Kashgar Desert - Urumqi - Shanghai, ow no, I meen Hong Kong - Beijing! (China trip part VI)

So now the promised long(er) update. I arrived in Beijing today and checked in into the hotel we had to check in anyway tomorrow. This now saves us the moving trouble and we know that everything is fine and we are on the list for tomorrow. Like the tittle suggests, instead of going to Shanghai we ended up in Hong Kong. After leaving Kashgar on the 20th we had a 24 hour train to Urumqi as planned. Upon arrival there we had about 6 hours to spare so we decided to check if I already would have my invitation. Oh yeah, I forgot to update that part as well. Just after we went to the desert, on the 19th of July, we printed the invitations for the Russian visa and soon found out that my name and passport number were wrong. This was a big problem. I therefore called Killroy to ask if they could change it... they couldn't. What I had to do was to apply for one online, which I did. The invite would be send to me the next day. Back to Urumqi; in the hours we had to spare I checked if I had the invitation. Instead I got a question from the website asking me whether I wanted the original instead of a copy since Shanghai doesn't issue Russian visas without the original. This came as a shock, since we would have a train to there in three hours. Half panicing we thought of the options and called around to see what we could do. The Shanghai consulate didn't want to help us (bloody Russians) so we had to fly back to Hong Kong. Going to the China Southern Airlines office we found that the cheapest option was flying to Guangzhou the same evening at 7.55 pm. We quickly bought the tickets and headed back to the train station to pick up our luggage which we left there and try to sell the train tickets to Shanghai we already had. There was a long line for the counter that handles refunds. While walking towards the line with my tickets in my hand some Chinese came over and asked for our tickets. Since we were in a rush we sold them our tickets for about 90% of what we paid for it. I guess not a bad deal since we didn't know how much we could get back from the actual office. And so, in the middle of the night after a 5 hour flight we arrived in Guangzhou...

The next day we took the bus to Hong Kong and arrived in the afternoon. We stayed there for four days and not much special happened. I met up with some people such as Patrick and Bart and finally got the Russian visa, along with the Mongolian. Yesterday (July 27th) we took the train to Beijing and arrived there today. The rest is basically history. What I forgot to type yet is the Camel trip story which we did in the Taklamakan desert 3 days before all the troubles started.

The desert trip started on monday where we were picked up in the lobby of the hotel by our driver and tour guide. We first went to the supermarket where we had to buy 40 (!) bottles of drinking water. We also bought some instant noodles and other light food and finally went on our way to the desert. On the way we bought 5 water melons for as much as 1 (!) euro. We arrived at the edge of the desert at around noon local time. The camel man told us that he didn't want to leave at that time since it was the hottest period of the day. Instead we had to wait 3 hours. We waited first at the artificial lake which borders the desert and made a round on a quad bike, which was very cool. After three hours of boredom we finally departed. Three camels were mounted with our stuff (drinks, food, tents) and we set off. The camelman was walking up front, pulling the camels, while the three of us were on the camel backs. We already noticed some heavy winds coming up that first day and one hour into the trek (and already surrounded by stunning sand dunes) a huge sand storm started blasting. Jamie immediately lost her cap and I had troubles keeping mine. Sand was getting everywhere; nose, ears mouth and unfortunately into our cameras, we noticed afterwards because both of ours stopped working. We ended up 3 hours later a local farm house where, due to the wind, we had to spend the night. That evening we had kebabs for dinner, because we decided to buy a goat from the farmer (10 euros only !). We then saw how the camel man killed it and stripped it completely to prepare it for dinner. It was quite a funny sight for some reason and the dinner was great! The next day the wind was gone and so where the clouds. This ment that it was hot! Not much really happened that day since we only walked for 7 hours or so. It was not only sand we saw since we were still basically ad the desert edge, but not and then we came into the 'classical' desert landscape which was very impressive (and again: hot!). That night we stayed in the tent, at least, that's what the intensions where. However, since only one tent was working the guide and camel man had to sleep outside. We then decided to do the same and so we ended up outside under the bright night sky where we saw the biggest amount of stars I've ever seen... how romantic...
The next day we got up early to head back to the camp. It was even hotter than the day before, but luckily we were back after two hours. At the camp we were picked up by a new driver and headed back to Kashgar. It was a very memorable trip and a good end to our Kashgar days. The next was my birthday as I mentioned, and everything went wrong, but right then, after the tour everything was very ok, as it is now....

So, next thing is the vodkatrain. The tour starts tomorrow as I mentioned, so hopefully (and most likely) our trouble days are now over. 20 more days till I'm back home!

bye bye!

