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“My early attempts to dig here didn't work” |
AM sez
My early attempts to dig here didn't work, but by plane, bus, and boat, we are now in China! Wish I'd kept those lima beans I didn't want when I was 7 to give to the kids here. We are about to go hiking in Tiger Leaping Gorge (5/4/06), will update this after that!
ron sez-
after a lovely stay in laos, we headed to China. Right from the border (and actually a little before the border) things were drastically different. China is building/constructing everywhere. The first evidence was the appearance of a great road in northern Laos which was unlike any we had seen We soon learned from the locals that it was being constructed/ and paid for by the Chinese as a traded route. We took a 28 hour bus ride from loas to Kunming which was made very long by stops along the way for no apparent reason, as well as stops to wait for incredible amounts of road construction.
Upon hittign the border we soon notes lots of things for sale-- which appears to be a them of this trip. After getting partly ripped off at the border changing some money ( not banks open yet)-- the locals give good rate but then give 5 Mao bills (1 mao is 1/10th a yuan) instead of 5 yuan bills-- overall it cost us ~2% which is still better than the banks so no big deal the reall bus ordeal took place-- 28 hours on alternative dirt raods in the rains while the new raod is being constructed-- aack. After a 1am dinner in a local bus stop where we pointed at various food stuffs which were cooked on ahuge wok before our eyes-- we arrive into the thriving city of Kunming. Kunmining has ~2.5 million people and apparently they were all out shopping. Turns out this was the start of the May day vacation week and festival in China-- a major holiday when all the chinese have off and travel (apprently primarily to Kunming and Lijiang). We did get to see a great parade in honor of the 'first annual may day international festival of touroism and festooned vehicles' and began eating the first of many bowls of egg-tomato-noodle soups. Kunming is really thriving and people were everywhere. We did have a great stop in the park near the university wher we saw live karaoke-- bands would play a selected song for passersby to karaoke to-- they LOVE their Karaoke. AM also tried to play a carnival game-- essesntially unwinnabe-- and they kept telling her she was doing it wrong and making here try again-- 10 tries later she quit against there advice , but they then wanted to charge us 30 yuan for a 3yuan game-- we of course refused which drew great crowds of laughing, curious onlookers. When offered the choice of 0 or 3 yuan the gamester ultimately took the 3 yuan-- all in all good clean fun.
the next day we first tried to make it to the "stone forest' in a nearby city but our attempts to make it there were thwarted by greedy minibus drivers who first tried to overcharge and then once we negotiated the proper rate procedd to wait to long to leave (trying to get more passengers) so that we ultimately went to the western hills in the lake district outside Kunming by city bus. For 1 yuan you can go a long way on the city bus. We hiked up to a great view over the city of Kunming where we could see the massive extents of construction underway. we also were wowed by the number of 'shoot the balloon' carnival type games which could be found at every turn of the hike, as well as the number of women hiking in high heels. On the way down we walked throught the 'Dragon's Gate'-- a pagoda and series of tunnels and shrines carved by a Taoist monk several hundred years ago. Very nice actually. And then again on the hike down along the road elbow to elbow stalls selling everything from jewelry to clothes to marlboro hats. From here we decided to head to the west and towards the foothills of tibet.
previous travel blog entry
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