Confucius say ‘when man flu become more serious then man get deep husky voice like Keith Richard’.  That’s exactly what happened to Neil when his common cold turned into something more debilitating and his voice turned into a deep gravelly monotone grump.  Not much change there then.

It might not have been so bad except for the fact that our flight from Lijiang was the first we’ve been on where the seatbelt sign was never turned off and delivery of drinks by the flight crew was suspended due to the extended turbulence.  To make it worse, during the final descent into Chengdu the pressure in Neil’s ears didn’t equalise due to his head cold.  This left him with a thundering headache and deafness that lasted until next day……….he went to bed at 8.30pm. 

The following morning the headache was gone, the deafness was gone but the rasping sore throat and ridiculously deep voice persisted forcing Neil to do something he never does – seek medicine – Chinese medicine.   Well, it had to be Chinese medicine as Neil declined advice from one of the receptionists to see a doctor and without a prescription he couldn’t get antibiotics.  He loaded up in a pharmacy with all sorts of capsules, lozenges and ‘dripping pills’.  His nose, whilst not red or sore, finished up feeling like a piece of sandpaper.  Within a couple of days he was starting to get better although his voice took a little longer to get back to normal.  Cheryl being the caring person she is kept reminding him that ‘it’s just man flu, get on with it………..I had it too but I didn’t complain……..much’.

Cheryl decided to choose our hotel based on its silly name. The Lazybones Templeside Poshpacker Hostel is in essence aimed at 30 somethings who want a better standard than a backpacker dive, but still want the friendliness & fun atmosphere of a hostel.  

Whilst this name actually makes a bit of sense, we have noticed a number of shops, restaurants, hotels and many more things which have used a strict translation from Chinese that leave us scratching our heads as to what they mean.  People wear clothing like T-shirts etc with the most insane comments on them probably because it’s cool to have an English slogan. We’re sure this also works in reverse when foreigners buy clothes with exotic Chinese/Japanese/Sanskrit adornments.  You may wish to check if your clothing is having a quiet laugh at your expense!

We try to avoid doing too many touristy things at weekends as they tend to be dominated by the Chinese.  We also like to observe real life in a country so on Sunday we decided to visit what is reputedly the biggest shopping mall in the world with 511,000 square meters of purchasing opportunities.  We’re not sure of this is true but it was so big we couldn’t fit it all into the camera lens.   It was pretty awesome and contained zillions of shops, eateries, coffee shops, 5* toilets, an IMAX and cine complex, an ice rink, waterpark with flumes and a mini seaside resort with wave machine and both concrete and sand beaches. 

The whole thing is overlooked by a huge Intercontinental Hotel having rooms inside the dome with views over the swimming pools and seaside resort.  We didn’t do any shopping but then just taking in the sheer size of it was tiring enough!  Neil did enjoy riding the escalators that reminded him of David Niven in ‘Stairway to Heaven’ – they were endless.  Oh, almost forgot to say, it has 24hr sunshine!

We came to Chengdu in Sichuan Province in the hope that we would get great food – it is renowned for its hot and spicy flavours.  Well, it is hot and spicy which we enjoy but it’s also incredibly salty and ridiculously oily which we don’t enjoy.  When we asked at Poshpacker if this is normal we were told ‘yes’ so with their help we created our own menu – we decided want we wanted to eat, wrote it down and the guys behind the desk translated it into Chinese characters.  Armed with our flashcards we started to get some food we could eat especially as we got them to translate ‘no salt’!  Simple unadulterated and delicious roast duck and vegetables that taste of vegetables.

We’ve done a bit of temple-ing while we’ve been here but you can’t come to Chengdu without seeing the Panda Breeding & Research Centre.  To get there before the crowds we took a taxi for CNY30 (about £3.50) in time for the opening at 7.30am.  The taxi man had obviously been watching the recent Grand Prix as he drove like he’d started from pole position rather than a set of traffic lights.  We arrived very early, got ticket numbers 3 and 4 on the day, and had a fabulous time watching pandas.  They are the icon of the WWF and they are extremely funny to watch, especially the young ones that seem to want to run, play, climb and play-fight all day long.  Considering that many Chinese tourist attractions charge very high fees this turned out to be excellent value as we spent around 7/8hrs there.  The entrance fee for both of us was CNY118, taxi CNY30, bus/metro home CNY8 so all in all, less than £20. 

Pandas are seriously endangered and we were given a number of reasons why this is.  Obviously, we humans have had a lot to do with it.  However, the female is only on heat for 3 days a year. To make things worse, the males still think their piece of equipment is just for peeing through – unlike most wildlife that can’t get enough.  It appears that pandas prefer chewing on a piece of tasteless bamboo over a bit of rumpy pumpy!  Also, a female will normally produce twins and abandon the weakest – this is nature.  However, the centre staff have come up with a wizard idea that is now saving almost 100% of those that would have died.  Pandas don’t seem to be too bright so the staff rescue the abandoned baby at birth and keep it in an incubator.   Then, as many as 10 times a day, switch the babies over with the mother.  Mummy panda doesn’t notice and she unwittingly rears 2 babies – we said it was a wizard idea! 

Pandas also live a very solitary life in the wild so even when a female is ready to mate there is very little chance of finding a male who isn’t concentrating on his next piece of bamboo.  Whilst not a reason for being endangered, the centre staff don’t know if a female is pregnant or not, well not until little Peter or Pamela Panda literally pops out.  All females will share the same body changes during this period even though they may not be pregnant so it does keep the staff guessing.  Actually, maybe the females aren’t that daft, as they get extra rations during pregnancy.

