China - Jiejie's Excellent Sichuan and Yunnan Adventure

After a 3-week absence from Beijing (and Flyertalk), I return with some information and thoughts, which might be useful for those looking for some ideas and how-to’s for these areas of China. To start off, some parameters:

Length: 3 weeks, Beijing-to Beijing. Depart October 28, return November 18.

Travel Style: Independent Soloist on a budget but not backpacker/hosteler low budget. In other words, private rooms w/bath, not dorms, and a mix of transportation methods. No name brand or international chain hotels used (I ain't got no points!).

Travel Planning: Little to no advance planning—the “Non-Susiesan Method” or if you will, the Jiejie Maneuvers. For those of you who followed susiesan’s threads on this forum, and her meticulous 12-month planning process for the details of her 16-day trip....well, I confess to doing very little before I left Beijing except buy a plane ticket to Chengdu, make a reservation for there and Zigong on sinohotel.com, and grab a folder of notes on various places in these provinces that I’d been compiling over the last few years. This methodology allowed for quite a bit of flexibility, which definitely came into play later into the trip.

Useful Tools: #1) Laptop, which I decided to schlep along in my daypack, even though it is not exactly a lightweight piece. Proved to be useful in the evenings for doing a bit of research on the next few day’s sights, and for making onward hotel and air ticket arrangements. Also for writing diaries/narratives about my journey (I don’t have an online blog). Except for one location along the way, every place I stayed had either Ethernet cable or wifi access...all free in the room rate. #2) Master notebook where I jotted down info I found along the way on transport, entries, sketch maps made on the fly, onward planning, tidbits gleaned, impressions etc. as well as what I spent. I normally keep these travel notebooks in my archives after I return from each trip.

Funding Method: All cash RMB, except VISA credit card for one night splurge hotel and one air ticket booked along the way via Travelzen.com. (no, I was not DCC’d at either place). Yes, this means I was carrying around a pile of RMB cash except near the latter part of the trip, also carrying USD currency, ATM, and credit cards.

Final Itinerary (after adjustments on the way, the last half of itinerary changed markedly from the original plan):
--Beijing (flight)-->Chengdu (3 nights)-->Zigong (1 night)-->Chengdu (connection to overnight train)-->Kunming (2 nights)-->Jianshui (1 night)-->Yuanyang (2 nights)-->Kunming (connection to overnight train)-->Lijiang (3 nights)-->Shaxi/Shibaoshan (1 night)-->Lijiang (2 nights)—Zhongdian (= Shangrila, 1 night)-->Chengdu (1 night)-->Chongqing/Dazu (2 nights)-->Beijing. Total of 21 nights on the road.

Intercity Transportation Methods:
3 Flights: a) PEK-CTU (obtained week in advance of travel by phone booking with ctrip, paid cash at ctrip’s Beijing office); b) DIG-CTU (obtained 11/9 for travel 11/15, purchased with cash at MU’s Lijiang office); c) CKG-PEK (obtained 11/14 for travel 11/18, purchased online via Travelzen.com, which had better pricing than ctrip for this flight).

2 Overnight Trains, Hard Sleeper: a) Chengdu-Kunming (purchased 10/26 in Beijing satellite ticket office for travel 11/1); b) Kunming-Lijiang (purchased 11/3 at Kunming train station, for travel 11/7).

3 High-Speed Day Trains (“D” type): a/b) Chengdu-Dujiangyan-Chengdu; c) Chengdu-Chongqing. All purchased as walk-up day of travel.

Rest of travel: Intercity Buses. For four longer journey segments, I purchased a pair of seats to guarantee more comfort and to keep my daypack/computer/valuables with me: Yuanyang-Kunming, Lijiang-Jianchuan and Jianchuan-Lijiang, also Lijiang-Zhongdian (Shangrila). Longer journeys were usually purchased day before travel to ensure my preferred departure time; shorter journeys just walk-up purchasing next available bus.

Hotel Reservations: Generally made only a few days in advance, mostly through sinohotel.com except for one location on ctrip.com (not available through sinohotel). Three locations in small towns were walk-up, no advance reservation. Nothing required prepayment, all were pay on arrival. All places wanted a deposit as well, put on a credit card or additional cash, refunded upon departure. I used the cash deposit method and kept my credit cards pretty much under wraps.

Over the next few days or so, I’ll add information to this thread for each of these places, reflecting how I set up activities and in some cases, impressions/opinions.

Had three must-sees on the list for Chengdu area:
1) Giant Panda Breeding Center
2) Sanxingdui Museum, in Guanghan city north of Chengdu
3) Dujiangyan, ancient river engineering works west of Chengdu

First day, had mid-afternoon to evening: Wenshu Temple (RMB 5 entry), a pleasant "filler" site, then subway'd down to Renmin Square and took a look at some of the new development going on. Walked all the way to "old street" Kuan Xiang Zi, lively and interesting in the evening. Nice people and good food in Chengdu, although the diagonal running streets mean you should take along a good map, preferably one better than Chinese one I had.

Second day, Pandas + Sanxingdui. Taxiied from hotel to Panda Breeding Center (RMB 41 taxi, RMB 58 entry). ARRIVE EARLY so you can see Pandas when they are eating and active. I arrived at the ticket booth at 08:20, not too many tour groups around then, and immediately went straight to the back part of the Center--the Panda Kitchen (where the chow that augments the bamboo is formulated), Panda House #1, then the Nursery, then Panda House #2. The keepers will be putting out the bamboo then, and the Pandas are pretty active. Most of the Chinese tours go to the front panda enclosures, so do the opposite and head up the hill and to the back. Trust me on this. There's also a tram you can take if you can't walk up (there is an upward road gradient though if you take it easy, not too bad to walk). After the feeding at Panda House 2 which has the 6 adults (check, but feeding commences usually 9:00 or 9:15), then work your way back to the front enclosures, which will be getting crowded by now...and the red pandas which look more like big red raccoons, and are not crowded. Also check out the continous-loop little cinema on the Breeding Center which is near the red panda houses. I finished up and exited the Center about 10:30, just as hordes of foreign and Chinese groups were entering. So...2 to 2.5 hours is a good time duration for a complete visit. Unless you want to queue for getting your picture taken holding a Panda (RMB 1000)--I didn't. And remember: EARLY!

