Sunshine Hostel Shangri-La

... back to the hostel around 8pm & went & sat in the community room next to the wood stove & had a hot chocolate. Nice!!!! Caught up with Wolfgang & Alison who arrived from Haba today. Also met 3 other aussie girls & hung out with them for awhile. Good fun!! My bed was so comfy & had a huge doona - can see a good nights sleep coming!

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... and the small cafees on every corner. The old city was full of small shops that sold tibetian jewellery, and every night about 19-20 there was a big ring dance on the square. Since the weather was so nice we descided to go up to see the the sunset by the Ganden Sumtseling Gompa (temple), when arriving we discovered that ther was an enterance fee of 85 RMB! We went up anyway and it was surely a nice place, but we have seen more beautiful temples for free. The sunset wasn't that ...

... historically, with Lhasa, which is a few hundred miles to the west, than with Beijing, thousands of miles to the east. Its bid for tourism reflects that heritage. The otherwise drab concrete facades of Shangri-La's main street have been given a Tibetan face-lift with painted window and door frames, faux stone siding and ornamental parapets. And a Tibetan village on the road to Pudacuo park has been turned into a living history museum with homes, a silversmith ...

... including the turn off for Tiger Leaping Gorge which promises to be amazing. Then it's into flatter land and suddenly Tibetan houese are everwhere. They're different to the other houses in Yunnan we've seen, for a start they're huge and imposing - they stand alond and have 3 storeys, with a high walled courtyard making it look like a mini fortress. On the side facing into the courtyard the house has a wooden balcony on the first floor and this is where ...

... from our friends in Deqin. We walked the Old Town for over an hour looking for this restaurant but could not find it. We later found out we walked right by it 3 times as the name of the place does nothing to imply that it is an Indian restaurant. But we had yak curry and yak noodles at a different place and it was quite good. As were the big beers. We read for awhile in the common room at Kevin's and then went to bed. The next morning we were headed to Tiger Leaping Gorge!

Zhongdian es parte del Tibet y un pequeno paraiso ya descrito en una novela, "The Lost Horizont", bajo el nombre de Shangri-la. Alberga a la etnia Bai, con sus propias costumbres, ropas, etc. Decidimos no participar en actividades y simplemente disfrutar del lugar, que ya es uno de nuestros favoritos. El ritmo de vida es muy lento y relajado, las calles y casas son muy antiguas, los monjes no se dejan ver mucho pero hay un templo y las ...

... refreshment/picture oppertunity so we all bundled out and entered the grounds. The views were fantastic but my attention wasnt on the views or the temple as i spotted a really beautiful green plant that i had never seen grow in the wild before.. :) anyway... It wasnt long before we set off again, target destination: Qiaotou. When we arrived we all got out of our respective vans and were instructed to buy our park entry tickets, which we did but as we doing so a older ...

... The first part of the trip worked its way past the same area as we went to Tiger Leaping Gorge, except this time at a convenient toilet stop we were able to buy some of the strawberries being sold along the roadside. They were delicious. Probably even more so since it had been quite some time we had eaten whole strawberries. Further on, the bus passed under a construction site - it was a dam being constructed - scaffolding supporting the roof above. Yes, a little scary ...