Finally Russian and Mongolian visa

It's been a while since my last post and a lot has happened. We were originally planning to go to Shanghai for out Russian visa, but due to curtain circumstances this didn't happen and we had to make last minute arrangements to apply for it at Hong Kong. So all the way back to where we started. Now both the Mongolian and Russian visas are in our passports and today we're finally heading off for Beijing!

I will try to update the whole story asap.

bye bye!

Kashgar - Yengisar - Yarkand - Sunday market (China trip part VI)

Last time I sort of ended with saying we had street food the night we came back form lake Karakul. Most of that street food is based on meat and most of it is some form of kebab. Well, people who know me also know that I like kebab. So I ate plenty. The next day I got my punishment however. I am still not quite sure if it were the kebabs or a some icecream I ate before, but my stomach didn't agree with it.

The day after we came back from Karakul we decided to go to Yengisar, Yarkand and stay the night in a village near Yarkand. At first we had trouble finding the right bus station for getting there but after some asking around and a bit of luck we ended up in the right bus... well, minivan. The road was extremely bumpy so we jumped up and down from our seats most of the time. At the end of the 1.5 hour trip, we reached Yengisar and my stomach started to feel bad. I thought it would go better once I would be able to get out of the van but it didn't. At one point it was so bad I just walked in a random store and asked for a public toilet. Since most people here can't read or speak Chinese (I used a mandarin phrasebook to explain) somebody else was called to read it. At one point three people were dealing with my request for a toilet. In the meantime things couldn't get better. While I was striving to get rid of whatever I needed to get rid of, Jamie got stung by a wasp in her stomach. Of course she was in pain as well so there we sat, basically in a village that can be classified as in the middle of nowhere. After a little while they understood what I meant and one guy brought me to a toilet. Of course it was just a hole in the ground but it was not my time to be picky. I sat there for perhaps half an hour but afterwards I didn't feel better. I told Jamie we should take a bus to Yarkand and we went on our way to the bus station. But I kept feeling worse and worse and when we crossed a police station I went to ask for a toilet again. They agent said they didn't have one (right!) and put us in a cab that brought us to a hotel. There we decided to stay the night since it was of no use to continue our journey like this. After an hour or two I started to feel better and the stomach ache disappeared completely. We walked around a bit after that. Yengisar is a town that's famous in the region for their knife production. I decided that I wanted one for myself, and Jamie as well, so we visited some shops. There were two types of knives there, production models and hand made models. The hand made models are more expensive and most of the time not even on display but in a cupboard somewhere locked away. When we came however some shops showed us the handmade. In one particular one we saw two that looked rather the same but have different arabic carvings in them. We wanted those. After some bargaining we got them for a good price. Then Jamie surprised me with saying that this was her (early) birthday present for me. That came as a suprise and it's really nice of her. After that we headed back for the hotel and said good night...

The next day we took the bus to Yarkand and decided to just take the bus back to Kashgar at the end of the day. On our way to there the road was again very bumpy. The tires felt like they were hitting the frame of the wheel all the time and yes, after a while we had a flat tire. The driver just put us out of the van, told us to walk a bit and just took off. Not really knowing what was happening of what would happen we just started walking. After about 20 minutes he came back with, luckily, a new tire and we could continue our journey. Yarkand was a good town to visit. Like most towns here it has a old Uyghur part and a new (always ugly) Chinese part. We had to search a bit but eventually we found the old town. Visiting that area is like going back in time. People transport themselves on wooden vehicles which is pulled by mules. Handicrafts are the biggest source of income in it's cool to see people working wood and iron and making pretty cool stuff without big machinery. The whole town had a high 'aladin' feel to it if you know what I mean. On the edge of the old town there is a bige mosque, a cemetary and a town of some lady that ment much to the region. Admission was 10 Yuan (1 euro). It was interesting to visit this although the mosque wasn't that special or anything. People where just praying and I felt (Jamie couldn't get in) a bit unwelcome. I can imagen though...
We headed back to the bus after a couple hours of walking around and had a 3 hour trip back to Kashgar, where we arrived at 9 pm Beijing time. I was still a bit frightened to eat local meat so we decided to eat at John's.

The next day was (is) sunday and this means big market day for Kashgar. The sunday market is devided into the lifestock market and well the other stuff market. We first visited the lifestock market which is an experience on its own. Where I said visiting the old town like going back in time, I guess time travelling didn't stop there. This lifestock market had a variaty of cows, sheep, goats, mules and other animals. It also had some foodstalls on the side where sheep where already waiting to be turned into kebabs. It's hard to explain what it looked like, I hope pictures will give some impression. After the lifestock market we headed over to the 'normal' market which was big and full of people. All kinds of stuff was sold there; carpets, knives, other fabrics, food and some touristy stuff. In total we spent a couple of hours on both markets before walking back to the hotel.