Outside the Center's gate, I saw the bus I needed to Zhaojue Bus Station (near Zhaojue Temple) was pulling away and not wanting to wait for the next, I took a waiting taxi to the Bus Station (RMB 25). Arrived at 11:00 and bought an immediate ticket to Guanghan (RMB 15) for the 11:15 bus. Bus went down the north expressway about 30 minutes to Guanghan bus station, outside the station are smaller local buses, found #6 (sign also may read 006) which goes to Sanxingdui, hopped on, and after a short wait, bus went through downtown Guanghan, turned parallel to the river, and then to the entry of Sanxingdui Museum, total of about 15 minutes and RMB 1.50.

Once past the guard house, visitors should turn immediately left across the front parking lot, and enter the big gray monumental Tourist/Visitor Center. Follow the hallway on the first floor to the ticket booths (Entry: RMB 82), then continue down the hallway to the entry turnstiles. There are human guides and audio guides available for hire, and I believe English is available for both, but I didn’t get the cost. Once in the entry plaza, head to the closest building which is the Comprehensive Building—it’s well curated, well captioned, and designed and presented to international standards. Clearly not the usual dusty Chinese warehouse of relics. Very interesting background on ancient Shu culture. After this is about a kilometer walk down a long processional walk to the Bronzes Building, many of which are bizarrely non-Chinese. If you see them, you’ll probably agree you haven't seen anything quite like them before. Note: the ticket you get has to be presented not only at the initial entry point in the Visitor’s Center, but also at each of the two exhibit buildings (Comprehensive and Bronzes) which has its own turnstile, with the ticket being good for one entry to each. So, once inside each building, get your fill before you exit that building, because you can’t go back in for a second bite at the apple on that ticket. (This is a bit of an aberration in Chinese museum entry practices, so thought worth a warning.)

To the side of the Bronzes Building is a park with a series of moats and pathways. Unfortunately these were drained of water for reasons unknown, so weren’t very attractive. A ceremonial altar (rebuilt) is nearby, IMO a less important feature. There is a path to the “Back Rampart” of the Museum site, possibly with an excavation pit display, but it was a very very long walk to get there, and I got mixed messages on whether it was open and whether it was worth seeing or not. So I have no first hand knowledge of that area of Sanxingdui. The Conservation Building was being renovated with completion date unknown—this may in the future have some things open to the public on the more technical aspects of the excavation and preservation. On the subject of the Museum site itself, it is quite large, even overblown and overly spread out for the buildings it contains, and for no clear reason. It’s obvious a lot of money has been put into the place, but it doesn’t seem to receive many visitors, considering the great significance of the archeological finds here. And it's fairly easy to access from Chengdu. I spent about 12:20 -14:00 inside the museum grounds, then exited to the road to find my way back.

There are two options to get back to Chengdu on public transport: 1) The same way as inbound, just in reverse. In this case, the #6 bus stop for the return journey is about 5-8 minutes’ walk to the left of the Museum gate, at the intersection by the river. The #6 can be flagged down after it returns from drop-offs at the Museum on the outbound. 2) Direct bus to Chengdu, usually 2x per hour during the day. Stand outside the Sanxingdui gate at the left wall (with back to guardhouse), and flag down the bus when it comes by. RMB 16 paid on the bus. I found this bus by accident when I saw two locals obviously waiting around for something, and I asked them! It does not go back into central Guanghan and does not take the expressway, but instead takes the back roads and passes through some rather unattractive salvage yards and other similarly unappetizing scenery. It also takes a bit longer than the other bus (1 hour 15 minutes) but does not require any connections and also ends up at Chengdu Chengbei bus station, which is near the Main Railway station, the subway/Metro, tons of city bus lines, and a lot more convenient to most hotels than Zhaojue Bus Station. I arrived back at Chengdu Chengbei at 15:45 which still left plenty of time to do something else. Taxi to my hotel: RMB 13.

Total cost of Day Trip, hotel-to-hotel, as individual, public transport, no guided tour:
Transport: RMB 41 + 25 + 15 + 1.5 + 16 +13 = 111.50. Entry Fees: RMB 58 + 82 = 140. Total: RMB 251.50.

Third day was supposed to be a long, active daytrip leaving early in the morning to Qingchengshan for a hike and climb, followed by an afternoon at nearby Dujiangyan to see the ancient dam-less river engineering works. Due to fatigue and lousy air quality, the Shan plan was dumped in favor of just going to Dujiangyan. Old method was getting to Dujiangyan from Chengdu by bus (1.5-2 hours). However, for the last couple of years, the new method is to take the high-speed D train from Chengdu (north) Rail Station. So I taxiied from hotel to station (RMB 13). Bought a ticket at 10:15 for the 11:12 train--remember passport is required to buy a C, D, or G train ticket. This train only takes 40 minutes to get to Dujiangyan, and that's with 3 intermediate stops! It functions more as a commuter train and there is a lot of development west of Chengdu. Cost is RMB 15 for train ticket (2nd class seat which is fine for this short journey). Train was quite full at midday though it was a Sunday.

Arrived at Dujiangyan Station just before noon and immediately went to the ticket office and bought a return ticket for the 15:17 back. (Had to get back to Chengdu in time to freshen up for dinner with mnredfox, who was coincidentally in Chengdu as a prelude to his own adventure trip!). Return ticket secured (also RMB 15), I set about finding a taxi. Had to wait awhile since the ones waiting for my train had all been taken while I was purchasing return ticket, and were gone. This new station for high-speed trains is out in the middle of nowhere. There are also buses, and as I found out later from a local, the #4 bus goes right to the Dujiangyan gate for RMB 1 or 2, but it takes about 30 minutes. After about 15 minutes' wait, I got a taxi which on meter was RMB 14 to the entry site, about 10 minutes. Remember: if you come to Dujiangyan by high-speed train, you must have motorized transport to cover the distance between station and town: either bus, taxi, or private car.

