kjp

I'm back in Brissy. Yay.

It's weird - such a relief to be back. So happy to see my the house, housemates (1 new), my room, etc, etc.

I got a free shoe cleaning courtesy of the Australian Government. Thanks all you Aussie taxpayers out there. :)

I'll be going to the coast (sunshine, probably) for a swim. The swell looks dodge for tomorrow - just 2 ft. Just not sure about the water temperature...??

Afterwards - some money out of the bank (hopefully my card will work...), and a nice salad sandwich from that place in the food court at Chermside.

Very happy.

am in kuala lumpar airport, waiting for myn flight hback to oz - brisbane. Have about 1/2 hr wait. stay o/n in kl was ok.

8 hrs to go.

kl is as i remember it from last time- humidy; with free internet but dodge keyboard.

anyhow.

internet is better than before - i'm using firefox on this machine!!

cool. looking forward to catching up with everyone and being in australia.

ohh... dali was good. - relaxing, one or two touristy things. kunming was great. a few touristy things - xishan and bamboo temple. was a relaxing stay. great way to end a trip.

bye now.

This am - went to 3 pagodas just a little outside of dali Old city. Was reasonably interesting. Took it easy in the afternoon (hired a bike thaat turned out to be dodgy, I couldn't be bothered as well). Was going to go up on the nearby mountains, but couldn't be bothered. I think I'm over trying to do everything that I can. Want to take it easy for a few days as it's the end of my trip.

Going to Kunming (final place before I fly out on Sat) tomorrow.

Ohhh, now, in Dali, my phone doesn't work... Even with the magic number put in first. The message in Chinese mentions Dali City (ie: the location). But the English message does not... So maybe better luck in Kunming?

Am in Dali Old City. Waiting for some lunch (it's 3.50 pm....).

Here for probably 2 nights. Kunming on Wednesday.

OK bye.

Yes, I know, the photos put up here today are totally out of order...

Anyhow. This was taken from one of the bus journies. There's fantastic country out there.

It's still bucketing down.

I think that tomorrow I'll be ditching Lijiang and going to Dali. If it's clear in the morning, I'll leave in the arvo, if rainy in morning, then leave in morning.

Well, actually (http://www.kjp.id.au/archive/2005/10/22/anyhow.html), I can ring Australia.

Note to anyone out there: if you find yourself in China and can't ring home on your SIM card, try putting 1795100 infront of the country code, then number as usual. Apparently it works but at a slightly higher rate. (Better a higher rate than not working at all).

Now, if only I knew how much credit I had left....

I'm staying somewhere in here - the old town of Lijiang. It's kind of cool really.

On the road to Zhongdian (in Yunnan) a truck took a corner too fast, blocking both lanes.... and leaking petrol.... while some people were smoking......

I walked back down the hill to the bus...

Temple at Litang

One of the wierd er things I've seen so far - in Litang (high up in Western Sichuan), plastic palm trees on the main N/S street.

Bizarre.

I can't remember what it's called. It and a small temple overlook the old part of town in Zhongdian. It rotates. But is very heavy. I could just (by myself) get it moving, but it's very hard work. A miscelaneous random Chinese tourist and I got it moving at a decent speed.

Big Buddist temple on the edge of Zhongdian. Interesting, but undergoing renovations at the moment. I think that I got blessed by some important lama dude. But he was a fair bit younger then me.... hhhmmmmmmmmmmmm.

Rain, rain, go away, come again:

never

(well at least until after I fly out).

It's kind of annoying. The sky is completely grey, with drizzle, and bugger all visability. Lijiang and it's surronds has some really great scenery. If you can't see them, then there doesn't seem to be much to do around here...

I planned to go to a really picturesque park on the northern side of town that has great views of the Jade Dragon Snow Mountains (?) - the mountains that have the Tiger Leaping Gorge on the other side. I went to it this morning, but the Y60 (!!!!!!!!!! - tai gui le) and grey skies put me off a bit. If it clears up a bit in the arvo I'll give it another shot. I got up really early (7.30am!) to get there before the hoards of tourists. Anyhow. So annoyed about not going this am.

