One Mile (Plus) High and Rising

Trip Start Oct 24, 2005
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Trip End Ongoing


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Sunday, January 21, 2007

We boarded the train in Chengdu around 4:00 and settled in for the night. All in all, it was actually one of the better train rides we'd taken, but... Konrad didn't sleep at all. Not a good start to a long twenty-four hours of traveling. We arrived in complete blackness to Panzhihua shortly after 5:30 AM. Panzhihua (pronounced Pan-gee-wa) is a mining town, through and through - even in the darkness this was apparent by the fire in the sky. We had the option of taking a bus directly to Lijiang, our next stop, but we didn't want to wait another hour and a half plus. Instead, we hopped on a city bus to the Panzhihua bus station. Unfortunately, the conductor was a bit of a scam artist and tried overcharging us. This, coupled with our recent sentiments about China, sent me over the edge, and I became rather aggressive. He stopped harassing us, and after about forty-five minutes, we arrived at the city bus station. It was closed, of course, but it did open shortly thereafter, and we went inside and waited in line Arbor
Arbor
 . My aggressive streak continued: I'd had enough of line budgers and rude smokers, and I let them know it. I shoved the line jumpers out of the way and shouted at the smokers. Not a good attitude, I know.... We got our tickets without being bludgeoned by anyone and hopped on the bus.

It was still dark for another hour (or more), but once the sun came up, we were treated to some gorgeous scenery: burnt sienna canyons, kelly green valleys, and whitewater rapids (some tainted with mine run-off, but...). The bus ride took eight hours, winding through the mountains, up and down, inhaling massive amounts of second-hand smoke (thank you bandana!), and tuning out the vomiting passengers with the new iPod (apparently, the Chinese are fairly prone to motion-sickness). Once in Lijiang, we mis-negotiated our way and ended up walking the long way (aka: around and then back again) to the city's old town. After an hour and a half of checking out the hotels in the area, we settled on a room without windows or heat; the options in town seemed to be either cold and cheap or heated but very expensive. Konrad, who hadn't slept in more than thirty-six hours, grabbed some z's, and I tried not to freeze to death. This task became even more arduous after showering - the water was warm, but once I got out, icicles started to form on my body.

After thawing out a little bit, we went in search of a restaurant (it had been two full days since our last meal that didn't consist of granola or bread). As luck would have it, we stumbled upon a restaurant packed with locals (always a good sign) that had loads of cheap veggie options. Sold! We sat down, ordered, and within three minutes, our food was on the table - not typically a good thing Baisha - Alley
Baisha - Alley
 . No, despite our first impressions, the food was awful, so we left it and continued our search. This time, we happened upon an excellent Tibetan restaurant where we dined on steamed momos (similar to dumplings) and Tibetan-style potatoes. We went back to our little igloo and huddled together for warmth. The next morning, we decided to pay the extra bucks (100Y more! About $13 - over 100% the cost of the room without heat) to move to a room with heat.

We spent the next day exploring the town. Lijiang, situated in a valley more than a mile high in the mountains, is divided into two towns: the old town, which is pedestrian-only, paved with cobblestones, criss-crossed by canals, and full of beautifully constructed wooden buildings; and the new town, which is your typical city and is built around the old town. Lijiang is a huge tourist destination (mainly for domestic tourists), and deservedly so: it's very scenic and surrounded by beautiful countryside biking destinations. One of the main reasons tourists flock to this valley town is to get closer to the large number of minority groups in the area. The largest of these is the Naxi, a very interesting group. The Naxi are a matriarchal society, so the women hold all the power. They also do all the work, but they control all the money, own all the property, etc., so it's not such a bad deal for them. The Naxi are also the only people in the world who still use a hieroglyphic written language. We were treated to a little slice of traditional Naxi life when we traveled to Baisha, a small town about ten kilometers outside of Lijiang. We took a bus out to the town (on which I was puked on by a kid in front of me) and walked back to Lijiang. In Baisha, we witnessed a large group of Naxi women doing something similar to a pom-pom routine using red cloths with bells sewn onto them.

We had been traveling much slower than we initially anticipated, so we knew we had to pick up the pace and couldn't stay in Lijiang forever (already we were sure we'd have to extend our visas). While in Lijiang, we were treated to some delicious cuisine (the goat cheese here is a bit different than typical feta and is quite tasty) and lovely scenery (lots of pretty mountains circling the valley). Nonetheless, after a mere three days, we decided it was time to head north, to the so-called Shangri-La, paradise on Earth.
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