Arrived at Dujiangyan Irrigation System ticket booth about 12:30, a lot of tour groups there seemed to be leaving, probably for lunch. I hoped that the afternoon group schedule was also at lunch, leaving me with a smaller crowd to contend with for about another hour (this proved to be true). Entry ticket RMB 90, which is pricey. This is a site that really is best to come to with advance research under your belt, and probably also with some sort of interest in engineering sorts of things. Viewed in this light, it's a brilliant piece of engineering that exists nowhere else in the world. Water control without building a dam. (There has been a spillway constructed to the side in more recent times, but it doesn't diminish the original concept nor that it still works after 2000 years.) Walk over both the near and the far suspension bridges. You can cut your walking down the diversion island by taking a tram (RMB 10 one-way or 15 round trip) from one end to the other. Across the far suspension bridge, there is a hill with a number of pagodas that make for a nice ramble, but I didn't have time. Unfortunately, the Museum part of the park that normally has the exhibits and explanations, was under reconstruction when I was there. But if you do advance research and take a diagram with you, you can manage. Dujiangyan is a UNESCO World Heritage site and has decent signage. I'm a bit geeky for technical stuff, so I thought this was a very worthwhile site and was OK with the value I received for the entry fee. Unavailability of the museum/exhibition was a minor annoyance (and the first but not the last such instance on this trip.)

Although there are other entrances/exits to Dujiangyan which would be useful to avoid backtracking if you have a private car/driver at your disposal, I felt I needed to retrace steps back to main entrance to find taxi back to rail station. Exited at 14:20, so I was onsite for just under 2 hours which is probably about right for most people, unless you want to explore the previously mentioned pagodas on the far hill. Getting a taxi back wasn't too hard but wasn't effortless either. Tips: 1) BLUE taxis can go to the high speed train station but GREEN taxis cannot. If you are heading for the bus station to get back to Chengdu, then Green taxis are OK. They are zone-regulated. For BLUE taxis, out front of the gate there is signage and pavement marking indicating the taxi stop area. First taxi that came by wanted off-meter price of RMB 30 which I refused and waited for another. Two minutes later another one came by and I got in, he wanted RMB 20 which I agreed to. It was apparent that outbound to the station, taxis don't like to use meter. I also got a rant and an earful about how the location of the High-Speed rail station sucks, etc etc. Cabbies in this town seem to be a crabby bunch, indeed. And they drive dangerously and insanely--you have been warned. But at least the ride was mercifully short--maybe 15 minutes max. Dujiangyan town is quite a bit larger than I expected. It is also possible to spend the night here, possibly a good option if you are headed further west into the hills.

The 15:17 train got me back to Chengdu right at 16:00. Walked over to Chengbei Bus Station to buy tomorrow's ticket to Zigong, then taxiied back to hotel (RMB 14) for a freshen up for meet-up and dinner with mnredfox.

Total cost of Day Trip, hotel-to-hotel, as individual, no guided tour (English speaking site guides are available, cost unknown):
Transport: RMB 13 + 15 + 14 + 20 + 15 + 14 = 91. Entry: RMB 90. Tram onsite: RMB 10. Total: RMB 191.


Additional: While I was a bit late for the dinner meet-up with mnredfox, we eventually met, found a place for dinner, and had a nice chat. Fortuitously, he had brought a gift bottle of wine for me and equally fortuitously, our original plan of having beer with dinner had to be abandoned when the only cold "beer" the restaurant had was some ridiculously expensive alcohol-free crap. Remember Jiejie's Rule in China: Always have Plan B. Plan B was to have the staff produce a corkscrew and a couple of wine glasses, and we polished off that bottle of wine, which went surprisingly well with our Chinese dinner. So another thank you to, mnredfox for the wine and for the Japanese snack you brought from Tokyo. :)

Neat Chengdu posts jiejie;

About 6 years ago, it was only 400 rmb to hold the red panda for a pic. maybe abet of inflation.

That sounds about right. >150% increase in USD.

Had wanted to see the Dinosaur Museum and Salt Museum for some time, so these were the reason for the trip to Zigong. Because Zigong is nearly 3.5 hours away from Chengdu by bus (and train is slow and impractical), it’s a little too far for daytripping and really makes for an overnight. As per a previous post, I purchased a ticket to Zigong (RMB 68) the afternoon before at the Bus Station when I returned from Dujiangyan. TIP: For any trip over about 2 hours or so, buying a ticket a day in advance to double-check the schedule and lock in your preferred departure time, is always a good bus strategy and saves queueing and anxiety at the window on departure day. My bus from the Chengbei Bus Station wasn’t until 10 am, but due to it being Monday, I checked out of the Chengdu hotel early (7 am) in order to guarantee myself a shot at a taxi before rush hour set in.

TIP: In a city with multiple bus stations, try to find out in advance where the “best” (fastest and highest quality) buses for your destination leave from, and exactly where they end up. Not paying close attention to this caused a bit of extra angst on this trip: 1) In the waiting room, I had a bit of anxiety because no bus to Zigong was on the schedule, 15 minutes before scheduled departure. Inquiring at the nice info desk, I found out my bus was called “Rongxian” which is a bit farther destination than Zigong, and that Zigong would be a stop on the way. A staff member walked this dumb foreigner direct to the right bus. 2) The bus was decent quality but not the very best on offer on this route (I’d only realize this on the return journey). 3) This bus didn’t actually go to Zigong Bus Station, but in fact dropped Zigong people off by the side of the road, on the outskirts of town in a commercial/industrial area . In retrospect, I remembered a torrent of Mandarin I only half caught the previous day—the info desk then was trying to tell me before I purchased the ticket, that this bus bypassed Zigong center and bus station....and that if I wanted the direct bus to the Zigong Bus Station, I should get a bus from Beimen Bus Station. Gave myself a Duh! Head Slap for Stupidity, as I waited by the side of the road in the outskirts of Zigong for about 10 minutes for an empty taxi to come by. Eventually one did, and to avoid competing with a young man from the same bus trying to grab the same taxi, I proposed we share the taxi and drop me first—he was thrilled and agreed. My share (prob paid for 3/4 of the cost): RMB 12. Zigong taxis are cheap. (BTW, the intercity bus ride itself was fine, and we had a brief comfort break about 2 hours into the journey.)

