Sichuan Mountains

  Xiangchen, China
Tuesday, August 14, 2007

Road out of Xiangchen

When, at a quarter to seven in the morning, on my way to the bus station through deserted Zhongdian, my cab driver hits and kills a dog and I thought to myself, "Self, this could be a bad omen." 

Luckily everything went perfectly from that point on.  Despite confusion two days earlier, there seemed to be no problem getting a bus ticket from Zhongdian through the mountain passes to Xiangchen.  The bus driver did make every pay another 20 yuan because he had to divert another 100 km around a major landslide, but that is minor really.  Especially once we got on the road and I realized the 9 hour route along mountain precipes and gorges from Zhongdian to Xiangchen was essentially one continuous rock and land slide interupted by occasional sections of pavement.

The scenery along that drive tops anything I have yet seen in China.  Every kilometer of the drive followed some raging river or creek along a spindly road perched precarioulsy on a cliff.  Occasionally we spotted Tibetan homes and communities nestled next to rivers or in pine tree laden canyons or along ridges above or below us.  I stared out the window in wonder for 9 hours.  The drive from Xiangchen to Litang, where I sit now, had similar spell binding scenery.  The views top anything in the Sierras, Ireland, or Mongolia. 

Both yesterday and today I couldn't help mapping out a kayak line through every river and creek I saw.  This is a whitewater paradise, especially right now with all this rain, and I have seen no evidence of any boaters anywhere. 

[Side note, a Tibetan boy, must be about 8, is poking me in the shoulder and wants to participate in my typing here.  If only I could speak Tibetan.  We're enjoying yammering at each other in two separate languages but there's zero understanding.  Well, ok, we did just communicate, "Mei Guo?  Dui, wo shi mei guo ren".  Oh! Now he wants to listen to my iPod.  And the similarities between Mongolians and Tibetans grows by one more.  So, I write this remaining paragraph with an 8-year old Tibetan boy sitting to my right staring at the screen, smiling, banging away at his keyboard (which isn't on), and listening to Marley's, 'I Shot the Sheriff' with me :).]

Detail of wall in room

In Xiangchen (4000 m, 13000 ft), I stayed with three Irish students and a Swiss and another Finnish guy in a Tibetan guest house.  Every one of us nearly fell over and we all exlaimed, "Wow!" when we stepped into the dorm room covered top to bottom in intricate wood carvings painted intricately in bright blue, green, white, red, and orange.  I fell asleep staring at the wall contemplating how many years it must have taken to have carved and decorated that dorm room.  It was, by far, without question, the nicest room I have stayed in while in China.  And it cost me18 yuan ($2.50).