If the weather is dodgy still tomorrow, then I'll just head to Dali. I was thinking about a day trip up the mountains. But again, if dodgy weather, then dodgy views - not much point.

I suppose though, this is the first patch of bad weather that I've had for all of the trip. 5 weeks of good weather is nothing to complain at I suppose.

Anyhow.

Some useles fun facts:
* The reason why there's so many Israeli tourist around is that they have holidays this time of year - endnig at the end of October. They have military service after year 12. 3 years for men, 2 for women. After that a lot of them travel for a bit, then start uni when they are 23 or so...
* Apparently the most common word spoken in the world (across all languages) is 'okay'. The second most common is "coca cola'.
* Apparently a whole bunch of plants and flowers and stuff got taken (ie: samples) from Tiger Leaping Gorge to England, and are now common in Englsih gardens.

So day before yesterday, Wednesday, I left Zhongdian on to go to Qioatou, a town that is at one end of the Gorge. On the way there, met up with two English women who were doing it, and also over lunch at a cafe in Qoiatou, two Israels. The five of us ended up donig very similar walk, and going (back) to Lijiang.

My original plan was to stay overnight in Qioatou for the first night, then one or two nights in the gorge and 1 night at the town at the far end - Daju. But, on Wednesday, we went to The 'Naxi Family Guesthouse', 2hrs up the path from Qioatou. There's not much at Qioatou, so yuo may as well get the first two hours of the walk done. Then on Thursday we walked to 'Half Way Guesthouse' which was a pretty good place.

I'd heard from other people that after dropping down to the lower road, the scenery after crossnig the ferry (ie: the road up to Daju), is pretty boring, and not really worth it. So I canned that idea, and this morning dropped down to the low road and then caught bus back to Qioatou and then on to Lijiang. Goto to Lijiang 4.30 pm ish or so.

So, after Lijiang I'll stop in Dali ( old city) and then Kunming. And then that will be the China trip.

OK, back to TLG. I thought that the scenary - the very high craggy mountains above and the Yangztee below was very impressive scenery. Very. Very. A chick from France wasn't as impressed, so maybe my impressions are effected by the lack of seeing any big mountains before. ??.

Anyhow, there'll be a few photos momentarily. I found it ok, I feel fine now (but I'll sleep well tonight - ie: just tired). I took all of my pack which was kind of stupid, but not. When I left I was planning to walk all the way through to Daju and then onto Lijiang. Given that my plans changed (and I doubled back to Qioatou), I could of left my stuff there, and just taken only a few things in my daypack. Anyhow, such is life.

Lijiang seems to be a pretty cool place. I'm staying in a hostel in the 'Old Town'. The new town is just another city. The Old Town is the remains of an old town - stone paths, waterways / canals (that apparently used to be the town's water supply). The down side is the masses of tourists that are cruising around. And the souvenier stalls that apparently pushed out Naxi shops (? check?).

Everything is lit up pretty well - building, red lantern things on the side of the streets (allayways really - no cars allowed). There's ample opportunitiy for some really cool low light photography stuff (there's heaps of Han tourists with the same idea), however, would need my tripod. Anyhow.

I would also need some room on my camera's memory card. Which is full, yet again. I was hoping that some of the stupidly many photos of the gorge would be duds and could be deleted. Found only 1 so far. do'h.

There's also a section where there is a canal with restraunts / bars on either side of the canal. The thing to do is to shout / sing Naxi chants / songs in competition with people in the bars/restrautns on the other side of the canal. It's pretty cool.

Tomorrow I'll just explore Lijiang, and do a few jobs. Houtian, go to Jade Dragon Snow Mountain (?). These are the mountains that are on one side of the TL Gorge. ie: Lijiang is on the other side to the walk.

Ohh, FYI: Listening to Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto with miscellaneous Chinese techno in the background isn't really a good combination.

Ohh, also, for some strange reasons I've started coughing funnily, and got a strange flu like sickness. And I've been clucking like a chicken. And eating seeds off the ground. I don't know why this is the case. It all started after patting that chicken on the gorge trail. Hmmm... Maybe I should see a doctor???