And now I'm here again updating my website. Tomorrow we'll be doing our three day camel tour... really excited to be going. AFter that we have a day 'off' (my birthday) and then onto Shanghai where we should arrive on the 23rd. We have the train tickets by now so that's settled. I'll be uploading pictures after this, so check out my webalbum soon.

thanks you, bye bye!

Kashgar - Lake Karakul (China trip part V)

In my last post I mentioned that we would take the plane to Kashgar the next day. So on the 9th at 8.55 am we got on our plane. It was a bit confusing at first because the flight didn't appear on the screens in the terminal. At the check-in counter however there was no problem and we got our boarding card, which said we had to wait at gate 21. When Jamie wanted to check in her bag, the scanner picked up two magnets she bought in the Philipines. For some stupid reason she couldn't bring them with her. She therefore had to take out everything in her bag in order to find them. This took around half an hour. It's still unclear why she had to take them out anyway. Arriving at gate 21 after that, the flight was still not on the monitor. Eventually we found it, but it said gate 2. Confused, we asked the personal there what the deal is with this flight. He assured us that we had to wait at gate 21. Eventually we found out that it is actually an international flight to Islamabad in Pakistan and it would make a stopover at Kashgar. That's why it also didn't appear on the monitors in the domestic terminal. Quite confusing...

All 'problems' asside, we arrived at Kashgar as planned and took a taxi to Noor Bish hotel, because according to Lonely Planet this was the cheapest option for us. Arriving there we were just refused, saying the hotel is closed, while we seen guests around! Unbelievable... And it gotten worst from there; in the next hotel, when the receptionist saw us approaching, he just duck under the counter! I've never seen anything like this, and it looks stupid as well, because ofcourse we have seen him do it. Not the brightest guy I say...
The third hotel was friendlier and told us it was full but gave us a suggestion for another hotel. We didn't follow it because we found another one instead. It's called the Seman hotel and we are staying there currently. It's a good hotel and it has a small travel agency in the lobby. After check in and organising the room we went to bar called John's cafe for breakfast and travel information in the area. We really want to do a camel trip through the desert and we were hoping he could arrange this for us. This was not to be. The only thing they had was 1 hour thingy in a small part of the desert. It's supossed to be really touristy so this didn't appeal to us. We went to the agency in the lobby. The boss of that agency spoke very good English and knows how to sell his tours. He first insisted we should be friends, well, why not... and after that we started discussing what we wanted. He said he could offer us the camel trip and told us the price. It all sounded really good and we went to the city afterwards, considering our options and to count the days we have to see what we could do. I think this was really the first time I had a real cultureshock here in Asia. This area of China really has nothing to do with well, China. The majority, by far, are Arabs. You won't hear much Chinees here, and the people don't look like Chinese either. It's actually quite a weird, or sad, story. It's obvious that China just want his part for its oil, or just to keep the country big or whatever. The city has one of the biggest statues of Mao in the whole of China, which, is totally misplaced for this part since the people just have nothing in common with the Chinese and their history. The government treaths this minority as terrorists, and since 9/11 presure has just been increased. This ofcourse with approval from Washington.
Back to the first day however. We felt quite unwelcome ofcourse after our arrival, but this changed rapidly after we just walked around and checked out the different places. Kashgar is famous for its huge sunday market, but there is a bazaar which is open daily and we visited that one. They sell a lot of different cloth and carpets, as well as knives and other Arab style stuff. Ofcourse when we passed the different stands everybody started shouting to try to sell their goods, but we didn't buy anything that day. We walked back after this to our hotel and had dinner at John's cafe again. After that we went back to the travel agency in the lobby to discuss the trip and quickly decided to do a three day camel trip through the desert. We discussed the details and bargained a bit untill we had a satisfaying price. We pinned the starting day on monday so we still have some days to do different stuff. We wanted to go to Karakul lake the next day and mentioned this to him. He then said that he had a van going there to pick up a tourgroup and we could catch a ride with the van for the same price as the public bus. This sounded really good to us and saved us the trouble for finding out where to catch the bus. We paid the deposit for the camel trip and asked if he could inquire for us what the train schedule is to Shanghai on the 20th, the day we want to leave. He agreed to do this for us and so the day ended good for us after a weird start...