We’ve had a good time in China and although we have an outline plan for Chapter 10 we are probably going to come back one day.  Here are our Top 10 observations, both good and bad:

1. The language is a barrier, no doubt, but we have got by with the help of a very friendly Chinese people and translation apps. We didn’t always get what we thought we were getting but that’s when a sense of humour steps forward.
2. China has to have some of the worst public toilets in the Universe.  Some are good but many are, mmm  well, we won’t describe them in case you read this eating your dinner and, just maybe, you may choose to visit yourself and we wouldn’t want to spoil the surprise.  We can tell you over a beer when we get back.
3. The public transport is excellent and simple to use even with the language barrier.
4. We have been in some remote areas and most people seem to be sharing in the new wealth being created. 
5. The amount being spent on infrastructure is breath-taking.
6. Young girls love to express themselves with fashion, especially shoes, and hairstyles.
7. Middle aged women need to take some dress advice instead of dressing like western tarts but even these girls are having fun.
8. Most men of all ages smoke, everywhere, even where there are signs saying don’t……it’s treated like the provision of hot water, a human right to smoke when and where I want.
9. There’s a lot of rich people here driving Bentleys, Porsche, Ferrari, Maserati and even your average Joe seems to drive a BMW, Mercedes or definitely a Japanese car.
10. It seems to us that it’s a good country in which to be old.  It’s like Last of the Summer Wine everywhere you go, in the parks, playing cards or mah jong or just singing and dancing together.  They are not locked away at home isolated from society.

We have liked China a lot, it’s been a real challenge but then we haven’t really had a challenge since we came here 5 years ago.

We fly home tomorrow, both of us looking forward to seeing everyone again and catching up with people we haven’t seen for some time.  We have lots on this summer so please keep following.

Yes, it’s true, we stayed in the same guesthouse as Michael Palin when he was filming his TV series ‘Himalaya’ in 2004.   We were trekking in Tiger Leaping Gorge and happened to choose the same one, Halfway House G H. 

The owner, Mr Feng de Fang or Frankie, proudly displays a simple hand written sign advertising the fact.  Our room, which cost about £17, had a wall of glass giving us a view of the mountains which Cheryl made full use of that evening.  Her bed was so close to the window that she could lay in bed and watch the moon rise over the snow-capped mountains……..wow!

Tiger Leaping Gorge gets its name from the legend that says in order to escape from a hunter, a tiger jumped across the Jinsha River at the narrowest point and there are 2 large rocks where this is said to have happened.  It’s one of the finest treks in China through some of the most naturally beautiful and diverse landscapes China has to offer. The 24 km trail runs high on the northern side of the gorge passing through quiet villages, shady forest, blustery precipice and verdant terraced farmland. The snow covered peaks of Jade Dragon Snow Mountain (5596m) and Haba Snow Mountain (5396m) shadow either side of the gorge making it a dramatic scene. 

Day 1 started with a 2hr bus journey with fellow trekkers to the park ticket office before we set off uphill on a concrete road.  Unfortunately, the road was noisy and dusty from construction traffic.  We’ve already mentioned in previous blogs that China is one massive building site and this beautiful gorge doesn’t escape the march towards China becoming the largest economy in the world.  It’s investing phenomenal amounts of money on infrastructure and in particular its high speed trains that travel around 360kph (200mph).  We travelled on one a few years ago from Shanghai to Suzhou and it was unbelievably smooth even at such high speeds.  Travelling so fast means very few bends which inevitably means that the lines go through numerous tunnels rather than around mountains.  Tiger Leaping Gorge is no exception meaning that the train will hurtle out of the mountain tunnel, speed across a 660m long 250m high bridge over the gorge before thundering into the tunnel on the other side.  We’ve calculated that this will take about 6.6 seconds from the time the nose exits one tunnel before the nose enters the next tunnel (maths freaks please feel free to put us right on this one).    We’ve also managed to find an artist’s impression of what it will look like when it’s finished in 2020.

Anyway, having negotiated the concrete road we finally found the poorly signed path and headed up the hill.  It was 1.5hrs of relentless uphill before reaching Naxi G H where we had lunch.  We were off again within 45 minutes to attack the infamous ’28 bends’.  Infamous for 2 reasons – firstly, there are many more than 28 and, secondly, it was more of the same but this time it was 2hrs of muscle numbing slog. 

Across the top we walked around 4hrs to Halfway GH.  It should have been 30 minutes less but at one point the path was so poorly marked we chose the wrong route twice before finally plumping for the correct one…..the one in the middle!  By the time we arrived Cheryl was absolutely knackered from the day’s exertion which wasn’t helped by a stinking cold. (As we write this Neil is now suffering from man flu).  After a few beers, chats with fellow trekkers to raise our spirits and some excellent food we went to bed, watched the moon rise and slept soundly.

On day 2 we rose late, had a massive trekker’s breakfast, and set off towards the end of the path.  At first the route was a good rough road before it became very narrow.  At some points it was a tad scary as there was nothing to prevent you tripping and falling far enough for rescuers to need several small boxes to scrape up the scattered body parts to enable repatriation. 

With the vertigo overcome we moved on to a very severe downhill section which was very punishing on the joints.  After about 2.5hrs we reached the end of the upper trail and we both came to the reluctant conclusion that to head down even further to the river on day 3 would be a massive mistake.  We decided to cut our trek short by one day and walked into Tina’s GH where, with real sadness, we booked a ticket back to Lijang on the bus that afternoon.  Trek over.

We thoroughly enjoyed the stunning scenery but, sadly, we didn’t enjoy the trek.  The really annoying thing was that we had done the hard part and the steep 3 to 4hr walk down to the river should have been relatively easy.  However, Cheryl’s knees were gone so it was game over.  The main problem was that the path was nothing like we have been used to in Nepal or in the UK for that matter.  It was rough with many trip hazards, gullies that required total concentration to avoid twisting an ankle and dust and pebbles on the steep down hills where you could so easily have your feet go from under you and land on your backside.  We were permanently staring at the path so that we didn’t come to harm.   We were very sad to quit and not complete the last few hours but decided to be cautious as we still have one more week of sightseeing before we fly home.

There is an upside to this tale.  We met some fellow travellers from London, Han and David, when we were in Dali.  They came to Lijiang a few days before us and checked out a restaurant called LaMu’s House of Tibet that serves excellent Tibetan food, superb western food as well as the usual Chinese favourites.  They also offer a good measure of Gordon’s gin and tonic with ice and a slice plus a very large glass of pretty decent red wine.  Obviously neither the excellent food nor the drinks were cheap but after weeks of Chinese food a decent beef chilli, dried fried yak meat, spag. bol, or pizza washed down with a dry red takes a lot of beating.  Yes, we know we’re home soon but give us a break – we ache like hell, have man flu and, anyway, we deserved it!  We had a regular booking at a window seat that made us feel like the old guys from The Muppets sitting in the gods and watching the world pass by below. 