[ Nah, just kidding in the last paragraph, of course.
[[ My humour is on par form as per usual.......... :), coughs...

Apparently my mobile phone here (or rather the SIM card I got all the way back in Beijing) is only good for SMS back to Aus. Tried calling, but got error message - something needed activiation. Too hard to do myself. Anyhow.

Wenshu Temple in Chengdu

Panda just outside Chengdu. Pandas - 23.5 hrs / day eaiting and sleeping. They've got it made...

The Id Kah Mosque in Kashgar. It's smaller than it looks.

From Kashgar (last Sunday week). These guys were just arriving at the livestock market.

Things are pretty good, I've gotten over the altitude sickness. I'm currently relatively high up in Zhongdian, 3.4 km above sea level (I think), but this is ok - no headaches, etc. It's just slightly (but not very much) hard to breath. But this probably has more to do with the cold. It's 'see your breathe temperature' - similar to Canberra winter. Brings back memories :). I've basically been in my thermals all the time since last Thursday night (when I started moving up in the world... har har).

I'm in Zhongdian for tonight as well. Staying in a relatively nice place (I'm lashing out (!) - $15 room instead of $4 dorm bed)... Off to one of the important lmastries in SW China in a little bit (once I'm done here). Internet here typically costs Y2 or Y3 (50c) per hour...

I can't really complain about the bus rides - they've been pretty good really, just 1 was a bit average. The last two have been interupted for some reason or another. The roads are narrow and windy.. Yesterday a truck had overturned, the day before there was a Rockside... Also yesterday when going along a dirt unreinforced road just above the Yangstze (quite steep, but not very, drop), feeling the ground sink beneath the bus is 'interesting' ..........

Yup, remote is the right word. It was either this or more touristy places (yup, like I'm going to do that...), and I felt like this was a better option anyway. Having just paid out touristy stuff, the walk that I'll be doing later this week is on several tourist backpacker trails. Anyhow.

We had a shortish bus trip this morning - 4 1/2 hrs. (Leaving at 7 am....). I've been feeling a lot better (although not 100%) than yesterday. It's kind of weird seeing trees on the tops of mountains way down below you, and being happy with that (as that's were you'll be soon). There was some weird landscapes - just rocks and a few low lying (< 0.50 m) shrubs. Nothing can live up there, pretty much.

There isn't much in XiangCheng - it's a Tibetan town that has an influx of Han Chinese people coming in and building a new town around the old town.... There's a pretty cool 1600's (Buddist) monestry at the top of the hill overlooking the town which I've just got back from checking out - it's pretty impressive. 1/2 hr from the end of the trip a whole bunch of locals got on the bus (to get a ride into town). The guy who sat next to me looked like a Tibetan Nelson Mandella. XiangCheng is pretty much an overnight stop to break up the journey to Zhongdian in Yunnan province.

Today I've felt pretty average. Headache all day, tired - presumably it's too high for me here. I checked out one of the Buddist temples on the edge of town in the morning, and all the Tibetan homes leading up to it. Tibetan stuff is a lot more colourful than other stuff I've seen. They've got those nifty whirlly things (brass?? drums) that you try and keep moving. It was in a big 'Chorten' thingy - ie: a Buddist tower, white, circular. What a great description.....

I bought my ticket to XiangCheng tomorrow. It will be just an overnighter there, the following day is to ZhongDian, where I'll stay 2 nights, probably. There's apparently not much in XiangCheng.

I just hope that my seat tomorrow isn't cramped, etc. My knees / legs are sore - probably the temperature / height (although I've had thermals on all day...). Needless to say, I'm kind of glad to leave here (XiangCheng is 2.something km up; but ZhongDian is apparently 3.4 km...) Anyhow. I don't really want to do 3 days of bus in a row (ie: here --> XG --> ZD --> TLG). Although, from a scenery point of view I wouldn't mind it, it is very spectacular in this part of the world.