Another thing that's a bit odd about this place is that they work with different times. First there is Beijing time, where the whole country should oblige to, and secondly there is local time, since Beijing time and the sun cycle don't much. Local time is two hours behind Beijing time. We decided to just skip the whole jetlag and just live on Beijing time. We also found out this has a lot of advantages for us. We agreed the driver would pick us up at 8 am local time. Thus, this is 10 am Beijing time, two more hours of sleep for us! After we set off that morning we first had to pick up a tour guide which was taking care of the group. This guy spoke good English and was fun to talk to. The total trip was a 5 hour drive and on the way the driver picked up three Israelies and their bikes, so the van was full. They countryside we passed through was full with mountains but completely different then the ones in Yunnan. The area looked very rough and rocky and no plants or trees grew there. It looked as though Osama Bin Laden himself could hide here. This part of China is also really close to Pakistan (the van was actually going there after dropping us off), and my view from Pakistan sort off looked as this landscape. On the way there was also a checkpoint where we had to show our passports. I have no idea why they have one there, but anyway, it just took 20 minutes and we could continue. We arrived at the lake at around 2.30pm Beijing time (12.30 local) where we found out we really underestimated the place. Nobody told us (even the Lonely Planet didn't mention this) that the lake was at a 3.600 meter hight and therefore cold. The wind started blowing and it started raining soon after we arrived and it felt as though we would freeze there. After a while it all got better and the sun started shining so it all got a bit better. We had lunch there and checked in into our accommodation. As the pictures in my webalbum show, we didn't have a hotel room but a 'Yurz' to our disposal. This is a sort of hut were the locals live in, and they built some for hiring out. The yurz was completely empty and instead of beds there were some blankets/matrasses and pillows we had to use. Surprisingly enough, after piling up enough of those it became really comfortable and this way of sleeping seriously can competer with regular bed. That day we decided to jsut hang around our yurz because the clouds looked quite treathening. It wouldn't be a good idea to circumnavigate the lake that day. We just passed the time with taking pictures, playing some mariokart on my nintendo ds and pee at weird places in the nature (we had no choice). At one point the guy who rents out the yurz (I don't know the plural for this word) asked us if we would want to have dinner at his place and asked how much shish kebabs we wanted, 5 or 10? We quickly said 10, because well, we wanted 10. Not really knowing of what we asked 10 pieces from we wondered what we could expect. Arriving at his place we noticed we were the only ones there. His wife gave us first a bowl of thick noodles with all kinds of stuff mixed in. This was really tasteful, although Jamie didn't really think so. After that the kebabs came and they were basically (really good) meatsticks, sort of like the ones I had in Shanghai before. And... we had 10 each! A bit too much perhaps, but because they were so good we just ate them. After dinner we went back, it started to get dark and we decided to have a beer before heading back. We asked a woman where we could get beers, and she directed her to her own tent where her husband(??) asked us to come in and sit down. And there we sat again, with a family, having beers this time. The tent looked really basic, but very practical, so that it seemed bigger than that it actually was. We found out that these people, and probably all of them that lived in the village, go to Kashgar on sunday to buy goods at the market, and then live on it for the week. Quite something different than what we are used too. After the beers it was already dark and especially windy and therefore freezing cold and we quickly got back to our yurz. We played some more mario kart and went to sleep afterwards.

We woke up the next day at 8.30 Beijing time and started to walk around the lake. It started well, but after about an hour and a half we ran into a swampy area which was very wet and we good only continue by taking our shoes off and wade through the various small creeks. The water was very cold and I was all too happy when I finally could put my shoes on. It took us a while to found out the best way to reach the high part again, but finally we made it. We walked to last bit on a fast pace since we saw dark clouds approaching. Eventually we came back to our camp (3.5 hours after departure) only just before it stated raining. The idea was to wait for the tour guide from previous day to discuss if the driver could take us to the sand dunes we saw on the way the day before and looked really appealing. We met him at around 12 am local time and started discussing a price. It was too high for us and another car was about to take off and offered a lower price. The big idea was to rent a yurz that place, walk around a bit and go back to Kashgar the next day. When we came to the dunes, they looked impressive, but not so that we wanted to stay the rest of the day. We decided to just go back to Kashgar the same day. We took some pictures and headed back afterwards. We came back in Kashgar at 5.30 pm Beijing time and took a local bus (at 10 cents each) to our hotel. Arriving there we checked in again and reclaimed our luggage which we left behind there. We were quite hungry by then and decided to go for street food today. There was one street we saw before which sold various food on so we went there. We took different stuff and some drinks and headed back to the hotel to eat it. After that we went to go on the internet at John's where I am now...