TIP: If you are picky about your comfort, and particularly on bus rides of >2 hours that are likely to be full...and when you have a bag or daypack with you that needs to be kept close, consider buying a pair of bus tickets for yourself rather than hope the seat next to you stays empty. The overhead storage space on most buses can’t accommodate anything much thicker than a briefcase or shopping bag. Whenever you buy two seats, let the ticket taker and the driver know when you board, so they don’t try to “sell” the extra to somebody else. Your proven purchase per ticket will ensure the extra seat stays yours, though you may have to defend against poaching attempts by other passengers by sitting in the aisle and putting bag at the window. It is uncommon for the Chinese to buy more than one seat for themselves so they tend to assume no butt-in-seat = availability. I did not do this on the Chengdu-Zigong-Chengdu segments, but would do so later in the trip in certain instances.

Zigong is not a large city by Chinese standards, but it is gritty and industrial and frankly unattractive, and also hilly like a mini-Chongqing. So you don’t see bicycles. There are not a huge number of places to stay in Zigong, and the decent ones are on the expensive side for the budget traveler. I stayed at the Xiong Fei Holiday Hotel in the middle of town, booked on sinohotel.com just before leaving Beijing. It was actually quite decent, with room overlooking the river. Staff was nice, too. One or two could speak a reasonable amount of English, though I was dealing with them mostly in Mandarin. By 14:00 I was checked in, dumped luggage in room, and headed out for the Dinosaur Museum. Asked the front desk where to catch a cab going the right direction and they pointed to a spot across the street. No problem getting cab to the Dinosaur Museum in about 15 minutes (RMB 18).

I loved the Dinosaur Museum (entry RMB 40). It has a huge 3-storey high room with the reconstructed skeletal remains displayed, and a couple of pits (one small, one large) with the partially exposed skeletons of dinosaurs displayed just as they were discovered, kind of Terra Cotta Warriors style for those who have been to Xi’an. They also have a display room with some intact skulls and decent displays on other flora/fauna of the period. Well worth the fee and effort to get here. There were very few visitors and no big tours, it was rather peaceful. Note: the back garden on the Museum property is being renovated and was off limits, as was the fanciful Dinosaur-shaped Visitor Center. Also, the immediate area outside and adjacent to the Museum property is under intense development, with new boulevards, a new toll plaza and parking lot, and some other structures under construction. (Likely a Dino mini-golf couse somewhere in there). Clearly the local government is wanting to put a bunch of tourist-support facilities in to increase tourism to this site. My guess is by mid-2012, will be mostly complete (on- and off-property). My visit took just over an hour total time on-site, though one could spend longer if you had the time.

Outside on the street, a short wait until a taxi came to drop someone off, and I took it back to town (RMB 16) to the hotel. Local city buses heading to town also frequently come by, so getting back isn't a problem. Then asked staff to point me towards the Salt Museum, which I knew wasn’t far from the hotel—about 10 minute walk. On the way, spied a fabulous old building which seemed to open into a courtyard—turns out it was a 300-year old teahouse complex. No entry fee. Took a look around, chatted with some old folks having their tea and playing mahjong, took photos. One of those serendipitous finds that you just run into in China, without planning for. Then another few minutes’ walk to the Salt Museum (RMB 20). I thought it was quite interesting...and I’d never been to a Salt Museum anywhere, nor thought much about salt at all. Best way to go to follow the exhibit logic is into the center courtyard, up to second floor and turn right, then clockwise, then to the back courtyard. (I did the opposite realizing part way into the visit that my direction wasn’t optimal). The building itself is also architecturally very interesting. Again, only a few individual visitors and one medium sized tour group. Spent about 45 minutes here, IMO a good investment of time and entry fee. Could have spent a bit longer but closing time was approaching.

More on Zigong: Finding eating places in the area around my hotel was fairly fruitless, so I ended up eating at the hotel. There were a few restaurants but at least 20-30 minutes’ walk uphill or a taxi ride, neither of which I felt like tackling at that point. This is clearly a working class Chinese city for which tourism has been completely incidental. Most commercial activity around this part of the river area are a couple of dozen bridal photo shops, a wealth of KTV parlors/clubs, all the town’s household appliance shops. Not even a nearby supermarket that I could find, which is pretty peculiar. During my earlier taxi rides, I had spotted no Wal-Mart, but I did see a “Mall-Mart!” Foreigners are rare in Zigong, as evidenced by the number of stares (not unfriendly) received. The locals like to play mahjong, and across the river from the hotel are a length of tea shops, also literally dozens of outdoor tables with umbrellas where group after group sets up to play cards and mahjong, and drink tea, when the weather cooperates.

Leaving Zigong the following day: Had a taxi (RMB 18) take me to the Chengtu (long distance bus station) about 08:15 and bought a ticket for the 09:10 bus to Chengdu (RMB 79). This bus was more luxurious than the inbound, only 24 seats and enough leg room for NBA basketball players. Again a comfort break half-way to Chengdu. Arrived Chengdu Beimen Bus Station in 3 hours 15 minutes, so about 12:30. Taxiied to Rail Station (RMB 11) to await my afternoon/overnight train to Kunming.

Bottom Line: If you have an interest in the subject matter of Zigong’s main attractions, Dinosaurs and Salt, it’s worth a visit. Otherwise, don’t make it a priority. Zigong can also be inserted as part of a triangle Chengdu-Leshan-Zigong (onward to Chengdu or Chongqing). However, the Leshan-Zigong road has not yet been upgraded (not sure of status), and last I heard, it is a 5 hour bumpy ride).

Total Zigong 1-day trip ex-Chengdu, solo, no group tour:
Intercity and Local Transport: RMB 68 (IC bus) + 12 + 18 + 16 + 18 + 79 (IC bus) = 211. Entry fees: 40 + 20 = 60. Total: RMB 271.

