yunnan

after playing beijing tourguide for sean's dad for two days (note: all i know how to do is say thank you and use the subway) it was time to hop on another plane to go south to yunnan. i had ants in my pants to hike the spectacular Leaping Tiger Gorge. Its a gorge where a river runs at the base of two 4000 meter mountains that are breathtakingly vertical (that's 2.5 miles high people!). Legend has it that it is so narrow in one spot a tiger escaped some hunters by leaping across. Sean and Al seemed a bit apathetic so i cracked the whip.

After the 3 hour flight, we arrived in Kunming and spent the next day in the pleasant weather. It was nice to be in cool, relatively clean air. (Beijing is as dirty as they say - if you're not choking back sand from the recent sandstorm, you're inhaling some sort of burt coal product or car exhaust.) Being in the south, there are more minorities so people seem a bit friendlier and are more exotic looking (read: more attractive). Getting to LTG was not easy, it required an overnight bus (9 hours to Lijang). Since Al is not a standard issue asian size, we had to buy him two beds in the bus and still the beds were too short, he hung over the edge at his calfs. But we made it there and it was another 2 hour car ride to the trailhead.

The walking was spectacular. We were so high, and the drop was so steep its really hard to describe. I literally almost fainted at one point it was so breathatking. I felt connected to the world. A very small part of it. At this one point the mountain was so large and sheer, you could put your chin on your chest and look down at the river, you could crane your neck back and see the mountaintop (barely), and you could look left and right and just barely make out the ends of the peaks.

All along the way the natives have donkeys to help the tourists up the mountain (because its so steep you have to use your hands in certain parts). I think even if we were to mount the little mules, they wouldn't have supported Al's weight. No asses for us.

We hiked for two nights and stayed in nice Naxi guesthouses. The Naxi are the so called "minority" people of the region. The food was excellent. They had this bread called Naxi Baba which was like a fluffy wheat pita bread that they put all sorts of toppings on: garlic, butter, bananas, chocolate, weed. you name it. it was great. The first night we arrived in the twilight (actually it was dark) and all the beds were full because of the big holiday week in china. It was 1.5 hours to the next guesthouse in the dark, and we were all very tired. The cute Naxi girls, giggiling, made us a bed on the floor and it worked superbly.

The town of Lijang was charming. Courtyard houses and a river running through the old town corresponded to what i thought china should look like.

pictures of yunnan, here