The plan for the coming week is as following. Tomorrow we want to go south to various smaller villages which are appearantly still traditionally Arab and stay the night in one of them. We second day want to visit some old ruins that are left from the ancient silk roads in the desert before heading back to Kashgar. On Sunday we want to be here for the big market. On monday we are going to start with the camel trip which will last untill wednesday evening. On thursday we will stay in Kashgar to relax and probably visit the old town part. Finally on friday we will leave for Shanghai on a three day train ride, back to (real) China...

Thank you, bye bye!

Lijiang back to Dali, to Urumqi and onto Kashgar!... but no Tibet (China trip part IV)

I am at a place now that I never thought I would come on this trip. Two days ago, our whole plans basically got messed up when I received a phone call that getting a permit for Tibet became very hard and it would take another month to settle it. We don't have the time, so the whole Tibet trip was suddenly off the table. We received our money back in Lijiang. This is a big bummer for us. To avoid depression we decided we wanted to do something really cool to make up for the gap that left the cancellation. We were looking at possibilities of going to Myanmar instead or to the north to the Xinjiang province. This is probably one of the least visited province by tourists, and going there is supposed to be like entering another country. Upon arrival here in Urumqi we noticed this. People look way different, all is in both Chinese and Arab, signs and stuff. It's way more like central Asia instead of the far east which comes to mind when thinking of China. It's quite weird being here, since we didn't plan it at all. Since my last post much happened...

The day after my last post (China trip part III) we set of for the imfamous Tiger Leaping Gorge. Although many travel agencies in Lijiang advertise for tours, we found some books at the Prague Cafe which had experiences of other people written down. It said that it's best (and cheapest) to just take the bus and go to a place called Qiaotou which marks the starting point for the hike. The hike can be down by two ways, the low and the high trail. The low trail is a paved road that leads just next to the Yangtze river, that flows between the two mountains. The high trail is higher up the mountain and has the better viewspots, but is also harder and a bit more dangerous than the low one. On that day we did just that. We took the bus at 8.30 am (we thought 7.30 at first so we were an hour early!) and headed for Qiaotou. Arriving there 3 hours later we got off just in front of a bar run by a woman named Margo. She gave us some information about the trail and because we didn't eat anything yet we asked her which the next point on the trail was to eat something. She told us this was only 2 hours later, so we went to a supermarked to by some simple stuff like cookies and crisps. We than started to walk. About 5 minutes, and basically just behind the corner, we came to a guesthouse run by Jane (so cleverly called Janes' guesthouse). Somewhere we read that Jane's often stoned, so we wondered if she was this time. Well, let's just say she might have been... It was strange to find it anyway since Margot told us there wouldn't be any place to eat. Jane was very nice but nobody was there at all, so from that point on we didn't like Margot. In the bus to Qiaotou we were joined by a bit annoying group of Americans, which made pour jokes and kept us from sleeping in that same bus. We found out later that they actually were walking with Margot herself (it didn't really surprise us) so probably booked a tour with her around the Gorge. Appart from all this disliking, the hike itself was absolutely amazing. It's hard to discribe the view (I posted some pictures by now so check them out!) if you haven't been there and witnessed it yourself. The trail started somewhat cheap and we found out that all the squash we played in Macau didn't really paid off as much as we wanted. We had a map with us which showed us that near the end of the first days hike, there would be a '28 bends' part that would lead us over a mountain and would top at around 2600 meter. At some point along the hike I thought we already arrived at the section, since we came across some bends and we had to climb already, but no, the hard part was yet to come. The bends reminded me a bit of climbing Mt. Kinabalu back in Malaysia, since it was as steap and also revealed my great *cough* physical condition I'm in. How happy I was when I could finally go downhill. The downhill part was also quite tricky but eventually after four hours we arrived at the Teahorse guesthouse which marked our stop for the first day. We were actually first appart from two Scottisch, but they weren't on our bus, so they don't count! We had a room for 1.50 each, and were able to wash our clothes there. That evening we sat around with the Scottisch and some French people. The next day we left last of everybody for the second part of the hike. For most people, this would be also be the last day, but we already decided we want to do an extra day and walk towards Daju, which is another 4 hours from the end of the Gorge.

