Around 09-09-2006
The main problem with China is not their weird language nor their 'letters'. It's their lack of Campingaz bottles. This might seriously lower the amount of hot tea I'm going to drink in remote areas of Chinese wilderness.
Anyway. We met with the rest of the group and the 10 of us took the train to Huangshan. Chinese trains (cheapest type, cheapest class) are a bit uncomfortable (but allow to make friends with a LOT of people) - but once mastered, are perfectly okay. You just have to spread your camping mat under the seats, then put up with your nose being 5cm away from the underside of the seat, The Sweep smearing all the dirt evenly across the whole floor rather than removing it and Chinese spitting on the floor. Hopefully around you.
Huangshan (or The Yellow Mountains) are one of the most spectacular in the whole World. If you've seen Polish Szczeliniec or Czech Ardspach - you can multiply them by ten to get the general idea. Chinese say, that one who walks the Huangshan will never want to climb any other mountains. They might be right.
We dumped half of our stuff in a hotel and with lighter backpacks - left for a hike. Unfortunately, the weather was cloudy and misty so we didn't get to see a fraction of what Huangshan has to offer - but they were magnificent anyway. There's a picture in a post below. After going up, we spent a night in tents between the highest peaks, in front of a hotel (they 'suggested' us that the nearby meadow is not a good idea. Snakes). In the morning it turned out that half of the Chinese population is going to the "See the sunrise in the Huangshan" trip. Around 300 of them were around our tents, pointing with their fingers and taking pictures. We got used to it by now.
After an exhausting day - only 13km on flat surface, but ludicrous amounts of climbing - we went back to the hotel. The late-evening visit from 2 girls offering a "massage" was little a bit of a surprise. They didn't get discouraged by us sending them off, and kept calling on the telephone - until Batman choked on the watermelon and kept coughing into the receiver for 30 seconds.
Around 12-09-2006
Another "The best of the world" experience. And not the last. Karst landscape of Guilin (biggest city around) and Yangshuo region is absolutely breathtaking. Again - there's a picture in previous post. We took a boat down the Li river one day, and hired bikes for another. Both trips changed a bit our opinion on how beautiful mountains should look like. I'll post more pictures when I'm back home.
Around 16-09-2006
The terrace rice fields are something unthinkable in Poland. Rice is grown on perfectly flat surface, as it has to be planted in shallow water. And yet, the Chinese managed to successfully grow rice in the mountains. The steps they carved look like isolines projected directly onto the terrain. Somehow, I didn't post a picture last time - and can't do that now, so just go here.
We managed to sneak in through a narrow, severely damaged by water streams path. Therefore, we didn't wind up in the main, tourist-focused village, but rather in a sleepy, completely forsaken one. It seemed like the time stopped 500 years ago there. The village stood almost unmodified since our Dark Ages. The group got spread (Bozena, Krzysiek and I hitch-hiked up the road, the rest stayed behind), so it was a bit more quiet and a bit less hasty. We enjoyed the atmosphere of Longji for some time, spent a night at Zhong minority hut (0,5 euro :)), and met with the rest in Guilin.
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