Yin Peng Hotel Emeishan

... Shan veut dire montagne. Alors nous commencons l'ascension de l'Emei Shan, cette place mystique. J'y aurai evidemment pris les photos les plus intenses de tout mon voyage. Je ne savais pas a quoi m'attendre, cette aventure etant ma premiere escalade d'une grosse montagne. Cela allait s'averer etre plus difficile que n'importe qui du groupe aurait pu s'imaginer. Comme comparaison, allez dans un gym, embarquez sur le stairmaster 3000, et activez le a intensite moyenne a ...

... the hike. Our starting point was 500 m elevation, the summit was over 3,000 m. All up about a million stone steps. The weather turned out to be great for us and we saw some amazing scenery. We made it to Jiejin just below the base and stayed at a Buddhist Monastery. Really cool. It has a different feel as you walk to your room through dark hallways and the smell of incense.

... 3000m n.m. nad okolni mracna. Diky lanovce se to tam jen hemzilo skupinkami nasledujicimi leadry s praporky a megafony. Nastesti je areal dost rozsahly, takze to nebylo tolik obtezujici. Na hore stoji tri chramy - zlaty, stribrny a bronzovy. Navic se zde nachazi obrovska socha jednoho z Buddhistickych posvatnych muzu na hrbete slona s tremi pary klu - diky jeho pobytu se hora stala posvatnym buddhistickym mistem.

Trochu jsme si odpocali, vse prohledli, vyfotili a ...

... for the change was the sharp turns on the road up but I you couldn't tell from the way these guys drive. It was a wild knuckled race as the fully loaded buses jockeyed for position all the way up. We found out that we lost a couple rooms at the top hotel to government officials. Apparently our group of 162 has been tracked fairly closely since we entered the country which is kind of interesting. The drive up brought us from approx 1100 feet to about 8300 ...

... and a cold rain was drizzling. Feeling a little ill from the early start we resumed the ascent. There was no enthusiasm, we pushed on because we felt we had to. My legs were aching from the previous day and my clothes (I hadn't packed enough) were still soaked in sweat. Leaning heavilly on our trusty bamboo sticks we pushed through the fog. I had already planned what I was going to write once we reached ...

... we were both drenched in sweat.

The path broke away from the stream and began to wind its way up the valley side. After an hour of walking we found ourselves in a clearing. To the right we could see down into the valley, although now the the valley floor was hidden by mist. To our left, a series of stone steps led up to a Buddhist temple. Through the open double doors we could see huge incense sticks burning, and large golden ...

Tottaly forgot about the Panda's in Chengdu Muchos Respect now for the Panda They have been around longer then Man They have only ever been found in China They spend half the day Eating , the other half Sleeping There are less then 2,000 panda's left in the world today They are Damn Cute! CHECK OUT PICS AT MY FACEBOOK - http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id ...

... due to the language barrier but they were so sweet and let us sit on their bottom bunks and helped me buy some noodles when the noodle man didn't understand me...through the sea of chinese faces we spotted a french chappie called Pierre and played cards and had good chat...we took the mick out of his french accent...he made fun of the english ("ooo I need a cup of tea" and such like)...very funny! We finally made it to Chengdu and ...

... your respective boys/girls rooms where you hand your outsides shoes over for some sandals (see? it worked out!) then enter a locker room full of naked chinese women. It was a little of a woah, and I was super glad I decided to change before I left. I put my shirt in my locker that unlocked with a nice magnet electronic lock thing and was handed a warm towel. Then me and the other two girls headed down the stairs past the showers, toilets, and feet cleanser area out to the pool ...

... Temple in the abundantly green mountains. It was a fantastic view from up there. When arriving at the top we visited the temple and monastery. The monks had their own vegetarian restaurant way up in the mountains and a different style bathroom to boot. It was interesting to see their way of life. Rachel had also done some great research on this area and had heard about a Duo Bridge area that was a much further walk then what the guide had originally proposed. He ...