Sanxingdui is incredible, and still relatively unknown and under-rated. It's a place I'd highly recommend any visitor to Chengdu to visit. The level of technology is unbelievable for a "lost" civilization that is still mostly a mystery.

jiejie, I'll find a way to get your thread into the master tour places somehow. ;)


Additional: While I was a bit late for the dinner meet-up with mnredfox, we eventually met, found a place for dinner, and had a nice chat. Fortuitously, he had brought a gift bottle of wine for me and equally fortuitously, our original plan of having beer with dinner had to be abandoned when the only cold "beer" the restaurant had was some ridiculously expensive alcohol-free crap. Remember Jiejie's Rule in China: Always have Plan B. Plan B was to have the staff produce a corkscrew and a couple of wine glasses, and we polished off that bottle of wine, which went surprisingly well with our Chinese dinner. So another thank you to, mnredfox for the wine and for the Japanese snack you brought from Tokyo. :)

Ah yes, was a fine bottle of wine. Too funny, went to dinner with someone from Zhejiang a few days later and we ended up paying a 开瓶费. Never had seen that before in China.

Sanxingdui is incredible, and still relatively unknown and under-rated. It's a place I'd highly recommend any visitor to Chengdu to visit. The level of technology is unbelievable for a "lost" civilization that is still mostly a mystery.

I definitely support the idea that visiting the Sanxingdui museum is a must if you are visiting Chengdu. The archeological finds (especially in terms of the bronze castings) are quite incredible - and present a real challenge to the conventional theory of Chinese history.

On the subject of advanced technology and the salt museum visited by Jiejie, it is less well known that Li Bing (of Dujiangyan fame) is also accredited with the idea to drill down to find brine reserves. Later it was found that workers would drop dead near boreholes, and occasionally flames would roar out of the ground. This was attributed at first to "evil spirits".

Eventually (around 100AD if my reference is correct) it was realized these "evil spirits" could be tapped and distributed via bamboo/mud pipes to heat the brine collected from other boreholes. So about 1800 years ago, while in Europe we were struggling with wood fires, the Chinese in Sichuan had a distribution system for industrial production of salt using natural gas (the "evil spirit")!

Third day was supposed to be a long, active daytrip leaving early in the morning to Qingchengshan for a hike and climb ...

Too bad you didn't make it to the Qingchengshans (Qingchengqianshan and Qingchenghoushan). Given how easy they are to get to they are a good choice for a easy day out of the city (though I would definitely recommend using a day for this rather than trying to fit in this and Dujiangyan).

I definitely support the idea that visiting the Sanxingdui museum is a must if you are visiting Chengdu. The archeological finds (especially in terms of the bronze castings) are quite incredible - and present a real challenge to the conventional theory of Chinese history.

There are some who believe that due to the alien appearance of the bronzes, that the Shu civilization was actually the product of visitors not-of-this-earth. OK FT readers, if this doesn't pique your interest in Sanxingdui, nothing will!

On the subject of advanced technology and the salt museum visited by Jiejie, it is less well known that Li Bing (of Dujiangyan fame) is also accredited with the idea to drill down to find brine reserves. Later it was found that workers would drop dead near boreholes, and occasionally flames would roar out of the ground. This was attributed at first to "evil spirits".

Eventually (around 100AD if my reference is correct) it was realized these "evil spirits" could be tapped and distributed via bamboo/mud pipes to heat the brine collected from other boreholes. So about 1800 years ago, while in Europe we were struggling with wood fires, the Chinese in Sichuan had a distribution system for industrial production of salt using natural gas (the "evil spirit"!

A visit to this area of China reveals a wealth of inventiveness and creativeness in the "1500-2000 years ago" category. Really clever stuff and not copied from other civilizations. When considering the situation of 2011, it makes one wonder about the modern Chinese...why have these inclinations seemingly disappeared?!

Too bad you didn't make it to the Qingchengshans (Qingchengqianshan and Qingchenghoushan). Given how easy they are to get to they are a good choice for a easy day out of the city (though I would definitely recommend using a day for this rather than trying to fit in this and Dujiangyan).

Yeah, sometimes plans are just not meant to happen during a given trip. But it does leave something on the "to-do" list for a future pass through Chengdu area. But glad you made a plug for it, so that other FT'ers with a free day around Chengdu can consider visiting. Qingchengshan is the final station on the high-speed rail line right after Dujiangyan, takes about 5 minutes more and about RMB 5 extra (so from Chengdu-Qingchengshan, around 45 minutes travel time and RMB 20.) Time frame: If one is only hiking around Qingchengqianshan (the front mountain) then it is possible, with an early start, to combine it with Dujiangyan Irrigation System visit. However, if wanting to hike both the front mountain and Qingchenghoushan (the back mountain) also, you'll need a full day--in this case, a good strategy would be mountains on Day 1, staying overnight at Dujiangyan town and doing the Irrigation system the morning of Day 2 then returning to Chengdu (or wherever), rather than trying to daytrip it all from Chengdu.

BTW, to all: please keep chiming in with your own experiences, anecdotes, thoughts, impressions, etc. on these places being mentioned. The hope is that the entire thread will spark some interest in some of these places (many on the less-travelled circuit) and also provide FT travelers to China with solid logistics and cost info on how to make it all happen. Sometimes the most useful way to process information is seeing it in context via actual trip reports.

Coming shortly....Kunming segment.

fine reports !
Thanks... and keep them coming. ^

Zigong is a bit off the main grid and therefore not very useful as a transport hub, so my route to Kunming necessitated taking a morning bus back to Chengdu, then getting over to the train station by about 13:00, in order to have plenty of time for lunch and then getting on the K165 train departing 15:00 for an overnight journey to Kunming. However, this was one of those rare occasions where the Chinese Railway system let me down, and the train was delayed by nearly 2 hours. Which leads me to give FT readers RAIL TRAVEL TIP #1: If you have a choice between two trains on roughly similar time frames, it’s nearly always better to choose the one that originates from where you are starting, rather than one originating someplace else previously up the line. The K165 originated in Xi’an not Chengdu, and somewhere on that first long-distance segment was the holdup. If I had chosen the K145 originating in Chengdu itself and scheduled for 15:30 departure (it left on time), I would have been better off. Also, the train staff did not have time to properly prepare the K165 after the Xi’an-Chengdu passengers got off, so the condition of the sleeper berths for the Chengdu-Kunming passengers made me rather unhappy. (Jiejie gives herself another Duh! Head Slap for Stupidity.)

