Tiger Leaping Gorge

This past weekend I traveled to Lijiang in the northwest corner of Yunnan, next to Tibet. Lijiang is a very touristy town, with a newly constructed "Old Town" and plenty of souvenirs. While many Chinese tourist go to Lijiang for the Old Town, my friends and I went for the breathtaking scenery and hike of Tiger Leaping Gorge. Lying between the Jade Dragon Snow Mountain (Yulong Xueshan) and the Haba Snow Mountain (Haba Xueshan) is Tiger Leaping Gorge (Hutiao) created by the Golden Sands River (Jingsha). It is believed to be the deepest gorge in the world. Near the river's mouth lies a large rock, an ancient legend says that a tiger used this rock as a stepping stone to leap from one side of the gorge to the other, and that is how the gorge got its name.

Lijiang "Old Town"

We hiked for about two hours to the first guest house, where we stayed the night since it was another two hours until the next guest house and it was getting dark fast. The view from my room was better than any view I've ever had at a hotel. We got up the next day, had a hearty breakfast and took off for our 8 hour hike we had ahead of us. The path was at times very steep and very much on the edge of the cliff, but was worth the effort for the view of the mountains. Seeing the snow on the tips of the mountains reminded me of when my family took a vacation out to the Rocky Mountains and I could play in the snow in the middle of July!

My friends up ahead walking on the trail around the bend of the mountain, this was the view for most of the hike

We made it down the mountain around 6 pm and were quite exhausted and sweaty. We found a van to take us back to Lijiang where we could find a hot shower and dinner. About ten minutes into the drive, we were stopped by a minor "roadblock". There were five men about 50 yrds up the mountain jarring large rocks off the mountain and onto the road. I am not sure why they were doing this, I am guessing for safety reasons, to get rid of the loose boulders so they won't come down on any cars or people. So our van waited for an hour, watching these large rocks and boulders bounce off the mountain, onto the road and into the gorge. Then the men ran down the mountain and cleared away the big rocks so the waiting cars could drive through. It was very interesting to see, a bit of a hazard but thats China.

The end of the trip concluded with a ten hour train ride back to Kunming. I tried to avoid the stares of the villager sitting 3 feet across from me but after a while I couldn't resist and starred at him back. Yunnan is a very rural province, so while traveling you might run into villagers who have never seen a foreigner in their lifetime. I am used to being starred at and don't make a big deal of it, but I knew I had ten hours ahead of me on this train and when I caught this mans gaze I couldn't help but laugh.

Overall the trip was great. I am very, very sore this week but now have some great pictures to some day turn into paintings!