Tomorrow we take off for yet another trip to China. We plan to combine it with a visit to Myanmar. We hope to go overland but this is increasingly looking impossible.

Our plan is to visit Beijing and then take the train to Kunming.

From Kunming we’ll try to get to a number of places in Yunnan, including: Heijing,Yunlong & Nuodeng, The Nujiang Valley,Tongcheng and around, Ruili (if it is possible to cross into Myanmar).

We still have a lot of material pending to put up on the blog, which we’ll do in October. I am not sure how much we can put up while we are on the road.

Tags: Travel, Uncategorized by Adam
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Xingyi 兴义

Whether you are leaving Guizhou Province from the West, or entering it from Eastern Yunnan, you’ll probably end up passing through Xingyi (see Map), a small town undergoing rapid development. To be honest, Xingyi is not the prettiest of towns, though we didn’t find it quite as grim as it was depicted in our guidebook. It is true that the town is entirely lacking in sights and has lost all its old neighbourhoods to the rampant white-tile and concrete construction that continues to proliferate in China. However, it’s a pretty laid- back place and its major sight, the Maling Gorge, just a few kilometres out of town and easy to reach, is truly spectacular.

Locals also recommend visiting nearby Fenghuang Shan (Phoenix Mountain 凤凰山), which they claim is another natural wonder not to be missed. Unfortunately, we didn’t have enough time to check this out.
We arrived in Xingyi on a bus from Anshun 安顺. The journey took around six hours and passes through some of the most dramatic limestone scenery you are likely to see.

As in the rest of China, rapid changes are underway even in this remote corner of the country. The future cross-China East to West Highway, currently in the initial phases of construction, will eventually pass close to Xingyi. For the moment, it’s giving China’s civil engineers and [Read more →]

Tags: Guizhou Province, Travel by Adam
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Ciqikou Ancient Town

One of the easiest places you can get to from Chongqing is Ciqikou, a traditional village of late-Ming dynasty houses, set on the shores of the Jialing River, about 10 kms from downtown Chongqing.

As we approach Ciqikou, and comment excitedly on the many traditional dark wood and white plaster houses we can see, our taxi driver shrugs his shoulders and says: “Still so many old houses, but what can you do?”.

When Adam tells him there are a lot of old houses in London too, he asks incredulously: “Why? Is London not developed then?”
Ciqikou’s main drag promises to be the usual [Read more →]

Tags: Chongqing Province, Travel by Adam
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Chongqing – August 2009

Chongqing at Night

A smooth two-and-a-half- hour train ride has taken us from Chengdu to Chongqing. As our taxi emerges from the modern station building we are amazed at the panorama in front of us: we can see a labyrinth of motorways and overpasses and a whole forest of gleaming tower blocks.

Chongqing at Dusk

Nothing we even remotely remember from our previous visit in 1991; that time we arrived in Chongqing by boat, all the way from Shanghai. Though we didn’t stay long, we did like the city. We still have fond memories of its steep, stepped streets, its colourful vegetable markets which invaded all the pavements, and its plucky women, defying the grey winter weather with their vivid outfits.

A Street Market in Central Chongqing 1991

This time, we will retrace our steps and leave Chongqing by boat, going downriver as far as Yichang, to check out the changes the Yangzi has undergone since the construction of the controversial Dam. But first, we’re planning to have a good look at the city itself.

The Green Fields in the picture are now the major highway along the Jialing River

Surprisingly, given the immense size of the city, the traffic is smooth. In fact, there are hardly any cars on the brand-new multi-lane motorways. In no time at all our taxi driver drops us at the Number Nine Hotel, conveniently located in downtown Jiefangbei district, close to the place where the cruise ships dock.

A bit of sightseeing

The Guildhall's Fantastic Eave Roofs

After a clean-up, we venture out into the scorching hot streets of Chongqing and head for its number one attraction: the Huguang Guild Hall. To our surprise, [Read more →]

Tags: Chongqing Province, Travel by Adam
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Khampa man in Kangding 2004

Faces of Kangding 康定 (2004)

In 2004, having just returned to Kangding from Danba, we were lucky enough to stumble upon a one-off festival aimed at celebrating Tibetan Kham culture and promoting tourism in Western-Sichuan. The streets of Kangding were jammed packed with proud-swaggering Khampas, dressed up to the hilt in their finest clothes. One could easily have imagined that the entire population of these once warrior nomads, had rolled into town off the grasslands. And like in the wild-west of old, many had come in on horseback.

With so much going on, nobody paid much attention to me as I used up roll after roll of film. Kangding has changed and modernised radically since these photos were taken, so I hope you enjoy them. It was a magic moment.