I had purchased my ticket in Beijing for this train segment on October 26, about 7 days in advance of actual travel. Cost was RMB 253 for hard sleeper middle bunk. In Beijing, it’s now generally possible to advance purchase tickets for any journey in the system, as long as it’s within the sales period (for most train types, usually begins 10 days in advance of departure). And it can be done at a remote sales office, no need to go to train station. This facility should also exist at other major Chinese cities, though possibly not yet in smaller cities. While there were plenty of berths when I bought my ticket on October 26—even getting my preferred hard sleeper, middle berth—on the day of travel November 1, the train went out completely full in both hard and soft sleeper. RAIL TRAVEL TIP #2: If you will be taking long-distance overnight sleeper trains from anywhere to anywhere and have a fairly good idea of your dates, and will start your journey in a place like Beijing or Shanghai, go ahead and try to get those tickets purchased if the sales period has opened up. Or when in a big city where the sales period opens for a future train journey, find the station or a remote office and get that future ticket. If you end up not needing the ticket, it can be returned/refunded, minus a 5% penalty.

At any rate, my train got going about 17:00 and everybody got settled. I shared my hard sleeper compartment with an old couple, a middle-aged couple, and a single fellow, all unrelated. Went to the dining car about 18:00, friendly old fellow taking orders shoved a hand-scribbled list of about 10 dishes at me to choose from. Uh, right. I decided to keep things simple, told him I couldn’t read his menu, what did he have with pork and bu la (not spicy). He rattled two things off and I asked which one was really best. He confidently told me the pork, cabbage, and ? I ordered that and hoped the “?” wasn’t something disgustingly inedible. Plus rice and drink. The “?” turned out to be some sort of mushroom/fungus which was fine. RAIL TRAVEL TIP #3: Before the journey, buy one of those ramen noodles in a bowl packages to take with you, in case you need a midnight snack, breakfast, or the dining car serves you up a Dining Disaster of a meal and you need a backup Plan B. Safe boiling water to plump them up is always available at the end of each train carriage.

Unusual for me, I did not sleep well on this train, as my legs and feet decided to ache much of the night. I did manage to fall asleep around 04:00 a.m., waking up about 07:00 a.m. to find that half of the passengers in my train car (and compartment) had disappeared and disembarked in the interim (at Panzhihua). Had my Plan B ramen for breakfast and a nice chat with the middle-aged couple still left in the compartment. We had long passed from Sichuan into Yunnan province and the countryside out the window looked quite different...and we went from hazy, smoggy, air to clean blue skies. Arrival at Kunming Rail Station, November 2 about 11:30, well over 1.5 hours late.

In keeping with the Jiejie Methodology of making things up as one goes, I had made a reservation for Kunming hotel only 2 days previously on my last night in Chengdu. Used one of my favorites again, sinohotel.com in combination with some review-checking on tripadvisor. Purposely chose something close enough to the train station to be walkable, and had address, hotel phone (critical jiejie Rule), and in my notebook, a sketch map plotting location against streets. Worked like a charm—less than 10 minutes and I was at front desk checking in.

Post pics from your adventure.

Kunming itself is not flush with classic tourist sites, and my list of must-sees was short:
1) Green Lake Park (Cui Hu Gongyuan)
2) Bamboo Temple (Qiongzhu Si)
3) Western Hills (Xi Shan) and Dian Chi Lake
4) Yunnan Nationalities Museum (Minzu Bowuguan)
5) Central city downtown walk-around

On the Stone Forest (Shilin): Long ago I had seen this and so had no interest in returning, since it would eat up much of a precious day and the entry fee is now an extortionate RMB 175. At this price point, it gets mixed reviews and particularly from foreigners. Those who seem to enjoy their visit the most, know enough to get away from the tour group areas and penetrate more deeply into the Forest and leave the crowds behind—just don’t get lost. As an alternative that is less visited than the main Shilin, the Naigu Stone Forest might be a possibility.

First thing that struck me on arriving in Kunming: the weather. It was cool and pleasant, with clean fresh air. Because of this relatively constant climate year-round and without extremes, it has the reputation of being one of China’s more pleasant big cities. And without a lot of heavy industry, plus wind that tends to keep air circulating, absent is the smoggy haze that affects most other large Chinese cities (and a lot of small ones). Although Kunming is rather far south in latitude, it’s nearly 1900 meters above sea level so doesn’t get muggy or oppressive in the summer months. All this makes Kunming a decent place to live, and for visitors, a place they can comfortably visit at any time of year. Kunming also has decent airline connections to SE Asia (Vietnam, Laos, Thailand, Myanmar, Malaysia, Singapore) in both inbound and outbound directions. (Sidebar: Kunming’s new international airport is nearly ready to open, probably early in 2012. It will be much further away from the city than the existing airport but will be much larger and have modern facilities. The existing airport will eventually be demolished.)

My plan for the remainder of the first afternoon was simple: walk a lot around the central city and all the way to Green Lake Park, saving items 2-4 on the list for the following day. The very center of town is a huge construction zone, as are some of the major streets. A new transportation hub is being constructed, as is a new subway/light rail system, which Kunming does not currently have. First lines will start running in about 2 years, but construction will be continuing for a number of years after that. There is also a huge amount of general building and development going on. (Caveat: If looking to book a Kunming hotel, be aware that many of the more well-known hotels are on or near these construction zones and they work 24/7, so noise could be a problem. Carefully check location and ask status before you make a booking.) Primary public transport mode in Kunming is bus and taxi. Compared to other Chinese cities, the bus system appears relatively more straightforward to use though no English of course. Empty taxis are difficult to find during rush hours. Central Kunming has a pleasant pedestrian-only zone which is very lively in the late afternoon and early evening, plenty of shops and eateries. It is a fairly clean city physically. Very little of the truly older architecture of Kunming still stands, so this is not the city to come to if looking for the real thing rather than re-creations. The area around Green Lake Park is much more tranquil and clearly a very nice part of town. I spent a very pleasant 40 minutes or so at twilight, walking in the park and just generally decompressing. I’m sure it gets busy and boisterous on weekends, as it has kid-friendly attractions.