The second day was much easier than the first one since there weren't any steap climbs. The trail was a good walk and the views just remained astonishing. For a mountain lover like me this was really fantastic. We came across a waterfall as well, which basically ran over the path and had to go 'through' it. (again, check the pictures!). In the end we had to climb down quite steaply to reach the point where the high and low trail come together again. This was at Tina's guesthouse. However we wanted to reach Sean's guesthouse to spend the night there. From Tina it was another 3 km to Sean's we found out. This was a easy part since it was a paved road and flat, so it was nice to walk. We reached Sean's at around 3 pm and sat down to decide what's next. It was still early and it isn't dark untill 8.30 pm so we played with the thought of just going all the way to Daju, spend the night there and take the morning bus back to Lijiang. We came across Margot again and ask about the possibility to do this. She said it was possible. We had to cross the river first to reach Daju, and Margot assured us we could catch the ferry and sleep at the other side. So we decided to chill out at Sean's, have a drink and lunch and start walking at 4 pm again. And so we did. We had the map and saw on it we had to follow a certain trail to reach the ferry. We walked for almost two hours when we came at a guesthouse where we drank something, before going further. The road was at first straight and than made a bend to the left. Just after the bend (according to the map) we had to take a smaller road off the main road which would lead us straight to the ferry. A road looking like this was there and I was convinced we had to take it. However on the main road red arrows were pointed a different direction towards the ferry. I was confused, but ofcourse we followed them at first, I guess the map would be wrong. I played with the tought that one funny Chinese put the arrows there. At the end of the road the arrows pointed to a guesthouse where a man who didn't speak English at all told us the ferry was closed and we should stay at his guesthouse. I immediately thought he put the arrows there so that people like us would end up at his place. I was also convinced that the ferry was still open since Margot assured us we could catch it easily. We were at the guys place at 6.30 pm and he said the ferry was closed at 6 pm. I didn't believe him at all and after he didn't give us information on how to get to the ferry and went furious, and basically told him to fuck off. I now thought that we did had to follow the map and had to take the road we saw earlier. At that point it made perfect sense to me. We went back down and Jamie couldn't do much but follow. When we entered the road, multiple people were warning us we shouldn't go that way, but stuborn as I was I did it anyway. Eventually I found out the path didn't lead us anywhere we decided to head back to the guesthouse to stay the night there and search for the ferry the next morning. I was still angry and the man at the other guesthouse, for misleading us with his arrows. We were dead tired when we came back and I soon found out the ferry actually did close at 6 pm. I basically came to me that Margot misinformed us and that the guy was only trying to help. I felt really guilty for what I did and Jamie wrote an apology in Chinese and we decided to go back the next morning, and give him the letter together with some Dutch clogs, we are giving out to people who are friendly and help us as a thank you. The next morning we set off at 9 am to find he wasn't there. A woman however accepted the letter and gave us something to drink. I guess it was his wife. After that we paid her for the drinks and she offered to show us the way to the ferry. She brought us to the good direction. For this I gave her some cash. We went further down the road, but the road became less and less clear. Eventually it became a very steap road down which ended up at the river bank near where the ferry would pick us up. The ferry brought us to the other side (seeing the river from this point was also amazing, it makes you feel really tiny) where had to climb up the cliff as steap as we had to climb down previously. I was very sweaty when reaching the top. There was a guesthouse there and we asked whether we could take the bus somewhere. To our surprise the lady told us there wasn't any bus going today! Great, now what. We decided to walk to the nearest village where another guesthouse was. Some other hikers where there already and they said we should talk to the owner and see if he could do anything. He said he had a minivan and would bring us back to Lijiang for 24 euros in total, so 12 each. This was quite a lot and he recommended us to wait if more people would show up to share the costs. We had to get back to Lijiang that day since we at that point still were unsure about when we would go to Tibet (if only we knew...). We already accepted we had to pay the money when to people showed up. One French and one American. I explained the situation to them and we agreed to share the costs. We actually managed to bargain down to 20 euros, so 5 each. None of us were really convinced that there truly wasn't any buses going to Lijiang that day, so we asked him if he could bring us to Daju to the bus station so we could look ourselves. So he did and there he quickly started talking to the people from the ticket office, and yes, the told us there was no bus going. This looking really suspicious but there was nothing we could do but accept the 20 euro and he brought us back. We arrived back in Lijiang at 3 pm. We went back to our first hostel to collect our backpacks (we only took a small bag each for the hike) and see if they still would have a room for us. They didn't so we found another one. It was good to have a shower there since we both smelled really bad after all that happened. I then called David (our contact in Lijiang for the Tibet trip) to find out when we could leave. He then said they had some problems and it could be delayed a few days...

