Day 31-32 (Nai Gu Shilin)

Arrived in Shilin town along with 20 other tour busses, all packed with camera happy Chinese tourists getting ready to follow a flag bearing guide around for just long enough to grab a few pics and then get crammed back onto their busses to the next location...needless to say I didn't stick around...3 hours hiking to the North and I was in farm country. Within minutes I began to see groups of Limestone forests, most about the size of a small city block, each completely individual, some with pine forests growing between them, some with smaller sections forming huge natural mazes (second picture).

Some of these columns reached approximately 30m in height, they varied from the thin breakable kind to collosal towers. Each one of these stone forests were within a kilometer of each other but what made this area even better was the fact that other than the occassional farmer, there was no-one else here. I ended up camping under a pine tree between two huge columns.

The following day was a hike back to Shilin to catch a bus to kunming.

Day 30 (Kunming)

And on the 30th day Max rested, and rest he did....and eat and drink ludicrous amounts, I met Jeremie from France, who I spent most of the day with, exploring the backstreets of the city in search of the last of Kunmings old buildings (which are being replaced by towering apartment blocks, derived of any character).

For supper we grew to a group of three. Supper was the best kind, in a backstreet with the locals, eating at a table no higher than my knees and sitting on toddlers play chairs... but as usual the food was great.


One of the many shops selling Chinese Liquor, everything from Bat & egg to fermented snail liqour.....MMMMMhhhh

Day 26-28 (Tiger Leaping Gorge)

I knew that being the 3rd deepest gorge in the world, the cliffs on iether side would be big, but I had no idea quite how big...no wait not "big", bloody enourmous!!!! Unfortunately it is impossible to really show the size of these mountains in these photos.

The first night in the gorge was also my birthday night, and I spent it consuming a feast of equally enourmous proportions, in a small guest house overlooking the gorge. This was a birthday to remember.

The following day was spend completeing the 8hour hike through the gorge. Excellent scenery, undeveloped landscapes and the sheer magnitude of this place made it an unforgetable experience. The hike itself is fairly simple, with only 2 decent uphills, however the hike is best done slowly to take in all the scenery, and with something new around every corner (interesting locals, goats and donkeys blocking the way, waterfalls, makeshift bridges to negotiate, etc) the trip just doesn't last long enough.

I reached the end at 2 in the afternoon, to late to catch a bus back to Quintou and to early to relax at a guest house for the rest of the day, so I decided to go down to the river (oh by the way it's the Yangtze that flows through the gorge) and walk the bottom path as well, which turned out to be the best part of the hike. You end up walking a few centimeters away from a decent plunge into the river. I decided to take a shortcut up the gorge wall, which nearly ended badly, as most of the cliffs are made of very brittle rock, and cuppled with some rain made any further ascent impossible. At the end of the path (3 hours later) you ascend a ladder (sky ladder) from the bottom of the gorge up to the road, which makes for some great photos as well.

I have returned to Lichang, enroute to Kunming, where I will plot the next section of my journey.