For the Spring Festival, Maple Leaf shuts its doors for a week and lets both teachers and students free on the world. Some of my coworkers headed to the Philippines and Thailand, while others chose to lay low in DaLian and just recover from what felt like a long stretch in term 3. I went to Yunnan Province, and got as close to Tibet as I probably ever will, unless time and money suddenly afford themselves more frequently to me. We arrived in Kunming and things instantly went awry. My travel buddy hadn't printed off the Chinese directions to our hostel, and we couldn't get the number to work. We were both getting hungry and feeling pretty tired, so we went to a different hostel to get help in finding the place we had booked. In my haste, as we were checking in, I realized (with a deep, sinking, frantic realization) that I had left my purse in the taxi we had just exited. Inside that purse was my passport, Tom's passport, $200 cash, my credit card, my Canadian and Chinese bank cards, my ipod, my camera, all the information for our flights and hotels, and my house keys.
Next day, we took a four hour journey to Dali, an old, walled city north of Kunming. The bus was fine, but the rural toilets were not. I don't think I will ever get used to using a squat toilet with no door, while people cruise by looking for empty toilets. My sense of privacy is decidedly Western. When we arrived in Dali (and stayed at the Lily Pad, which I recommend), clouds had settled low over the city and the rain wasn't just threatening, it was starting to punch. We ducked inside a chicken restaurant to wait it out. From the chicken restaurant, we made our rounds through of several of the local bars. We didn't see much of Dali that night, but we sure did get to know their local brew. In the morning, we explored the Ancient City of Dali. Dali has the feel of a Southeast Asian city with its backpackers' guesthouses, restaurants, and banana pancakes, but it also feels like a small and ancient Chinese city (mission accomplished, Dali--I presume that's the feel you were going for), minus the busses and power lines. It's set against the mountains and a great lake. I would have liked to stay a little longer as it felt like a great place to unwind and explore. We had, however, booked a minibus to Lijiang for that afternoon (we rode with heavy smokers who tapped their ashes into sloshing buckets of water), and three hours later we arrived at the amazing Panba Hostel (more like guesthouse/mini hotel). It's set down a very quiet alley that is not far from the centre of Old Town Lijiang, but feels like worlds away from all the tourists and hard-bargaining shops. Our patio overlooked the roofs of the town and the mountains beyond. We explored a little and grabbed some dinner canal-side, then went back to our room to get ready for our two-day hike in Tiger Leaping Gorge. We took another (ugh) three hour minibus ride to Qiaotou and Jane's Tibetan Guesthouse, where the gorge hike officially starts. We got some info from Jane and then set off. The weather that day had started off freezing cold, but the sun quickly bore down on us. We climbed higher into the hills and looked down over terraced fields of rice, some bleached yellow from drought, some emerald green from close attention. We passed mule after mule, and goat shepherd after goat shepherd. We hit the 28 bends and climbed up, and up, and up, and up, and up (I would like to write that 28 times just so your eyes can begin to feel as tired as my legs did, but I'm nicer than that). After 4 hours, and around 5pm, we came across the Tea Horse Guesthouse and decided to call it a day. We sat around with a few other hikers and ate noodles. Our room was sparse but clean, and we had a gorgeous view of the soaring, snow-capped mountains. The only thing that was difficult for me was the bathroom: another open-door squat toilet with a strange, angled and tiled contraption that ran down between the concrete trough you had to stand over. I wish I'd taken a picture. However, despite my complaining, it was very clean. And it had a view of the rice terraces.
Next day, we took a four hour journey to Dali, an old, walled city north of Kunming. The bus was fine, but the rural toilets were not. I don't think I will ever get used to using a squat toilet with no door, while people cruise by looking for empty toilets. My sense of privacy is decidedly Western. When we arrived in Dali (and stayed at the Lily Pad, which I recommend), clouds had settled low over the city and the rain wasn't just threatening, it was starting to punch. We ducked inside a chicken restaurant to wait it out. From the chicken restaurant, we made our rounds through of several of the local bars. We didn't see much of Dali that night, but we sure did get to know their local brew. In the morning, we explored the Ancient City of Dali. Dali has the feel of a Southeast Asian city with its backpackers' guesthouses, restaurants, and banana pancakes, but it also feels like a small and ancient Chinese city (mission accomplished, Dali--I presume that's the feel you were going for), minus the busses and power lines. It's set against the mountains and a great lake. I would have liked to stay a little longer as it felt like a great place to unwind and explore. We had, however, booked a minibus to Lijiang for that afternoon (we rode with heavy smokers who tapped their ashes into sloshing buckets of water), and three hours later we arrived at the amazing Panba Hostel (more like guesthouse/mini hotel). It's set down a very quiet alley that is not far from the centre of Old Town Lijiang, but feels like worlds away from all the tourists and hard-bargaining shops. Our patio overlooked the roofs of the town and the mountains beyond. We explored a little and grabbed some dinner canal-side, then went back to our room to get ready for our two-day hike in Tiger Leaping Gorge. We took another (ugh) three hour minibus ride to Qiaotou and Jane's Tibetan Guesthouse, where the gorge hike officially starts. We got some info from Jane and then set off. The weather that day had started off freezing cold, but the sun quickly bore down on us. We climbed higher into the hills and looked down over terraced fields of rice, some bleached yellow from drought, some emerald green from close attention. We passed mule after mule, and goat shepherd after goat shepherd. We hit the 28 bends and climbed up, and up, and up, and up, and up (I would like to write that 28 times just so your eyes can begin to feel as tired as my legs did, but I'm nicer than that). After 4 hours, and around 5pm, we came across the Tea Horse Guesthouse and decided to call it a day. We sat around with a few other hikers and ate noodles. Our room was sparse but clean, and we had a gorgeous view of the soaring, snow-capped mountains. The only thing that was difficult for me was the bathroom: another open-door squat toilet with a strange, angled and tiled contraption that ran down between the concrete trough you had to stand over. I wish I'd taken a picture. However, despite my complaining, it was very clean. And it had a view of the rice terraces.
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