After the visit to frenetic Dali we weren’t expecting to like Lijiang as it has an even worse reputation for Chinese tourist madness.  However, we actually enjoyed our stay and you can see from the photos that we spent each evening walking back from LaMu’s taking photos of the twisty narrow streets, small rivers, and the myriad of shops offering drums, clothes, hats ‘n cats, bric-a-brac and much more. 

It was great fun asking the young Chinese tourists dressed in their funky clothes to pose for us.  Also, take a look at the picture of the fire engine – that will show you just how narrow the streets are here in this very pretty ancient city which is surprisingly large. 

It’s not just firemen that get a mention here.  Rubbish collectors also come around in a small truck twice a day.  The vehicle plays a very loud Chinese tune that is really quaint for us to lie in bed with a cup of tea and listen to as they pass below our balcony.  However, it must be totally maddening for the workers who have to listen to it all day, every day!

Tomorrow we fly to Chengdu for our final stop before heading back home.

As soon as we arrived at the Yuanyang rice terraces we were whisked off in shared minivan to see the sunset from one of the viewing points – what a mixture, French, Brits, Canadian and Japanese.

Our choice of Timeless Guesthouse turned out to be exactly what we had hoped – very sociable and with an owner who knew so much about the terraces and planned each day for all of us as soon as we had eaten breakfast.  He joined travellers together so we could all enjoy the beautiful scenery and chat about it as we walked the terraces on the good days and visited markets. 

On the bad, cold damp days we sat in the guesthouse, hogged the only fire in the place and drank coffee and beer as we solved the world’s problems and learnt about each other’s countries.  During the next couple of days we became great friends with Han and David from the UK, Eden from Canada, Gimena from Argentina, an Ex USA marine called Megan and a Portuguese lady who we never found out her name as she never sat still long enough. 

Getting to and from the rice terraces was a long and difficult journey but it was oh so worth it.  It’s a Unesco World Heritage Site covering 12,500 hectares and is home to many different minority tribes that all come together on market day.  It’s a photographers dream to watch the colours change as the sun rises, moves across the sky before finally setting giving stunning reflections.  The terraces were hewn out of the landscape by the Hani people centuries ago and today continue to provide extremely fertile land where many vegetables are grown as well as rice.  

Our four nights on the terraces flew by and it was soon time to back track to Jianshui for one night before catching the overnight train to Dali.  The Soft Sleeper was excellent and clean and we were very lucky to be sharing with 2 young Chinese girls who were very quiet. 

Dali proved to be a lovely place with well-preserved/restored buildings and lots of places to eat including Bakery 88 which offered excellent bread, cheese, salami, prosciutto and wine- all the things we had been missing for the last few months.  Sadly, many of the bars and restaurants catered for the mainly Chinese tourists by pumping out music loud enough to wake the dead! 

After a couple of nights we managed to share a taxi with a family to our next destination, Shaxi (pronounced Shassi).  This was another preserved/restored town but it was so much more sleepy and relaxed than Dali.  It is one of only three surviving caravan oases from the old tea horse road between China, Tibet and India.  Less well known than the silk road, it was just as important for trade and at its peak 20,000 Tibetan horses were traded for 1.5m tons of Yunnan tea.  Horse rides are still provided for tourists through and around the village – quite evocative to hear them clip clop on the tree lined cobbled streets.  It’s not surprising that it’s such a popular location for movie sets.  Many of the guesthouse, including ours, and restaurants play very chilled Chinese Jazz – all this place needs is a Waitrose!

This was a place made to just chill out and relax and that’s exactly what we did.  We headed to the quaint village square each evening and sat in one of the many cafes to enjoy a couple of very strong G&T sundowners.  We then followed the reviews in Tripadvisor and headed to The Hungry Buddha for dinner which offered excellent vegetarian and vegan food.  Yes, you read this correct, we were eating veg and vegan!  This place was set up by a Michelin starred foreigner chef who trained the local people who are excellent chefs, their skill and attention to detail was incredible.  There are only 10 barstools set around the tiny open kitchen and it was just mesmerising watching them work as we chatted to other guests.  In addition to the delicious food it offered excellent wine – result! 

On our last day we went to the huge market which was fascinating to walk around, take pictures and just enjoy the lively atmosphere as villagers came from far and wide to fill up their shopping baskets, grab some food and catch up with friends before heading home. 

We make no apologies for the excessive number of photographs of old people, animals, colourful ethnic costumes and cute kids – these are our reflections of Chinese life.

We had no Chinese money, couldn’t speak Mandarin and the ATM at Kunming airport wouldn’t take our card.  Oh ****, looks like we could be leaving China earlier than planned if things didn’t improve!

Anyway, things did improve.  We arranged a car from the hotel and the driver was waiting with a sign in English!  It was easy for him to spot us as we were the only foreigners in the airport.  We chose our hotel because the reviews said that Rebecca Yang at the hotel spoke really good English…..she did and with an Aussie twang!  We had emails from her confirming the taxi, train information and all sorts of other stuff but you can’t actually type with an Aussie accent so it was something of a surprise.  She told us where to get food, train tickets, how and where to catch the bus into the centre and what to eat or not to eat!  She also walked us to the nearby Bank of China ATM which was good enough to cough up 3000CNY (just over £300)…………we breathed a sigh of relief……so did she as we could now pay her for the room and the taxi!

Our first observations of Kunming are that for a massive city of over 6m people it’s a pleasant enough place to live.  There’s virtually no English spoken, all the scooters are electric and are unnervingly silent as they fly past you from all directions.  There are lots of rubbish bins so there’s hardly any litter, the traffic is quiet, people are dressed well, we haven’t seen too many beggars and most of the cars are imported from Japan and Germany.  There’s also a huge amount of building going on – ready mix concrete trucks queuing to get into a site at 8.45pm on a Sunday evening.  On the massive site next to the new metro project there’s a construction going on 24/7.  People are very friendly and helpful although our lack of Chinese does make it difficult when people try to help us.

