Qianyang Chengde

... the last time I had done it was last summer in China - before that was many, many years. But, lucky me, I didn't get killed by a truck, just rode, eyes plastered on the road ten feet in front of me, and my skin pale and clenching tightly to the lifeline of the handlebars.

We biked for about an hour, far off the main highway through small farming and factory villages, past a field full of goats and along a meandering river. The destination, I ...

... me very much of a natural rock pillar close to my hometown (Stein's Pillar). Past the entrance to the park, we paid to take a lift over the hills and up close to the peak. The lift-ride itself was very nice and quite long so I had time to take many pictures of the city.

At the top we were greeted with the usual mob of vendors trying to make a buck from the 'rich-white boy'. The peak itself ...

... more like trail-mates as we wended our way together along the ancient bastion.


Although it's only a distance of about thirteen km from Jinshanling to Simatai, the walk takes nearly four sweaty hours as the trail is extremely steep in places and, at times, the crumbling stonework requires careful footwork. It was nearly 10.30 when I set off and the mist, which I had hoped would burn off, showed no signs of rising ...

... 20+ story apartment buildings and busy market streets and department stores. Even small towns in China have a way of becoming quite busy and prosperous compared to my quite 'villages' back home in Oregon.

The many family lunches and dinners aside, I'll just list off some of the most memorable experiences and let the soon to be posted pictures do more talking.

The day after ...

... at times (damn that papparazzi). The attention is all very friendly, with cries of 'hello!' frequently following us down the street - we've never felt the least bit threatened or unsafe here.

Indeed, crossing the road in the cities is probably the most hazardous activity we've been undertaking lately - pedestrian crossings are provided typically at junctions where four roads with five or six lanes in each direction meet, so the perilous ...

... was spectacular.

It is possible to walk from Putuozongcheng Temple to some of the other temples. It is 1 km to Xumi Puzhou temple, another massive temple or around 7km to Puning temple. Just be wary of the passing car and bicycle. Or you could just catch a bus to the junction of Puning lu and Huangcheng Beilu and catch bus no 6 to the north of Puning Lu.

Puning temple of the home of the massive statue ot Guanyin, the Goddess of ...

... sva seveda morala obiskati se eno naj naj stvar na svetu, ki je kot po nakljucju zopet na Kitajskem. V enem iz med sosednjih templjev namrec domuje najvecji leseni kip na svetu, ki v visino meri vec kot 22. metrov in ima 42 rok ter ostale budisticne rekvizite. Zal je kip mogoce obcudovati le iz zabje perspektive in se tako ob njem pocutiti se manjsega kot v resnici smo. Ob vseh nastetih zgodovinskih znamenitosti mnogi ...

... the small town we hoped for. Getting to the train station we were accosted by ladies offering a few nights in a Mongolian yurt. Not for us - only for tourists we thought, we have our trusty Youth Hostel - which are very good here by the way. We got to the youth hostel, which in the meantime from the address card being printed to us visiting had turned into a 4 star hotel - things move fast in China! The taxi man didn't speak ...

This was brilliant. We left our hotel in Beijing and drove for 3 hours northeast of Beijing to get to a place called Jinshanling. We were dropped off here and the bus went off with our big bags to Simatai where we would meet it. Again it was very cold -1 or so. When we started walking we were joined by around 16 locals who would follow us a certain part of the way and try and sell us stuff along the way. They divided themselves up so that each of them was ...

... his wife. Some people earlier at one of the Temples wanted to have their photo taken with the token blonde English woman which I thought was nice. But since then, she was told she was beautiful by the costumed entrance person at the theatre and again but the doorman at the hotel. Extended visas will be applied for soon as well as new makeup to cover the glowing cheeks. Tomorrow is going to be a long travelling day. We start with ...