I'm not sure I'm in a place to complain about knees / legs on buses, etc... Earlier this arvy I was talking to a giant French guy who had just arrived who would be 7 feet or so....

After Zhongdian, it will be a shortish bus ride to the village at the start of the Tiger Leaping Gorge... Dodgy knees on the days leading up to a walk probably isn't the best of all things.

Hmmmm.. Tired and sore, want it to be 7am tomorrow when we leave... I was glad when I found out that the buses run tomorrow (even though it is Sunday).

Anyhow. If you ever find yourself in Litang, head to Mr Chen's (just left a few shops of the Crane guesthouse) - he's got decent food, a bit of English and a personality...

We got into Litang about 1 hr ago. Just been wandering around, trying to get out of the sun (very bright, clear sky, don't want to add to my headache...).

Yesterday morning got what was apparently a chartered bus to Kangding. I thought I had paid a bit extra to the guesthouse I was with for getting the ticket & transfer (didn't have the time / couldn't be bothered to go to the bus station myself). But turned out to be a roomy cushy seats bus. Bad things - the smoking of some people (and lack of openable windows / no air con). Anyhow, at Kangding there was a person trying to flog hostel beds - her place was on my list of 'possibles', so that was that.

Kangding is a nice place, in the valley with steep mountains either side, river running through the middle of town. There didn't seem to be much to do there, and the bus ride was pretty good, so decided to go on to Litang today (ie: just stay one night).

In Kangding I met up with a Korean guy who is backpacking around China, and has a similar itinery as me for the next few weeks. Ie: night or 2 in Litang, Xiangcheng, Zhongdian in Yunnan, Tiger Leaping Gorge, Lijiang, Dali, Kunming... seems like a decent person which is very good.

The bus to Litang was vastly different to yesterdays. Crowded, I moved from the back seat (where my head was touching the roof, and any of the multiple bumps in the road would have seen me going through the roof... Moved to the fold out in the isle seat next to Korean guy (yes, I've unsurprisingly forgotten his name). But this had: (a) a metal rod in a really unconfortable position - really sore bum now; (b) noisy Tibetans carrying on all around (although they quietened down a bit after lunch); (c) dodgy road in places... Fortunately there was only a few unsealed bits and these didn't have precarious drops on either side...

Speaking of the trip... there were some fanastic views as we climbed through the mountains. Some photos later. Need to explore Litang. There's heaps of Tibetans / lamas cruising around, places to explore.

Ohh, if there was any doubt, Western Sichuan is ***vastly*** different to Xinjiang or any of the other bits of China I've been do. Mountainous, active Buddist, etc.

I found a good internet cafe - windows xp. But my camera isn't being recognised.... so I can't transfer pictures.,, dang. anyhow. I'm off to Kanding tomorrow, following by Litang the day after.

Front of the Mogao Caves - inside - a very big buddha.

This was one of the views from the top part of the Horse ride when we were camping in the HEavenly mountains... We were staying just near the lake (1 km below)....

Jiaohe was an ancient city sandwiched between two rivers. They dug most of it out (instead of building ontop of the land). Near Turpan.

Flaming Mountains - northern side of Xinjiang.

This is the Emin Minaret + Mosque in Turpan - built 1777. Pretty nice building.

Ohh, I'm on a decent computer for a change. A few more photos to come (fingers crossed), but in no particular order.

So,

there was no photos last night because I couldn't upload - same problem on that computer. Couldn't sort it / get it sorted out. Anyhow. Also couldn't regenerate for the same reason (but was done automatically overnight).

Anyhow. So the cafe across the road has windows 98, so I can't access my flash drive or camera. So no photos yet again. When I next go, I'll go back to the previous internet cafe and hope for a better machine...

So this morning I went to the Panda research centre. saw a whole bunch of them, including a 1 month, 1 year, and 2 yr old. very cute. Also saw some red pandas.