Despite all the modernisation there is still space for the little man and his shop outside our hotel.  We went in to buy a beer and some milk, nobody could understand what anybody was saying, and suddenly out comes his phone and he spoke into it, pressed a button and hey presto a voice from the phone said, ‘yes, that carton milk’!  So you can speak into it and get a translation or you can type into and get the same.  Cheryl now has an app that if you scan some Chinese it will translate.  Obviously it does make life simpler but it doesn’t always work so sometimes we just have to smile, say xie, xie (phonetically cher cher which means ‘thank you’) and walk away.  Everybody has been really helpful including an old guy in our favourite grocers on our second visit.  We were trying to find out how much something cost and he tried to help with surprisingly good English.  When we left with our ‘xie xie’ he replied with a huge grin on his face ‘you’re welcome’.

We were in Kunming for 4 nights exploring the city but more importantly getting set for the rest of our trip.  Rebecca was brilliant giving us written translations for really common things and arranging taxis etc.  In addition, which wasn’t in the plan, we had to buy some warmer clothing aimed mainly at our planned walking later in the trip.  It started off here at about 23C which was lovely after the sweltering 35C of Bangkok but it suddenly plunged to about 4C overnight so buying coats was essential.  Ordering food has proved to be almost impossible as very few menus contain any English or pictures.  Most of the restaurants we’ve found offer buffet hot pots which tend to be quite dull.  Instead we’ve concentrated on food courts where the variety is huge and there are pictures that you can point to.  That way you’ve got a much better chance of getting somewhere near to what you thought you had ordered!  Food courts don’t have much ambience but sometimes needs must.

We did some sightseeing to a temple and the big lake in the centre.  At this point it was grey drizzle so we were very glad of the coats.  We were amused by the groups of people, mainly elderly, dotted around the park dancing, singing, playing instruments or playing cards and mah-jong.  Most groups bring their own large speaker system on wheels and we passed several groups all within earshot but each sticking to their own routines.  What a great way to socialise and keep fit and active. 

We moved on by train to the preserved town of Jianshui.  It was an amusing journey as we were the only foreigners and we had the Shopping Channel brought right to our seat as train employees did a selling job on sweets and flexible toothbrushes of all things. 

Jianshui has some colourful old buildings and is a good place to stop off on the way to our ultimate goal, The Yuanyang Rice Terraces which is a Unesco World Heritage Site.  Our onward journey was by local bus which proved to be something of an endurance test as men here seem to ignore no smoking signs and happily turn buses into smoke filled boxes – including the driver!  The journey wasn’t all bad as we did have lots to amuse us as we switched buses in Nansha for the final leg of our journey.  We had planned to get to Xinjie and then take a minibus to the terraces but as we got off the bus in Nansha another bus driver suggested we take his bus to Duoyishu.  There aren’t many foreign tourists in China, and any that are in this area are all heading for the rice terraces so it wasn’t surprising that this driver approached us. Cheryl had a quick look at Lonely Planet, it was close to where we were headed, and gave him the nod. 

The bus took us to our original staging point of Xinjie and when we tried to get off the driver said we should stay put.  When we say ‘he said’ it was all done by sign as he didn’t speak any English.  Off we went again, passing through a number of villages before getting to a small town where we stopped to let people off.  Then our rucksacks that had been in the storage place at the back of the bus appeared inside the cab.  What followed made us laugh so much as we became surrounded by boxes of food, snacks and all sorts of other things.  The driver attempted to move on but the small town was gridlocked by double parked vehicles blocking the roads and we sat there for almost an hour while the traffic cleared.  Nobody got angry…….it was amazing. 

After a while the driver asked Cheryl for her phone again so that he could read the translated name of our guesthouse.  We have been using booking.com and the app works offline to show the address of the hotel in the local language.  There was a tense moment for us as he and his nearby passenger both looked puzzled and there were a few head shakes.  He intimated that we should call the guesthouse but Cheryl, using her best sign language, explained that we did not have a Chinese sim.  He called the owner and before very long we stopped, he told us to get off, and after a lot of shouting down the hill we were miraculously met by a small van that took us right down to our guesthouse……thank you lovely bus driver! 

Have we mentioned before that ‘Lucky’ is Neil’s middle name?

So far in our travels we haven’t really felt overly challenged by being in China, despite not speaking any of the language apart from “hello” and “thanks”. Maybe it’s because we are familiar with life in Asia. We have travelled in Japan and learned to get by with gestures and smiles when you have a complete language barrier. Maybe it’s that we are just a little more relaxed in our attitude when things don’t appear to be going as you expect. We suspect that being on the tourist trail also helps as the local people we have met are used to hapless foreigners and can usually work out what is it that we want or are trying to do.

To test this theory we decided to leave our baggage in the hostel and take overnight packs for a couple of nights in the small town of Chongzuo to visit the town’s only attraction, the leaning Pagoda. We checked the train times the day before and set off in plenty of time for the train station. We were met with chaos and a seething mass of humanity in the ticketing hall, about ten queues of jostling people each about 25m long and not going anywhere fast. With almost an hour before our train departed we felt we had a reasonable chance of getting a ticket but joined separate queues just in case. Cheryl’s queue moved fairly quickly, until we realised it was due to the fact there was no ticket seller at the window and people in front had left to join another queue! The slowness of the queue, plus queue jumpers muscling in at the front, almost lead to queue rage….and suddenly a man in uniform appeared and stopped the jumpers. People were getting desperate and were pleading with those at the front to buy tickets for them.

With almost 15 mins to go, the ticket seller suddenly appeared in Cheryl’s queue……and a young girl ahead of her suddenly asked in perfect English “Do you need any help?. Cheryl did have the extract from Lonely Planet with Chongzuo in Chinese script, plus the train number and departure time written down to point to. However, the offer was accepted, and good job too as the ticket seller was reluctant to sell as there were only 7 mins left before departure. Tickets finally in hand we shouted our thanks and ran for the gate. We had to get through airline type bag scanners before finally arriving at the platform and onto the train with 2 mins to spare, phew! The whole chaotic experience was surprising as so far China has impressed us with its efficiency.

Three bum numbing hours later we were told our stop was next. We have found that when using public transport our destination is checked and we are told when to get off, which does make using transport in China pretty easy. Chongzuo is much smaller and less wealthy than Nanning but does have a small range of fairly upmarket shops and the usual good infrastructure of wide main streets. We soon discovered we were the only foreigners around and headed into town to find a bed for the night.