Tags: Culture, Sichuan Province, Travel by Adam
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(The end of our route:  Xining 西宁 to Chengdu 成都 2009)

Our Route 2009

Leg One: Ganzi to Kangding

Tired and groggy after a week of sleepless nights due to altitude sickness, I stumbled out of the hotel and we walked into the adjacent bus station. We were taking the bus straight to Kangding as, apparently, Ma’erkang was closed to foreigners. Anyway, I don’t think Margie would have put up much longer with my hallucinations and the incoherent gibberish that I was producing every night. At last, we were heading down and off the Tibetan plateau.

Ganzi Old Town

Five years before, we had done the whole ride from Ganzi to Chengdu in 17 interminable hours on a smoke- filled bus, while witnessing at least 5 fatal accidents and nearly being involved in one ourselves. So, we had decided never to do it again. We thought that by breaking up the journey, it would be smoother and less painful; little did we know what had happened to the road.

Our broken down bus 2004

Most roads in China have improved over the years, but the Chengdu-Tibet highway has actually got worse, for now at least. Admittedly, [Read more →]

Tags: Sichuan Province, Travel by Adam
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Places to visit around Ganzi 甘孜

We visited 3 monasteries within a 30 kilometre radius of Ganzi: Dagei Gompa, Began Gompa, or Baigei Si, and Beri Gompa, or Baili Si (all names are approximate).

In order to do this, we hired a taxi for a half day for 250 Yuan. Our driver was a friendly chap who seemed to be of mixed Chinese- Tibetan origin and could speak both Mandarin (of sorts) and Tibetan. More importantly, he seemed to get on well with everybody.

Our first stop, Dagei Gompa, is about 30 kilometres back towards Manigango. The landscape along the way is glorious: lots of grazing animals, imposing mountains and small villages, their houses and walls covered in vertical beige and white stripes.

Dagei is quite large, almost a monastic village. Hidden away above [Read more →]

Tags: Sichuan Province, Tibet, Travel by Adam
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Serxu to Manigango & Dzogchen Gompa

石渠 到 马尼干戈 与 竹庆佛学院

We pass quickly through Serxu Xian, the modern administrative town, 35 kilometres after the huge Serxu monastery. Our driver seems concerned that the local police may look for an excuse to fine him, just because he has Qinghai number plates.

It feels like a long drive now. Progress is brisk, as the road is paved and in reasonable condition, but in general, signs of life are few and far between; we pass a few Tibetan villages with the odd monastery.

In some places the landscape is a bit less harsh; we pass a large lake, surrounded by soft, green hills.

Soon after, there is a succession of passes and the landscape changes abruptly. Suddenly, [Read more →]

Tags: Qinghai Province, Sichuan Province, Travel by Adam
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Yushu to Serxu

Preliminaries:
I could see the doubt in the driver’s eyes. Either he thought Christmas had arrived early, or, more likely, he was contemplating some grim and rapid end to his life. What we had proposed was the following: Yushu to Manigango in a day, with stops at Serxu Gompa and Dzogchen Gompa.

His reservation: his claim that Sichuan Tibetans were not honest like the Tibetans who lived in Qinghai. The word ‘Manigango’, he repeated it several times with distaste, evoked some kind of hellhole from which you’d never return. “Bandits, the lot of them; what if I just drop you at Serxu?”, he protested.

His incentive: The 1,000 Yuan I was offering, plus food and accommodation in Manigango.

I pointed out to him that we had been to Manigango in 2004 and found it quite safe. Even though we too had heard numerous stories of pillaging bandits around Manigango, these seemed to belong to an era long gone. Still, I remembered that Manigango had felt like a real Wild West frontier town in 2004.

The main problem was that I had no option: the altitude sickness was playing havoc on my body; five days without sleep and the Tibetan medicine and the oxygen tank were having little or no effect. Serxu, at 4,200 metres above sea level, is another 500 meters higher than Yushu; lingering around, counting on dodgy bus schedules, didn’t appear to be the best option. So, basically, the upshot was: “Either you take us or we’ll have to hire another car”.

The first leg of the journey
Price agreed and the driver’s mind set somewhat at ease, we set off at 6.00 am.
The road followed what was now familiar territory, passing the Mani wall, Domkar Gompa, the turn- off to the Leba gorge and finally [Read more →]

Tags: Qinghai Province, Sichuan Province, Travel by Adam
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The World’s Longest Mani Wall/嘛尼石城

 

The Seng-ze Gyanak Mani Wall is truly enormous; a sign by its side proudly proclaims that it is 283 metres long, 74 metres wide, 2,5 metres high and consists of 2 billion stones! What’s more, the Wall is still growing, as we witnessed with our own eyes: devout pilgrims contribute new stones everyday, which are hoisted up on to the pile carefully. The billions of beautifully carved stones carry the Buddhist prayers “Om Mani Padme Hum” or, “Hail to the Jewel in the Lotus”, and other orations.

Tibetan pilgrims from all over the Kham region and further afield descend on this huge Mani Wall from dusk to dawn. Dressed in their finest, they [Read more →]

Tags: Qinghai Province, Travel by Adam
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