Then back to the apartment. Walked into town - aiming for a particular bookstore for a Sichuan map. Got there eventually, but nothing appropriate. Chengdu has heaps of little places where you get a bit of food / snack on the run. I had a few skewers with some sort of meat on them. After the person cooks them in presumably very hot oil; you let them cool for a bit; then dip them in the spicy powder stuff. On one I had a bit, another just a tiny bit and the l last had none. Given that I'm in Sichuan (ie: hot food); the one with spice kept my mouth burning for a while.

For my second bit of Western food this trip; I had a Macas icecream cone - 2 Yuan; Thank goodness pig fat tastes the same everywhere :).

A bus trip to the other side of town and I checked out Wenshu temple (active), nice buildings, buddha statues.

Strangely, the fare going there was 1Yuan, going back south it was 2Y.

Anyhow. Someday I may get a few more pictures up here. I also need to sort out transport Westward. This arvy I'm sending out a whole bunch of postcards - look out mum and dad......... (if I knew the smily emoticon for 'sly grin' I'd do it....)

Am in Chengdu, Sichuan - ok, fairly tired - just slightly (2hrs) later than expected.

Things started of slightly dodge when in Kashgar, the chick behind the counter crossed out my flight number from Urumqi to Chengdu and put another flight. Fantastic. I also bucked the system at Urumqi, when I had taken off my sticker that apparently told the airline person that I was a transfer passenger (I'm such a rebel... har har). Anyhow, I was told to go to the arrivals area.... (I was worried then), but after a while someone found me and put me in the departure area.... silly westerners.

Anyhow, back to the flight - I think that my second leg was canned for some reason, and was put on the other flight. Anyhow. This meant that I saw most of my fellow group (10 people out of the 13 person group from Beijing to Kashgar) off from Urumqi. It was a *very* weird feeling - 'Crickey, that's it - I'm on my own' sort of thing.

Anyhow. The flights were boring. In keeping of the weird food from airlines - the snack on the Kashgar to Urumqi leg was ---- a roll (the annoyingly sweet fake fairy bread that they have in China) and a cucumber. Anyhow. Ohh, actually, there were some cool scences on the flight to Urumqi - craggy mountains poking through clouds. Urumqi was pretty cold - you could see your breath in the outside air.... Someone heard that apparently a cold front from Siberia had come in.

So Chengdu is: dark (it's night, durr). a bit smokey (probably smog, yuck). The area I'm in seems to have lots of students around. Probably a few schools in the area.

I'm booked to go and see the Pandas first thing tomorrow morning. Have booked 3 nights in the place I'm in. It's basic but fine. I'm going to have to start being more careful with money... ie: get more out from the bank (cheques)... more regularily. Hmmm.

This internet cafe is riduculously expensive (10 Yuan), but is modern computers. But - the settings on the computer mean - I can't reply to messages in Yahoo, or compose or check (ie: any of the buttons). I think it's the security settings. But movabletype works fine, and I can read yahoo messages. I'll find a better cafe tomorrow...... Mum, please pay the Telstra bill. That's fine.

Oh, a word from the wise. If you find yourself in China, Ctrl - Shift typically changes the data entry mode from English to Chinese. Anyhow. OK, so I've explored enough for the day (am tired...), so a bit more time here, so now for a few photos.

Well, we weren't effected by the earthquake at all. When it occured we were in a bus going to Kashgar - on a bumpy road...

Kashgar is pretty cool. We went to the livestock market in the morning which was heeps of cool fun. Cool watching all the sheep, goats, cows, horses, donkeys, etc, etc be tied up, examined, sold, test riden (horses).

The Sunday market after that was ok, but is probably more aimed at the locals - mostly food, stuff around the home, clothes, etc.

Then went to Id Kah mosque in the centre of town, built in 1442 apparently. It's a lot smaller than in the pictures I've seen. Smaller than the Emin Minaret (sp???) and mosque (well, the front is a lot smaller). Id Kah has a fair bit of shady / greeny areas in it.

Anyhow. This internet cafe doesn't have usb ports on their computers. dang. so no photos.

Plane to Sichuan - Chengdu tomorrow. It will be good to get my body clock in sync with the real time / daylight time. We've been working with Beijing time (mostly). Theoretically China is all one time zone; but Xinjiang is often 2hrs behind (but only for non official stuff).