After using signs and gestures we got to see a few rooms, some good, some bad and some downright grubby and decaying. We eventually returned to the first one we tried and started to check in. The girls on reception did not speak any English but we managed to agree a price, work out that there was no internet or wifi, hand over passports and finally understand that what we thought was a huge price increase at the last minute was actually a room deposit! All OK so far we thought as Cheryl’s passport was scanned, then the second girl on reception made a phone call before scanning Neil’s passport.

Suddenly the deal was off, we were no longer welcome, and our money was given back to us along with the passports. A map of the town in Chinese was produced and another hotel was circled, “this engrish” the girl said. We were totally bemused….what had gone wrong? There was no arguing with them, it was clear we had to go.

We decided to head in the direction of the circled hotel and passed another hotel on the way. The reception staff were welcoming so we checked it out and it was pretty good apart from not having wifi. We decided that if the hotel we had been sent too was no good or too expensive we would return here.

Finally we reached the circled hotel. It was big and looked way out of our price range but we ventured in past the crowds collecting for what appeared to be a wedding party. The young man on reception spoke a little English and we checked the price, 130 Yuan (the most expensive so far but still bang on budget at £13). The room was the best we had seen, almost Hilton like in the size and layout of the room, with only the slightly grubby carpet to let it down. We went back to reception to confirm whether there was internet just as the longest set of firecrackers we have ever heard was set off for the wedding. The noise was incredible, totally deafening and continued as Neil pushed the limits of the young man’s English trying to explain about the internet. When the firecrackers eventually stopped we checked in without any problems.

After sorting out the room we went for a walk and wandered around the corner into the nearby neighbourhood. A westerner!!! Our westerner turned out to be the owner of a US style bar, after all he was from Tennessee, and so we decided to stop for a beer and a chat. Our host, Terry, was Operations Director for the local chemical company which appears to be part US owned. Hopefully, we thought, no relation to Bhopal based Union Carbide! Terry had the bar as a sideline which his Chinese wife ran whilst he was at work. He gave us lots of local information including the fact that in this town of around 0.5 million people there are now approximately 12 westerners. We had increased the number by 20%.

We explained to him what had happened over our strange hotel experience and he just smiled. It appears that the “authorities” like to keep westerners in the same location and that the call that the young girl made in the first hotel was probably to the police. They had clearly told her to send us to our chosen hotel which we have since found out is right opposite Police HQ……surprise, surprise! Either way, we weren’t bothered as our hotel was excellent for the price.

Later a couple of other westerners came into the bar, one French one American, for some drinks and overpriced familiar western food. After some tips on how to avoid dog in the food stalls we headed off for our budget priced food. What we eventually settled for was a 50/50 hit/miss. Pork with vegetables was a big hit, and the very chewy dish, which we eventually found out to be intestine, not such a winner. The green vegetables with garlic were, as usual, excellent. After another wander, some interaction with the locals to obtain water etc we headed back to our bed.

On Sunday we headed off to purchase our train ticket for tomorrow to avoid another “bun fight” on the day. No queue, no problem, so why so difficult yesterday? We then headed off to the bus station to catch the bus to Zuojiang Leaning Pagoda. It stated in Lonely Planet that you could get a local bus, number 3, but despite asking a number of bus officials we were eventually led outside and bundled into a taxi. Finding number 3 was just a tad difficult as none of the buses had numbers so we went along with the solution. The nice lady told the driver where to take us and after some sign language he confirmed that it would be no more than 20Yuan (a couple of quid!). As it turns out, it was 13Yuan so we were more than happy.

The pagoda, whilst not the most splendiferous, was very cute, plain and, as described, leaning. It was also virtually tourist free so we agreed our ferry price and headed off for the 15m journey across the river. The steps up the pagoda were very narrow and the roof very low so keeping your head down was the order of the day. A tough call for Neil with his track record but he did well…….only one minor collision which resulted in no blood……well done Nellie!

In the pagoda we met a young couple and the girl was clearly desperate to practice her “engrish” with “hello, where you from?” She tried again and again without being able to get anything else out. Then she said, “Change money?” Cheryl worked out that she wanted to change Yuan for English money. We explained that we didn’t have any money and then Neil remembered that we had a single £1 coin. Neil handed it to her and said, “1 English pound, the same as 10 Yuan”. “Too much” she said, not realising that we had given it to her. When she finally understood that it was a gift she was clearly ecstatic. Now she could go to high school tomorrow and show her friends her coin and explain that her “engrish’ friends had given it to her. (a lot of money, albeit useless, to a Chinese teenager). Do they have “show and tell” sessions in China schools we wondered?

After our visit we walked about a kilometre back to the main road to, hopefully, catch the number 3 bus. After a short while, 3 well dressed Chinese drove back from the pagoda in their fancy 4 x 4, crossed the main road and stopped, then gesticulated to us to get in. Assuming this was a lift and not an abduction we got in and without understanding anything that was said we eventually showed them some information from the hotel and that was exactly where they dropped us. Once again, very nice helpful Chinese that always want to assist the hapless westerner.

Before leaving our hotel we eventually worked out that that it had one or two quirky attributes. Hot water only appears after 20.00hrs and seems to last into the night but by 08.00hrs it was definitely “tepid”. “Bath” towels are not really bath towels at all but are of hand towel size. Not a major problem but it does make drying after a luke warm shower a little more complicated.

After returning to Nanning for one night we caught the early bus to cross the border into Vietnam. What was supposed to be an 8 hour journey was actually 10 (that’s unusual……NOT!!) so we weren’t too unhappy. The border crossing was pretty uneventful, Chinese side very smooth and the utterly shambolic Vietnamese making Dad’s Army look organised.

Our stay in Nanning has been mostly about catching up with news, photos and chilling out at The Nanning City Hostel with the other travellers. It’s run by Weston, a Texan, and it’s a very large apartment over 3 floors in a snazzy complex. It’s just like a flat share Canary Wharf Style with the accommodation a mix of dorms and private bedrooms and a large kitchen/dining and living area that includes an Xbox, Playstation 2 and DVD’s……the backpackers dream. Once again, there’s a mix of guests, Brits from Thornbury near Bristol (about 8 miles from our home in Bradley Stoke!), Americans, Canadians, Germans, Chinese, Austrians and Dutch.

