Zha Xi De Le Hotel Shangri La Shangri-La

... house. which has 2 dogs! yesssss.
we walked in the old town for a bit today, everything is really interesting, Tibetan culture is so different from anything Ive seen before, most of the people are dressed in traditional clothing and the mini shops are selling interesting bits and bobs. everything looks like its from little dorit we went to walk in the outskirts of the town ...

We got up early because we would be walking round two lakes today and we needed as much time as possible, early sighns didnt look good however as the place we were to meet the driver was closed and when we called the owner he said he was in bed. The driver arrived 15 minutes later, we spent the time watching the locals set up their stalls in the usually busy square street.

On the way to the lakes the driver told us we would need warmer clothes so we ...

... 1502;זכיר את חואנג לונג שנמצא בסצ'וא
503;, גם שם היו עשרות בריכו 14; באותה תצורה של סידן. אבל פה, נר ...

... Caragh bought the CD!?) and to watch everyone in town join in. Another highlight was the Shangri-La Yak Cheese Shop. We'd tried Yak cheese as part of a Naxi breakfast in Lijiang and didn't think much of it; the Shangri-La Yak Cheese Shop confirmed that cheese as 'young' Yak cheese. 'Old' Yak cheese is infinitely better and we enjoyed a plate of it with crackers and a glass of Yunnan red wine. We were tempted to buy a small round ...

... ng Zhèn), the capital of the county.

so this place was better than lijiang and a lot less touristy but still couldnt see mountains around us because of the rain. elevation is 9600 i think. we would soon find out that shangri-la is really a town called deqin which is right on the border of tibet and north of ...

... of uneaten food, and a handful of beers before we decided our first choice of restaurant was not worthy. We finally found ourselves some good food and drinks at a local Tibetan restaurant and then hit a Chinese disco so Lindsay could rip up the dance floor. After our long day of hiking, a few drinks was all we could handle and we were packed into Mama's hostel before 10pm.... awaiting another early morning bus ride to our next destination.....

... porridge and soon after we began our second day trek which thankfully was not as challenging as the previous day we soon made good time and arrived at Tina's in time for lunch when the weather turned for the worse and rain belted it down, fog and mist arose from nowhere. With 3 hours to the rock where the tiger leaped from we decided to call it a day and negotiate a price for a car to take us all to Zongdian otherwise known as Shangri-la.

After our journey down the tourist route of China we set off on the Tibet-Sichuan highway, a road only opened to foreigners in the past few years. Before we left Chengdu we had 2 uniquely Chinese experiences. We went to see the 'national treasure,' the giant panda, which despite looking impressive is arguably the most inept animal in the world. The women only get broody once a year and the men have one of the weakest sex drives of all animals; even when they do ...

... Lijiang which is like tourist town on steroids. We spent the afternoon walking around the big monastery there. It was full of monks of all ages, with lots of temples, and chanting going on. We ended up talking to a couple of monks, they all thought I was the guys translator. We met a really old monk that had such a thick accent no one could understand him. No hard feat for me.

... only yeilded more brothels not a pub in the town, so back to the hostel for a pint. Walked for two days in the tiger leaping gourge. It really beutiful and the deepest in China, really deep. Slept in a guest house on the trail mid way and at the end so no roughing it necessary. The trail runs high above the tourist busses which crowd the lower route, on the second day we decended all the way to the river, which is really powerfull and impresive, kinda cool.