That evening we slowly started to think about alternatives if the delay would actually be longer than the 10th of July, the last day we pinned down as a possibility to leave. We thought of going to Myanmar or the desert in the north. A well, first we had to know for sure we couldn't go, we still had high hopes at that point. The next we planned as a do-nothing day and we just had slept long and had breakfast and strolled around a bit. Getting a bit bored, I called David again to see how things are and if he had any tips on what to do in the neighbourhood. However, he told me about the extra month before. The rest I basically mentioned in the introduction. We got our deposit back and ran off to an internet cafe to see that we could do instead. We found our Myanmar would be difficult, but found a flight from Kunming to Urumqi that would cost us 150 euros. We now have saved some money from the Tibet trip so we could afford it. We went to a travel agency and booked a bus for the next day to Kunming. We also booked a flight for the day after to Urumqi the day after (the 9th of July). We were happy we did this, it was quite impulsive, but we needed it after the Tibet deception. That eveving we didn't do much. We went to some bars to watch Chinese dance (they dance really stupid, which was quite entertaining for us). At one point we were also forced to dance with them. It wasn't that much fun but they thought it was a great thing to happen that evening... ah well...

The next day we woke up early to catch the 8.30 am bus to Kunming. It took 9 hours in total to arrive, which we did around 5.30 pm the same day. We took a taxi to a hostel recommended by lonely planet and after dropping our backpacks we went off to a bookstore to buy some more books. I bought the third Harry Potter (by then I already finished the first one and was well into the second) and Jamie bought the Davinci Code. We then ate something at a pizzeria (very good pizza this time) and went back to hostel. We read something and went to sleep. The next morning (this morning actually) we woke up at around 8.30 to catch a taxi around 9 to the airport. We had the flight at 10.30 am. The flight took us in total 6 hours since it also made a stopover at Xian. We reached Urumqi by 5.30 pm and took a taxi straight to the train station. The station was filled with people. It was really chaotic. Right when it was our turn to purchase tickets to Kashgar (we wanted to go the next day as early as possible) they closed the counter! I couldn't believe it! We had to go back into another line. We had been waiting for a while already and no way I wanted to go all the way to the back of another line. One problem though, no-one spoke English what so ever. I was quite mad and Jamie went back to another line to secure our spot anyway. I tried to explain to the guards there that I was already standing in front of another line and I think eventually they understood what I ment, because I could go in front of another line. One Chinese that could speak a bit of English came to my aid and explained the guard that I wanted to purchase two tickets to Kashgar. However I found out all trains are full for the next two days. Disapointed I went back to Jamie and told her the bad news. We decided to check out how much a flight would be. At the China Southern Airlines companies office we found out the flight would only be 17 euros more then the train at 50 euros in total. We could also take one at 8.55 the next morning and we decided to do this instantly. And now I am here, in an hostel typing this story. We will leave for Kashgar tomorrow morning. I am quite tired now and will finish here...

thank you, bye bye!

Pictures!

Finally! I found a place which allows me to upload photos. I just finished updating them and updated the Lijiang, Dali, Kunming and Guilin (which actually wasn't in Guilin itself, as you should know!). I came back today from the three-day hike along the Tiger Leaping Gorge. It was very tiring, but it was also absolutely amazing! I am quite tired now and it took me a while to upload all the pictures, so I'll post the complete story maybe in a few days time. Check out the pictures from the hike if you like. They are stored under the Lijiang section. All photos can be viewed when clicking photo album at the link section of this page. Enjoy!

Still in Lijiang (China trip part III)

Still in Lijiang and it's now three days later (or is it four?). I am sort of losing track of time on this trip and just found out today that it's actually tuesday. The last three days been really cool. The first day after arrival (so since my last post), we basically didn't do much. We just strolled around the city to see what it's all about. It's a very nice looking city and lookes especially great at night. However it is very touristy although you won't find that much westeners. Most of the tourists are Chinese Han people, ofcourse joined together in various groups with their tourguides holding up the flags up front. It quite a funny site and the Chinese really don't understand they look like sheep.