I was a bit worried last night about the time zone issue - it was 11.30 pm and hadn't eated since midday or so -- and felt ill. Just ate some dinner slowly, and was ok this morning. I've almost used my 1 Yuan (15 cents or so) worth of internet, so I'll sign off here. Bye from Western China!

I really should get some souveniers or presents or something...... And send some postcards.

Hey, I've found an internet cafe with a working keyboard, and windows xp so my camera and flash drive will be recognised. And it's 2Yuan per hour - cheep!

Woo hoo.

This place has just cleared out - it's just gone dusk, and most people around here are fasting for Ramadan. Or feasting as of a couple of minutes ago.

I cruised through the Bazaar earlier this evening - it's pretty crazy - so much going on around you. So much stuff to check out.

Earlier today we were doing the touristy things around Hotan - checking out the Jade, Silk, and Carpet manufacturing / processing. Also went to a guy that makes Mulberry Paper - stronger and lasts long than paper from wood pulp apparently.

Anyhow. I have major issues with storage of my photos. Ie: no space at all. anyhow. Got to sort it out and then onto the nightmarket near the hotel.

Travelling tomorrow to Kashgar, then Kashgar Sunday market, then monday = fly to Chengdu.

Yup, the travelling (well really, the exploring) is cool fun. We've just had 2 1/2 days of travelling on a bus through the desert. It was kind of boring, but interesting and fun to drop into little towns on the way, and see the scenary change. It's kind of weird seeing sandy sand dunes with mountains in the background that have snow and glaciers on them.

The bus travel has meant I've been able to catch up on some sleep. The previous two nights were camping in a Yurt in the alpine forest on the north side of the desert (we're now on the south west side). I slept pretty poorly on both nights. The first night I ws too cold, second night I was too hot (and maybe had drunk too much earlier that night.... anyhow).

Today and tomorrow we're in Hotan - lots of Jade sellers on the street. It's a fairly strongly muslim area - 80% of women have some sort of head scarf - 5% you can't see anything but there eyes. Having said that, all of the head scarfs I've seen are trendy and fit into the clothing of the person wearing it (ie: there's a fair bit of fashion involved).

Dodgy keyboards seem to be a common factor in internet cafes over here.

So it's late - 10.44 pm Beijing, 8.44 pm local. Today we crossed the Taklamakan (sp?) desert. The second largest in the world. It got a bit boring. Repeatitive sand dunes do that to you.

The sunset was pretty cool - a new moon jus peaking over the colourfu horizon with just 1 star (probably a planet) in the sky.

Ohh, ths keyboard is crud. The enter, space, caps all have burn holes in them most of the other keys don't work first time you press them.

Anyhow.

Our driver was a cheeky bugger. Said that we would be getting in at 12 midnight (!!); but really was 9pm arrival time. Our 7 am start was delayed to 8am due to a short on the battery terminals or something....

Anyhow.

Past two days have been fairly long travel days - in the bus crossing territory. The previous couple of days were camping in a Yurt near what is called 'Heavenly Lake' - which is a picturesque lake in a mountain range. Alpine forests. Pictures tomorrow or later.

Horse ride up from the camp at 2000m to the top of a nearby (but not the highest) hill at 3000m resulted in fantastic views of the lake, snow cpaped mountains, pine trees glaciers, etc. Although the sun fairly close to the glaciers, so not the best phjotos.

The last 10 minutes of yesterdays bus trip (at 8pm) lasted 2hrs due to a 4wd getting squished between a semi-trailer and a 'sleeper bus' (bus with beds and seats in it). But no cops directing traffic flow, etc. The 2hr wait was helped by Kaula + Vodka. anyhow that last night.

Anyhow. Am tired. it's now 11 am. At least we have a decent start to tomorrow. breakfast at 8, leave at 8.30am.

The guy next to me )who is playing cunterstrike) is smoking and checking out what i'm doing.

Ohhh, I've sent exactly 1 postcard so far, a big batch will be sent from either Kashgar or Chengdu.

bye for now.