The city itself is about 3.5 million people, clean and with tree lined boulevards making this a quite pleasant place to live. Drivers seem to use their horns much less and even have a little more patience with pedestrians. All in all not a bad place to hang out with parks to visit, trains to sort out, buses to book and different food to try.

Graham, who we first met in Yuangshuo, is also here and we’ve been out to eat with him a couple of times. One evening we went to a Muslim Noodle House where you can watch them make the noodles. The guy makes it look easy as he slowly kneads the dough and then stretches and makes the noodles……years of practice! We all pointed at the pictures on the wall and Graham’s choice turned out to be the most interesting. A large platter arrived with lots of chicken with some vegetables in a rich and tasty sauce, flavoured with cinnamon and star anise. The chicken was more bone than meat, which is tricky to eat with chopsticks, and included both claws and the head! Graham and Neil went for the claws and decided that they were both very dull and devoid of any meat (no shit Sherlock!). Graham baulked at the head but Neil gave it a go…..more Sherlock! Hey, it “head” to be done…..tee hee.

We are here for a reason. To get our visa for Vietnam and this one of the value added services that Weston offers to arrange for free. We’ve had experience before of the “flexible pricing” of visas in Vietnamese Consulates. This way, at least, we’re not going to have to pay the “tourist tax” as decided by the whim of a crooked clerk. 480Yuan (about £48) buys us a 90 day single entry visa. It takes 3 days and gives us more time to do the things we want rather than hassle with the Vietnamese authorities. After evaluating all our travel options into Vietnam we’ve decided to take a direct bus to Halong. It costs us about £17 each and will probably take about 8 hours including a couple of hours crossing the border at the Friendship Pass. Buying the tickets, a few days in advance, was quite easy as the ticket counter had an English translation so all we had to do was point to the chosen route and write down the date and time in the correct Chinese format of year/month/day.

We also set aside some time to visit the ancient town of Yangmei. It turned out to be a quaint village with some well preserved Qing Dynasty houses and not very touristy so it gave us the opportunity to explore the dusty alleyways without any hassle. Our day out was planned to be just the two of us. Then Graham decided to join us. Then a new arrival, Michael and his Chinese “friend”, agreed to join the party. Finally, at the very last minute, the five of us were joined by two young Chinese girls who were on holiday from further north. Like a lot of cities in Asia, Nanning has several bus stations, so we made a number of attempts over the previous couple of days to try and find the correct one. The Chinese girls were very impressed that we went directly to the correct one and even more impressed that we guessed the correct departure time of 11.00 a.m.

The bus was packed and, having been on a number of local Chinese buses in the past, we smartly headed straight for the last remaining space….a seat on the engine in the very front of the bus. We had a great view from the front and it was better than sitting on the plastic stools in the aisles that Michael and his friend had to put up with. Graham found a seat and the two girls joined us facing backwards sitting on the engine. The journey was pretty uneventful, albeit bumpy, but did take us through some busy countryside where all sorts of crops were being grown. Maize, beans, sugar cane, bananas, tomatoes and other salad ingredients plus masses of things that we hadn’t seen before.

We lost Michael and friend shortly after arriving so lunch was just the five of us. We headed down to the restaurants by the river and the Chinese girls helped us choose from the menu. We had a delicious lunch of tiny fried fish, beef with pickled cabbage, stuffed noodles, sliced pork with starfruit, rice and green vegetables. The girls also insisted on paying which was a very honourable and generous thing to do but made us feel very embarrassed. Nothing would change their minds.

On the journey home, we managed to get the five seats at the back of the bus.

Things were going nicely until we reached the level crossing in what can only be described as a soulless, godforsaken, cowboy town.

Here in this strange small town, the road narrows to single file to cross the tracks giving the potential for a major log jam. Sure enough, there were a number of large trucks stuck making it almost impossible for even motor bikes to weave through. Drivers had given up and gone to sleep, others had left their cabs (probably to get food) whilst others just sat and watched. Amazingly there was no road rage. Everyone just accepted the situation and got on with it. We had a little banter through the window with one of the drivers who was woken up by our laughing at him. He seemed to ask us what the situation was ahead so not really understanding exactly what he said we gave the “thumbs down” sign and that seemed to do the trick.

The journey back to Nanning was completed without much more ado and we arrived about 30 minutes late.

We’re now a step further south in a town called Yangshuo. It’s the premier destination for Chinese tourists who come for the Li River cruises to see some of the most spectacular scenery in the world. The number of large cruise boats, medium boats and bamboo rafts defies belief as it replicates the M25 on a Monday morning.

Sadly, as China is home to more than 1.3 billion people it seems that they all want to be here, especially on Saturday nights! It’s not all bad. The limestone karst scenery is stunning so we understand why they come here and they do come to have fun…..lots of fun! It is party town for the Chinese so who are we to criticise……after all it’s their country.

We had a couple of nights in a quieter part of town and then we moved to a much calmer and smaller village called Xingping, pronounced “shingping”. It has a really quaint old quarter that is pedestrianised with couple of very good restaurants. Whilst also very touristy in the day it becomes very sleepy at night with most places closing around 20.00.

The title of this blog is “Hello Bamboo?” The reasoning is simple as everywhere you go in Yangshuo and Xingping you are stalked by ladies asking “Hello Bamboo?” This simply means “would you like an overpriced tour of the river on a bamboo boat?” Firstly, the modern boats are not made of bamboo but plastic pipe and second, the way the ladies sidle up to you makes it all sound very illicit, almost as though bamboo was a form of marijuana…if only!

Our first experience in Yuangshuo was a touristy thing to do…..to watch a fisherman with his cormorants’ fishing at night. Whilst it was a show for tourists, it is still an art practiced by the older fisherman throughout the length of the Li River. Neil saw it on a TV nature programme about 5 years ago, probably David Attenborough, and decided that if he were ever to visit China then it would be on his list of things to see.

Since seeing the show, and visiting Xingping, we have seen a number of bamboo rafts carrying fishermen and their birds doing their stuff in a much more private manner. It is quite amazing. The birds have a small constriction around their necks and are trained to free swim the river, catch fish and bring them back to the raft for the fisherman to disgorge the birds and deposit the catch in a basket. Every 6/7 fish the master allows them to eat thus ensuring their loyalty. It’s very, very clever and fantastic to see man and beast working together so well. A bit like a shepherd and his trusty mutt!

