't very good at.

An aerial view of the village.

The next day we woke early, as we wanted to go trekking in the surrounding hills, and headed for the showers.
A little background on the Dhong people is required here;
The Dhong are considered expert architects. Each Dhong village is charicterised by its drum towers (basically a very large wooden echo chamber, used to amplify the drum it houses to call the villagers to the square), and its wind and rain bridges (which are what you would think they are, covered bridges to keep the wind and rain out).
Not such an achievement in itself, a tower and a bridge.... Pretty easy really, except they don't use a single nail. They are like giant 3D jigsaw puzzles, with the pieces cut to size and then put together.
They also created the sea of rice terraces you have seen in the pictures in this blog, in often very steep and rugged terrain, with amazingly complicated irrigation systems.
Pretty impressive eh? Well, they may be good architects, but they are crap at plumbing and wiring.

After finally getting the water to run, we were treated to an extremely cold shower which didn't drain properly (remember the rice terrace irrigation boys??? Put the drain at the lowest point......LOWEST POINT).
Well, even if we couldn't shower, at least we could get our clothes washed....
Enter the Magical Mystery Washing Ladies Of Zhaoxing! The Mystery being why they charge AUD$1 for every item of clothing they wash...... I suppose we could have sewn them all together, but we just bitched at them instead, and resigned ourselves to stinking for at least a few days more. Oh well!!

We set of and walked north from the town, up the valley from whence we came, following a little stone path that must have been the main route out of the village before the "road" was built and turned onto one of the access paths that the villagers use to access their rice paddies.

Martin on the old road.

An old guy we met on our walk up, smoking his pipe.
All the old Dhong men wear jackets like his.

We followed the little trails you can see, and made some of our own.

We spent the whole day wandering up and down the paths which link the terraces, trying to stay as high as possible so we could get better views. Although all of the terraces have paths leading to them so that the villagers can access them, not all of these paths link together so we spent quite some time scrambling up and down bushy hillsides and rock walls trying to follow the route we wanted. Obviously they didn't think of tourists going walking when they designed them, but it all adds to the fun, and it was a beautiful sunny day so we didn't care how long it took us.

Debating which route we should take over to a new path.

The cherry blossoms are in bloom, this one doubles as a hay storage post.
I think they wrap it around poles and compost it over winter,
then plow it into the fields in spring.

One of the terraces being composted and prepared for the next seasons crops.
Nothing was wasted, and everything recycled.... Until the plastic bag that is.

The plants growing in the field above.

We walked around to the top of the terraces in that part of the valley, and snaked our way along the edges of the fields. The air in the valley was beautiful, and filled with the scents of all the spring flowers.
There were millions and millions of white butterflies fluttering about, the air was thick with them sometimes. It made me wonder about the pre pesticide days in Europe and Australia - it was probably like that then, too.

The view from the top of the terraces you can see 3 photos up.

The same view, a little further along the path.

When we reached the top of the valley we could no further, and scrambled down a hillside on our bums to another path which lead through a pine forest and back to the village.

The path home.

Worst Bus Ride in China (part two)

Sanjiang to Zhaoxing:
An exercise in patience, this trip was doomed from the beginning.

We all got up at 6am for the 6.45am bus out of Sanjiang, and staggered to the bus ticketing office in the dark with our heavy packs, still bleary eyed, and spoke to the ticket lady (the same one we had spoken to the previous day, and who had told us to come back at that time), only to be told "mei you" or don't have. You can't imagine our excitement and joy at hearing this news... but they did have the 11.30am bus. This was only a relief up until the moment when we actually saw the beast.

It was so beat up it was scary. One of the seats inside the bus was more like a rocking chair, and the actual seat board/pillow kept flying off whenever we went over really large bumps (ie. every 2 minutes, no exaggeration). The overhead luggage racks weren't attached properly at the rear (this bus obviously did this route a lot) and rattled constantly - which, bizarrely, became quite comforting after a couple of hours. There was even live chickens stuffed into the racks, just to complete the picture.

The ride was supposed to take 4.5hours but ended up taking 6.5hours. One of those hours was used moving the piles of rocks (again, from the landslides) that we would come across every 20 minutes, and probably not surprisingly, the other hour was spent waiting for a team of monkeys to fix our two burst tyres.
At one point, while trying to make room for a dump truck, the bus driver got us stuck on a rock that apparently damaged the exit door, so we had to stop again a little further on and wait while someone bashed it back into shape with a mallet.

Waiting for the tyre and roads to be fixed.

This bus ride, like all bus rides, was also conducted at breakneck speed, and where possible we overtook every slow vehicle, given the opportunity. Clearly our views and the bus drivers' views on what constituted an "opportunity" differed somewhat. Having said that though, our bus driver was excellent... the messes he would continually get us out of was truly amazing.
When not staring out of the windows with a mix of horror and awe (the scenery was beautiful), Martin, Tim and I entertained ourselves with debating which of the two bus rides were the worst, and we couldn't decide.

Some of the beautiful Dhong villages we passed along the way.