The following day was my only full day in Kunming before moving on. Having fleshed out a plan for the next few days, after getting up that morning, I first went to the train station nearby to buy a Kunming-Lijiang train ticket for the night of November 7 (4 days hence), hard sleeper lower berth. Then decided to simplify my transport issues, speed things up, and increase my costs, by hiring a taxi off-meter to cart me around to a couple of errand-stops, then to the Bamboo Temple, then drop me off at one of the access points for Xishan. I estimated about 3 hours worth of driving and waiting. Deal was struck with a driver outside the train station for RMB 200, which I believe was overpriced by at least RMB 30-40 per my gut feel...but there comes a time when you have to trade off for convenience.

After errands were run, first true sightseeing stop was the Bamboo Temple. My guidebook readings on the location of this place did not give me an accurate impression of just how inconveniently located it is. It is on the western edge of town (development has moved out to meet the formerly isolated temple), it is up a hill though vehicular access is right to the entry, and few people are around. There is public transport in the form of small buses, but they looked to be very infrequent. Entry fee was only RMB 6, a bargain. The main claim to fame of this temple are the stunning sculptural figures (arhats) in the main worship space. The “surfing Buddhas” are brilliant, and lifelike. Unfortunately, you cannot get close to them as the low picket fence barrier into the inside of the worship hall closes the space to visitors. But you can see them pretty well by standing at the barrier and looking in. Photography of them is forbidden, but if there is no dragon lady sitting up on the platform watching you, it might be possible to sneak a non-flash attempt. More photo-possible are the ancillary buildings which have dozens more arhats, each appearing to be modeled after an actual human, as they are all individual. Some of them are hilarious, others are downright scary with the facial expressions. The ancillary buildings range from very dark (no lights on) to reasonably light enough from outside windows, to take non-flash photos. Though photography is supposedly forbidden, there is normally nobody sitting around in the ancillary buildings standing watch...so if you go and can’t resist trying to photograph, be discreet. Bamboo Temple is an active Chinese Buddhist place of worship and there are a few monks in residence. The courtyard is a popular place for local people to come and play mahjong and cards, chat with the monks, and generally relax. I highly recommend this place, and 30-40 minutes should be enough time. Just make sure you have either a private car, or take a taxi and have it wait for you so you don’t get stranded for awhile.

My next stop and final drop-off point for this taxi driver was Xishan, the Western Hills. I had heard a lot of raves about it and how it was a “must-do” when in Kunming. However, after having the experience, I found it neutral at best, certainly not a highlight. The main feature of Xishan is the Dragon’s Gate area which is a famous lookout clinging to the side of the rocky hill, and which gives a good view of the Lake (Dian Chi) and of Kunming city in the distance. Access to the lookout is by steps from below and above, and there are other platforms with small shrines and historic residence buildings on the stepped path. Mostly, they mean nothing to a foreigner. IMO, the impressive part was the older portions of infrastructure itself, specifically the paths and steps and mini-tunnels that were whittled into the rock by hand about 200 years ago. This area has an entry fee of RMB 40 which is payable at a Visitor’s Center that is midway up the entire hill. From this midpoint, you can do the classic climb up the steps and paths to Dragon’s Gate then walk or chair lift down. Or you can do what I did, and pay for a one-way chair lift up (RMB 25) then walk down through the Dragon’s Gate and other features back to the Visitors Center. Backwards, but it worked well as the small Chinese tour groups were huffing and puffing going the other way. The chair lift going up can be windy, a bit cold, and takes 25-30 minutes. Walking back down to the Visitor’s Center at a leisurely pace, stopping to take many panoramic photos, took me just over an hour. Note that to access the Visitor’s Center, you do have to get partway up the hill, which can be done by walking (not recommended unless one is an avid hiker), or by vehicle from base of hill to the parking lot/drop point nearby the VC. Or by enclosed cable car from the eastern side of the lake by Haigang Park. The latter is what I did (RMB 70 for a round trip). So, all total, this excursion cost me RMB 135 and 2.25 hours of time. Upon reflection, I do not think it was worth my time or money.

After the return trip by cable car (peaceful and quiet) to the east side of the lake, a waiting cab drove me the short 10 minutes (RMB 11) to the Yunnan Nationalities Museum. Note that this is NOT the Nationalities Village, which is a heavily-marketed tourist trap that has Chinese dressing up as Minorities and posing in staged “villages.” The Chinese tour bus scene is big on this place, but most foreigners are not. But across the street is the much more deserving though less-visited Museum. Entrance is free. The building is pleasant and nicely laid out, and the collections are very interesting—my favorite was probably the Costume/textile display of all the various Yunnan minorities. There are some good English speakers on staff there, and on my way out at closing time, came to me to give me some free postcards and an invitation to return. I really regret fooling around on that silly Xishan hill when my time would have been better spent in this museum. With time running out, I had to “speed visit” some of the galleries and completely skip over others. Bummer. Particularly if you will be starting from Kunming and venturing elsewhere in Yunnan, stopping by this museum first will help give some context to the rich demographic diversity that you’ll encounter in this province. I made a personal pledge to return next time I get to Kunming, and set aside a couple of hours for a proper visit.

Returning to the main street outside the Museum and across from the Village entrance around 5 pm, there were no waiting taxis but there was a bus stop. My Kunming city map (not the greatest and in Chinese only) told me there were at least a couple of buses going back to center of town, and queries to other people waiting at the bus stop confirmed this. So I chose a bus heading to the center and for RMB 1, got back to town center where I could focus on food, then eventually back to hotel. So, to-do list accomplished though not in a completely satisfying way.

For 1.5 days in Kunming, transport costs total: RMB 250 (incl 200 for 3-hour off-meter taxi hire). Entry Fees, Cable Car, Chair Lift: RMB 141. Total: 391.

This is an interesting region of Yunnan south of Kunming, towards the Vietnamese border. Many many minorities and relative few Han Chinese, particularly as you get towards Yuanyang. Most people are speaking their own minority languages (Hani predominates), and those who speak Mandarin don’t speak it very understandably, so for Mandarin-speaking travelers, your language “advantage” over rookie foreigners is considerably diminished! Access to the area requires road travel, either by private car or bus. No other options—no train and no airports. Using Kunming as a launching and return point, which is the most logical for travelers, you can consider a minimum time to do this as a “module” of 4 days including travel time. (It’s also possible to visit this area if heading to/from Kunming to Laos or Vietnam overland, but I won’t get into that here.)