Xingping is quite revered in China as on the back of the 20Yuan note there is a picture of one of the groups of limestone karsts that dominate this area of China. Here we are doing what all the Chinese tourists do…pose with their note (value £2)!!

The room in our guesthouse here in Xingping has the most impressive view we think we’ve ever had…….let us know what you think!

This area is also great for trekking and we’ve done a number of routes some of which have been quite tough….especially up the 1500+ steps (Fiona we didn’t count them) up the nearby karst to the viewing point to catch the sunset……boy was that steep and tricky. It was well worth it as the view below was breathtaking making the village on the opposite side of the river look like toy town. Again, see the pics as nothing we can say can adequately describe what we have seen, especially the sunset over the myriad peaks.

Yes, we did take a dawn bamboo raft trip up the river. By going at dawn we missed the “M25” rush hour and had the river almost to ourselves. Our boatman, whose name can best be described in syllables, (Sin, Chin, A), was great and pointed out some of the most interesting karsts. The locals have given them some amazing wonderfully poetic names like, The Eight Super Naturals, Tortoise Climbing up the Hill and Chicken Cage Hill.

The trip up the river took just over an hour and we decided to take the trek back which took us about 4 hours. Again, take a look at the pics which our “point and shoot camera” really doesn’t do justice to. If there are any camera buffs out there (Alex can we have your camera when you’ve finished with it?) then you need to visit this place! We did name one of our own karsts, Snail Crossing the River, and Neil was good enough to pose as usual.

We returned back to Yangshuo to stay in a different guesthouse where all the food is included in the price. Whilst breakfast is no great shakes, dinner is served for all the travellers around one big table. It’s very sociable and it offers a great opportunity to swap stories and pick up ideas. In addition, the food that Mr Wei and his family put on the table is quite excellent.

What is also lovely about this hostel is that when you walk in the door everyone puts on a pair a cutesy knitted slippers which means that all the floors are kept so clean. You also need to ring the doorbell when you want to come in so it feels like being a teenager again…..”and what time do you call this?!” We have Brits here, Austrians, Germans, French, Spaniards and an Chinese/American….it’s such a friendly social place to stay. Sadly, we leave tomorrow for Nanning.

We were looking for an off the beaten track adventure and decided to leave most of our baggage behind at the guesthouse to head off for a few days to walk the Dragon’s Backbone Rice Terraces.

We left the guesthouse in Guilin by a private “taxi” with a few other travellers to take the 2 hour drive to Ping’an. A pretty but very touristy village about 1000m up in the hills that are dotted with other villages occupied by the Red Yao people. Our room for the night had a stunning view over the valley and the rice terraces which date back around 600 years. Whilst a little over our budget, it was the best room we saw and the view was fabulous.

We ate in a nearby guesthouse with Shaun, a young lone traveller from Chepstow of all places. He had been teaching English in Japan and was on his way home to the UK for Christmas. He was doing it the hard way, overland via the Mongolia and Russia railway. Our host for dinner was Mei, a really friendly lady who spent her “not working” time buried in a self teach English book. Whilst we ate and chatted she was busily reading out loud to herself the usual garbage these books teach you. “I can wait for an appointment but my toothache won’t”! We had a lot of banter with her including explaining the meaning of “urgent” by Neil pretending he was desperate for a wee…she soon got the meaning.

Next morning we had the best breakfast yet with Mei whilst explaining a few more things from her book. Then it was off to take the 5 hour hike through the hills to our next destination Dazhai. We headed off up the steep track towards the terraces. The scenery was everything it was cracked up to be. The only slight disappointment being the fact that just a couple of weeks earlier most of the rice had been harvested. Our pictures couldn’t capture the natural beauty of the countryside or the amazing engineering feat of the terracing….truly spectacular.

We met a number of people along the way many of whom had been ‘weak’ and given in to the constant hassle from the locals wanting to act as guides. Whilst the route isn’t particularly well signed it didn’t take much working out for anyone with an ounce of grey matter. One small group in particular, from Philadelphia, had hired two guides to get them to the terraces and then another local guide to navigate the terraces themselves. They were amazed that we were doing this alone, “Do you speak Mandarin?” “Not a word” said Neil. “How do you get by?” “With signs, pointing and lots of laughs!” said Cheryl, “and when it goes wrong you have a great story to tell”. They were gobsmacked at our relaxed attitude.

The rice terraces area is the home of the Red Yao People. They are a minority people occupying a very small part of China. Apart from the brightly coloured traditional dress worn by the ladies they have one other claim to fame….they sport amazingly long hair and in the case of our host to be in Dazhai village, all the way down to her ankles! It is worn wrapped elaborately around their heads and often topped off with a black felt hat.

Once in Dazhai we set about finding a bed for the night. After about 3 or 4 attempts we settled on a room in the ‘Jinkeng Mountain Hamlet’ a traditional wooden hotel. Our host didn’t speak a word of English but with “sign and pointing” plus the aid of a calculator display we agreed a price of 50 Yuan, a little less than £5, and our cheapest room yet, and with the added value of a western toilet! The season is coming to an end here and the guesthouse was going through some improvement and all the chaos brought Fawlty Towers to mind. Her husband, “Basil”, was busy making a huge din with a circular saw in one of the adjoining rooms making our viewing of the room and the subsequent negotiations something of a challenge. “Sybil” shouted at him in Yao with something along the lines of “shut the f**k up” but it didn’t work and she turned back to us with a nice Sybil smile, as though nothing was going on, and encouraged us back downstairs to complete the formalities (parting with money).

We had dinner, probably our best yet, in another guesthouse followed by a walk through the village, just in time to see our first whole cooked dog being prepared for the table. Just next door we bought some local bottled hooch after the proprietor had attempted to sell us his own various brews from large glass demijohns. Whilst the room and bed were very comfortable our sleep was not good. Our guesthouse had a number of animals freely wandering around, both inside and outside, pig, chickens and ducks. The cockerel had quite clearly not been given a watch by his owner as he spent all night roosting in a tree outside our window desperately trying to impress us with his “cock a doodle doo” (noisy little bastard)!

