9 Dragons, 7 Stars, and a Moon
Trip Start
Sep 17, 2007
1
117
272
Trip End
Oct 08, 2008
Longsheng,
China
Saturday, February 23, 2008
Bus stations are all slightly more challenging than train stations here in China (and buses are more expensive than trains...go figure). We found the buses pretty quickly, but one never knows whether one buys a ticket on the bus or goes to the ticket window. If it's the latter, which in our case it was, one has to find said window. This provided a bit of a challenge for us, as the gate for the buses to leave was not really in the same place as the ticket counters
Ping'an
. I tried to order tickets from some random guy. We finally got the tickets and climbed on the fancy bus. They gave us free waters and newspapers. Once in Longsheng we were supposed to find a bus to Ping'an. This was supposed to be easy. It wasn't. The ticket counter didn't sell tickets to the place, so we had to start asking bus people which bus to get on. I was not a happy bunny at this point because it's pretty challenging to find someone to ask when everyone is wearing civillian clothes. People kept pointing in an "around and back" motion, so that's where we went. But it looked like that was where all the buses parked. Parked buses generally aren't the ones we want. Finally we found a woman who took us to a man who ended up driving us later but at this point took us to another bus outside the bus station. So if you want to go to Ping'an, which also goes by some other name, all you need to do is walk out the bus station's road until you come to the main street, turn left, and when the road forks take the road that curves up and to the right. There's a huge sign that says (in English) that the bus goes to all the places you want to visit along the terraces.
That's right, I haven't mentioned yet WHY we're going to Longsheng/Ping'an. Ping'an, home to three minority groups, is also home to the wildly impressive farming feat of engineering, the Dragon's Backbone rice terraces
drying corn
. Now, we've seen rice terraces, but we've never seen them like this. Lucky for us, the terraces are absolutely beautiful 11 of 12 months of the year, and we were there on the 12th month. So the terraces were mostly a dead brown color, but that doesn't make them less awesome!So, back on the bus, we arrive at the town of Heping, where we had a little rest stop. The stop turned into everyone piling out of our bus and getting into the other bus that arrived, which was conducted by the man who led us to the bus in the first place. If he was going, why didn't he just put us on his bus? China is full of mysteries. I got green bananas that ended up not being crunchy, which was lucky, cause I was hungry.
After another few stops to pick up/drop off passengers we stopped in a rather touristy spot and a pair of uniformed people got on the bus and headed straight for the white people. That would be Travis and me. This was where we paid for our tickets to get into the protected area or whatever it is. There are several places in China like this - without a gate, but you must buy a ticket on some random part of the road. We wondered how they figured Chinese tourists, or if they just didn't have to pay (annoying), but we have often found that Chinese tourists go places in tour groups and probably buy their tickets in the group herd
looking down
. Then at another stop everyone told us to get off. This is the convenient thing about being the obvious tourist (that is to say, the white tourist) - everyone knows where you're going. We then caught a bus that I thought might kill us (on the cliff-side switchbacks) up to the village of Ping'an.
Our first interaction was with a woman wearing a towel on her head. Technically it's not a towel, it's the head-dress of the women of one of the minority groups in the area. It's the only group whose name I can't remember, but I do distinctly recall a section of LP talking about these women with hats that look suspiciously like towels. She wanted to be our guide, but given that there are all of two paths and I could not understand a word she said, I thought we could do without the guiding. But she was friendly.
We walked through the gate, where we had our tickets stamped, and continued up the road to the village. Already we began to see terraces with water flowing through them. It would be easy to spend the night here or trek the whole of the terraces in a more leisurely fashion, but we were not leisurely, so we hauled up to the first look-out
she doesn't like stairs
. As we progressed we could see more and more of the terraces extending below us, and the village became a collection of black tiled roofs tucked into the valley. At about this time we were also adopted by our self-appointed guide, a tiny Yao woman with tinier feet. The Yao people actually live in a village on the other side of the ridge, but that doesn't stop them from coming down to Ping'an every day to see what tourists they can scrounge up. They are famous for their Guinness Record long hair (the women, that is), which they tie up in a kercheif. We tried to be discouraging, really we did, but nothing worked, and we finally ended up at the top of the lookout with a woman making a hard sell. We weren't interested in trinkets, but then she offered to take down her hair and let us have a photo, and that we thought we could be down with. So she very matter-of-factly unwound her hair, revealing her secret! Her hair, while significantly longer than any hair I've ever seen in the US, was not anywhere close to breaking a record. Moreover she had two two-foot pony tails, which she used to fill out and lengthen her hair. You can see the extension if you look closely (or maybe not closely) at the photo of her holding out her ponytail. Then she decided that was that and wound her hair right back up. It was surprisingly not that hard to do, although I'm still not sure how they make that nifty hair bubble at the front
rice paddies
. After a last attempt to sell us more stuff she was happy to leave us to our own devices. While there is a bench at the top of the peak, we discovered that the view of the terraces here is obstructed by the terraces themselves, along with some poorly placed bushes. Ergo we carried our sandwiches farther down and appreciated the stunningly expansive terraces to our hearts' content. Travis belittled my ability to take good photos of animals, which I did not take kindly to. He just doesn't understand cattle like I do.
A relatively short and flat walk took us to the "Moon and Seven Stars" lookout, where you are able to stand well above the terraces you're viewing. I was partial to this area, although we didn't stay here long (didn't want to get stuck!). The top of the peak is a round paddy, and the terraces cascade down from it, making the whole hill into terraced paddies, rather than making one side or part of the hill into terraces. It creates a luminous, enchanting effect. It would have been better had there been more water, or at least some rice. Oh well, I guess we'll have to go back some day. And apparently the other set of paddies can be even more stunning and is generally less touristed.
Our attempt to return to Guilin led us to catch the last bus everywhere. But at least we caught them. The bus station in Longsheng was completely empty, which never seems to be a good thing in China. We got back to Guilin late and decided to get a good night's sleep so we'd be ready for our next adventure. (Travis's favorite thing EVER.)
Erin