As I said the first day we didn't do much but walk around. The city is full of (actually there are nothing but) souvenir shops and bars. We basically explored them and made reservations to have dinner at 'monkey bar' which has a refference in the Lonely Planet. The idea is to eat with a family and pay 15 RMB (1.50 in euros). What you get for dinner is whatever there is on the market that day. That evening we got there at 6.30 pm to start the dinner. We met a American couple, wel a guy from Atlanta who is married to a woman from Kashmir. It was quite an interesting conversation that ofcourse ended up being quite policital. It's kinda hard not to mention Bush at some point... The host itself was very silent so we didn't get much out of him. The food however was really delicious, and cheap, so it was certainly something to do while being here. That evening we checked out some bars to find drunken Chinese. From previous experience we know that this type of Chinese are of the funiest kind, and on itself a guarantee for a good evening. We found them in some bars but not all, so the evening was so-so.
The next day we went cycling again. First we went to the Black Dragon Pool park which has some beautiful Chinese architecture. It's famous for both that and it's pool (hence the name). However the pool was almost dried up, so it left a muddy residue. It wasn't even half as nice as the pictures ofcourse but there was plenty other stuff to make up for it. One of those things was the Dongba Research Institute that tries to keep the local ancient Dongba culture alive, through means of giving classes and teaching people the rituals of the culture such as the writing language which is unique from any other. We got a small lecture from one of the students, which revealed to us that there are nowadays only 20 Dongba people left, eight of which are connected to the institute. After the whole park thing we went on our way to a local village which is called Baisha. It was recommended by Lonely Planet as well. We are now starting to find out, however, that most things that are recommended in LP are either full of tourists, or have seen large amounts of tourists in the past so that it is now not full of them anymore, but filled with shops selling all the same stuff. As I mentioned before, Chinese are quite blinded by money and if one concept (or shop for that matter) proves that it appeals to tourists, they don't think much but copy it right away. This can spoil cities, Lijiang still has its old town appeal, but Baisha is just a simple village that basically ruined itself with it shops that by the looks of it don't make much money. By the time we reached the city heavy rain poored down so we were stuck there for 2.5 hours. After that my bike broke down so I had to go back to get it fixed. We reached Lijiang at around 7.30 pm. We took it easy that day and I finish my book, to finally start with Harry Potter. I wanna see where all the fuzz is about. I've seen the first movie, which didn't impress me, but I must say that the book's off to a good start. We'll see...

The third day, so today, we had breakfast at the 'Prague Cafe' where we were approached by a woman offering a one day tour around the neighbourhood, promising no other tourists and secluded placed where no other tour would bring us. In that same cafe there are books to be found where other peoples experiences are bundled and we read before that these tours from the woman that approached us, are in fact quite famous and bring the experience they promise. So we decided to do that. Around 10 we set off and by minibus we first travelled to... well I don't know... somewhere. The area showed us small Naxi villages (the type of people in this region of the Yunnan province or from the Naxi kind and there architecture bear a lot of similarities, hence, all villages basically look more or less the same) and lot of farmland that is mostly used for growing potatoes, we learned. Eventually we reached a certain village and went out of the minivan to have a small walk around the area. Soon we reached a small lake where a few men where fishing and the guide suggested to buy some fish and go to a Naxi families house to either bbq, fry or boil it. Ofcourse I voted for bbq, since I haven't had a good one for ages. we had 3.5 kilos of freshly cought fish (it was still alive, even after the removal of its insights and thrown on the bbq) that costed us 30 RMB, 3 euros! The house we went to was like a prehistorical house with no electricity and everything in one room. Although primitive, all things were cleverly placed and the way they make food is maybe the best way. Basically everything is barbeque, or cooked over a fire which was in the middle of the room. It is quite hard to explain this, so I made some pictures to illustrate this. Same story, uploading them hasn't worked yet, but I'll make an attempt after finishing this story. Besides the bbq we also had some rice and baked vegatables mixed with pieces of ham. The lunch(!) was really good and filling. After an hour or two we left again. It was now already 4 pm. We headed for some more villages, where we were around 5.30 pm till 7 pm, and noticed that that was the time most farmers quite there work to play either mayong (men) or some card game (woman). We stood watching a card game by old woman for about 10 minutes. The old woman where really hilarious (to see a movie of this visit Jamies website jamieroundtheworld.com). We were told that the woman where at least 80 years of age. Although they looked very old by appearance, the were behaving very 'young'. Appearantly people in these villages reach a very high age, I really wonder what their secret is. I assume this is mainly because a healthy lifestyle (not being in contact with alcohol or other 'unhealthy' stuff) and a lot of physical excersize, in the form of labour on the lands. They all still work hard everyday. By this time I really had to think at what 80+ people do in western countries, such as the Netherlands... hmm.
We came back to Lijiang this evening around 7 pm and ate at KFC (for shame, I know) The plans are to go hiking for three days starting tomorrow at the infamous Tiger Leaping Gorge, which according to many (reliable) sources should be amazing. We also found out that we will be accompanied by to men at our trip to tibet, which will be shortly after we come back to Lijiang. This basically ends my story here. I will probably go online one time before going to Tibet to update on the hike and perhaps update some pictures.

For now, thank you, bye bye!