Travelling independently does not always guarantee success, and we do get the occasional dud. Breakfast from our host was just one of those duds. Pancakes and eggs floating in oil, not at all appetizing but after a few mouthfuls it was amazing how quickly our appetites were satisfied.

After our “un-petit dejeuner” we caught a number of local buses to get us to The Chengyang Wind and Rain Bridge and the village of Ma’an. Yet another dud! Whilst both the bridge and the village were quaint , neither were worth the arse numbing hours spent on the buses getting there plus the steep £6 admission fee.

However, it was not a complete dud as we did have some local “cabaret” after dinner. Just after we arrived in the village we met a couple who had been staying in the guesthouse in Guilin. We thought we might have bumped into them for dinner somewhere in the tiny village. It didn’t happen but on return to our accommodation we found them inside having their meal. They had been “adopted” by two local guys who had been drinking heavily.

The Dong people have a reputation for fun and these two guys were no exception. There was a total language barrier but with lots of laughing, singing and quaffing, we seemed to communicate and have fun. The highlight of the cabaret was the “gentle slow motion comedy falling” off his seat of one of the locals. Everyone burst out laughing as he went, taking everything off the table with him, including our bottle of local spirit. Check out the pics but no surprises for guessing who fell off his seat. The lady of the house didn’t bat an eyelid. She got off her chair and swept up the debris before providing more beers from the fridge. Cheryl shot off to buy more supplies of very expensive 32% proof…….for 60p!

Next day was notably cooler so we decided to return to Guilin to catch up on mail and plan the next couple of weeks…..busy, busy, busy!

We know that at least two of our readers have done some very extreme travelling more than 20 years ago so to them this probably sounds all very tame. However, for us, just like the guys from Philadelphia, it’s good to get out of your comfort zone and take a few risks. Going “off piste” can be challenging to various degrees depending on your experience so we really enjoyed the last few days and It has encouraged us to do more.

China was the top of Cheryl’s “must do” list so, after places like Vietnam and Hong Kong, it was good to cross something off her list, in fact, long overdue. Her ultimate “must do” is to walk The Great Wall but that will have to wait until April/May.

Getting the visas in Hong Kong turned out to be a great plan with the whole process going perfectly and much cheaper than having to make two journeys to London. Getting out of Hong Kong and into China at Shenzhen was, quote Lonely Planet, “a breeze”. Get on the metro, one change onto the East Railway Line and, 45 minutes later, you’re going through immigration. Once through customs it’s a 500m walk to the main station.

Even though there wasn’t a single English sign, getting a ticket for the overnight sleeper was also relatively easy once we had shown the nice lady a copy of the trusty guidebook with its translation of Guilin, our destination, into Chinese characters. “Hard or soft sleeper”? “Soft please”. It was done, all we had to do was while away 5/6 hours. Downtown Shenzhen is very glitzy and the malls are full of very expensive brands, much like HK. Lunch was also easy as there were familiar HK brands in the malls.

Every new adventure brings at least one funny story and Neil had yet another while checking out the mall near the station. Going up the escalator he was followed by a young guy trying to sell him jeans, watches, in fact, anything you could think of. Neil kept silent as he always does. Up four flights and he was still trying to sell him stuff. As Neil started his descent his friendly salesman shouted, ‘you want Viagara”? At this point Neil could not hold out any longer and burst into laughter and shouted “no, no viagara, I don’t want to buy anything, only my lunch’!!! “You must want something, anything, you must buy something!” “Yes, my lunch”!! He went away.

Once on the train we found our cabin. Soft sleeper comes with 4 berths so we were pleased to find out that one of our room mates spoke Chinglish very well, in fact, he was very well educated and spoke very good English. He was very chatty and explained that he and 17 colleagues had been to Taiwan on business. They had flown into HK and many of them had followed the lead of their younger member, our room mate, and bought iPads. He spent much of the start of the journey showing them how to use it. He went off to speak with some of his other mates and returned shortly later to tell us that he had been able to switch his berth leaving us on our own……result!

The compartment was excellent. Very comfortable berths, carpet, a/c, sheets/quilts/pillows all provided and hot water in a flask to make tea/coffee (wish we’d known!). All in all, at £40 each to cover just over 1000kms, it was fab value. We did have a peep at hard sleeper class and decided that we had made a top decision. 6 berths in much narrower cabins, no lockable door, just open corridor with occasional seats for people to get away from their “room” mates! Yes, as we are worth it, a top decision.

We had taken provisions onto the train to see us through the journey which very soon ran out. Neil went up to the buffet car to find that the beer was sold out…..”what”? Two guys and a girl, who had been translating for him to the buffet attendant, had obviously drunk most of the beer on the train as they had multiple empties on the table. After much banter she talked Neil into buying a bottle of local hooch….mmmm….£1’s worth of fire!!

We both slept well and arrived in Guilin a little early at around 07.00. The guest house was only around a 10-15 minute walk and we were shown to our room without delay. Hot shower, breakfast and the day was on. The guesthouse is away from the centre of town which is great as it’s quiet with its own bar, garden (where this is being typed), and large rooms with funky art work on the walls. We’ve checked out some other guesthouses and decided that this one is OK.

Just a short walk away is a large shopping mall with a great food court offering many superb food options, on table BBQ’s and a large beer and a coke for 90p!

Guilin is much more China as we expected. While a lot of it is grey concrete it does have a lovely walk along the Li River, one of reasons we came here. The people are generally affluent, there is some poverty which we didn’t see in Shenzhen, but they are so friendly. The guys in the guesthouse speak great English and are helping us with planning our “off piste” adventure but communication with many locals is via sign language which can be hilarious for all concerned.

As we neared the hostel on our way back after dinner, a little guy in the security gates beckoned us in and played his musical instruments for us. He danced as he sang with his banjo then followed with an impressive tune on what can only be described as an elongated 2 string violin played with a bow but balanced on his knee. He giggled as his picture was taken, a thoroughly lovely old man.

We are getting cocky and decided that organised trips (tourist rip offs) are not for us. We’re leaving our baggage at the guesthouse to travel independently via local bus, to The Dragons Backbone Rice Terraces. We’ll be gone for 3 nights, finding beds on the way, so watch this space.