Chambre D'Hote Asstee Lijiang

... for identification purposes and, quite often, the group members wear identical coloured base-ball caps. The colour coding is essential owing to the number of tour groups. And the photo stops could easily lose a tourist or two. The Chinese love the photo opportunity and will pose in front of every monument or historical feature. It is not enough to shoot the waterfall, there must be a family member artistically positioned in front of it. They are not at all self ...

... Through a Gorge in Yunnan

... 3pm and stopped at Sean's Guesthouse where I met up with Chris who had taken a minibus directly to Sean's.
http://www.tigerleapinggorge .com/
I didn't like Tina's, as it is a huge modern building directly on the street. There was nothing local or romantic about this guesthouse. Sean's is a comfy place, each dorm bed has a teddy bear on its pillows. And, you cant' beat 20RMB and a happy hour from 4-8pm. ;-)

I left the next day ...

... cards or chess, women drawing water from the well or streams with buckets, washing their clothes in the stream.

Lijiang has been the base of Naxi minority for the last 1400 years!. Naxi women wear blue blouses & trousers covered by blue or black apron. The t shaped apron they ...

Xi had decided that hourses where a good idea for today and when I reminded her about my problem with hourses she assured me that this would be nothing more than a casual strole, when we were 20 minutes up a mountain she told me that she may have been wrong! Still, this was different from last time, the path wasnt rocky but lead through a mountain side of pine trees. my hourse wasnt scared of bags and wasn't interested in my feet at all! We had several stops for ...

... door handles, the Mao hats that were for sale, but did not buy anything. Honestly it is just too exhausting sometimes. You can not just inquire about the price without entering into a negotiation. I am just curious, I really don't want to carry more things around from place to place! I like price tags, it makes life easier! I saw Dr Ho's office, but did not go in (famous Taoist physician). I did not seen any frescos or temples that are supposed to be ...

... where we had a hilarious time trying to order lunch with a menu and waiters who only communicated in Chinese! Eventually Mike found someone dining in the restaurant who could help us and we ate a pleasant meal before heading off to look at the gorge. It was a 1 hour return walk along the cliff face with the path mostly dug into the side of the cliff ...

... the air when we went over them. This stopped any kind of book reading in its tracks so I was forced to watch the countryside going by. In some parts the countryside could have been in the UK, complete with polytunnels for strawberries. Most of the villages we past through looked pretty poor but unlike Laos or Cambodia there was power and phone lines everywhere and very little garbage piled up. The bus took 3.5 hours and then it pulled over at the Tiger ...

Yes, a place called "Tiger Leaping Gorge." This is why we come to China, to visit something called "Tiger Leaping Gorge!" We can pretend we are in a wuxia pian/ kung fu movie. Actually, this Gorge is the beginning of the Yangtze River. Nathan wasn't feeling too well, so I headed off on my own. I was on a tour bus ...

... disappeared with the flooding. However, eventually we were driving alongside the river and made our way to Qiaotou. Accosted by men trying to get us a taxi, drive us to the gorge, or get us a horse for our trek simply washed over us and we walked up the road to a guest house run by an Aussie lady. We were inches from the rusking of the river, with stunning mountains as a backdrop - an awesome sight!! What made ...