If you are round-tripping from Kunming and not using a private car/private tour but are taking public transportation, I recommend leaving all excess luggage (nonvaluables) at Left Luggage in Kunming and heading south with minimum stuff—I parked my locked rollaboard at the Train Station (RMB 3 per day per bag and you get a claim check receipt) since upon my return to Kunming, I had an outbound train scheduled. You can also leave at Left Luggage at Kunming Long-Distance bus station. All I took with me was my daypack (with computer and valuables inside), and a very small cheap gym bag picked up the night before at a street vendor with a couple of clothes changes and minimal toiletries.

Kunming Bus Stations: In 2010 or 2011, Kunming moved nearly all the long-distance buses to various new stations on the outskirts of the city. So, discard all older information on the internet which tells you that long-distance buses leave from right by the Train Station—it ain’t so anymore! For Jianshui and Yuanyang and points south (including Laos and Vietnam border crossings), buses leave from the South Bus Station “Nanbu” which is a long way out—and an RMB 35 cab ride. Arriving at the bus station by cab, I purchased a ticket for the next bus out to Jianshui leaving 20 minutes later, for RMB 81. During the day there are 1-2 buses per hour leaving for Jianshui, so no need to fool with advance purchasing. The route is mostly expressway, with a comfort break about half-way, at one of the more disgusting outhouses I encountered on this trip. Enuf said! (Mini-Rant: It irritated me that all the public bus drivers seem to stop at this point, mainly so they can wash their buses down—when for passengers’ sake, there are plenty of better places that could be used as a comfort break nearby. Rant over.) Total time to Jianshui was 3.5 hours, a pretty easy trip. Taxi outside took 5 minutes to get to “center” of town by the Old town. I did not have a hotel reservation for Jianshui, just 3-4 hotel names and addresses, and a rough sketch map of the town. You won’t find international-branded hotels in this place, but comfortable accommodation is available. After a short walk in the old town from where the taxi driver dropped me, I found my target and staff showed me a small but new and clean room for RMB 130. Very friendly but no English spoken.

Jianshui is a relatively small Chinese city with a small but good old town architecture area that has not been “tarted up” for mass tourism. I used it as a stopover point between Kunming and the Yuanyang terraces. Two-three leisurely hours’ walk around Jianshui old town is enough to get the flavor and hit the highlights. The locals have a lot of interesting activity going around the Old Gate, the old guys with their singing birds, some musicians, etc. I did not visit the main feature of the old town, the Confucius Temple (RMB 60 entry) as I’ve seen enough Confucian temples to last a lifetime and they are mostly the same. Also skipped Zhilin Temple which is on their little tourist signage (nicely signed streets and wayfinding, BTW), in favor of going into an uncelebrated but rather nice Tianjun Temple where 5 old guys were practicing their music on traditional instruments. If they weren’t pros, they were gifted amateurs and I enjoyed a free concert in a peaceful courtyard for 15 minutes or so. The Zhu Family Home andGarden (RMB 50) might be interesting to some and it is also a boutique hotel though a little pricey. I recommend this friendly little town for a quick stopover, ideally a day if you can manage, as there are also a couple of attractions outside the town which time and threatening weather didn’t allow me to see (Swallows Cave and the Old Arched Bridge).

My intent to get up early and take morning photos around the town was derailed by weather—it had poured rain during the night and was still sprinkling. Instant plan change to check out, find a taxi to the bus station and get on the road asap to Yuanyang. Got an immediate bus out which was a local and rather “colorful” bus—no farm animals though. These smaller 20-person buses go the “old route” to Yuanyang which is direct and over a winding, unsealed road through various villages. It can be bumpy. I stopped smoking on the bus by telling the would-be puffers about my serious lung problem and that I could die (also throwing the window open and gasping for air). Smokes went out--nobody wanted to be responsible for killiing the foreigner. :D Takes 3 hours to get to “lower” Yuanyang (Nansha) which is a busy little town and bus station. After a 20-25 minute stop there, another 45 minutes to get to the real target, “upper” Yuanyang (Xinjie) which is the staging base for the Terraces. Arrived at Yuanyang Xinjie town around noon. Again, I had no reservation but was firmly settled on two parameters:
a) I did not want to stay out at the Terraces in the villages themselves, though this is a highly recommended option for those who want a lot of peace and quiet, who can deal with fairly simple lodging and food, and who want to hike a bit in the villages and terraces. This is a personal preference thing.
b) I did not want to stay at the “prime” hotel lodging available—the Yunti Hotel which is overpriced, sits in the bend so the town’s main busy road loops around it, and had onsite construction going on. Instead, I walked out of the bus station and down the street to the little town’s pedestrian “square” and spotted the Yunti Shenjie Hotel which looked OK, checked out their offered room for RMB 100, very decent with ensuite, and was set up. There are not a lot of good lodging options in this town, though with a bit more development, this will likely change. In the off-season, walking-in is possible. During Chinese major holidays, the place is packed out and particularly with photographers.

By good fortune, the regional market happened to be at Xinjie that day, and it was mass of activity and color, with all the local minorities from various regional villages in town (in full dress regalia) to shop and trade and socialize. Some incredibly good photo opportunities were taken advantage of. Noted some key useful places: couple of restaurants, the bakery, the internet shop (wangba), etc. Important: in Yuanyang, there are no ATM’s that will take foreign cards, and no bank will do foreign currency exchange—so you must come with all the cash RMB you will need. I have heard the closest place for foreign card ATM/forex is Gejiu city and that is 1.5 hours away by bus.

Next task was to find local transportation to get to my targets during my preferred time frames: 1) The Laohuzui Rice Terrace later that day, for the sunset views. 2) The Duoyishu and Bada Terraces for the following morning, including sunrise at Duoyishu. The layout of the area is such that from Xinjie to each of these areas, is approximately 45-60 minutes’ drive each way. My sunset and sunrise requirements dictated that the cheap public minivans that gather in the town to shuttle villagers back and forth, weren’t going to work since they weren’t running to my time frames. Choice of local private transport then becomes one of two options: a) Bargain with a taxi for off-meter flat rate. b) Travel agency. At the Yunti Hotel complex, I spotted a local agent office who offered to set me up for both that day and next day with a car and private driver for total of RMB 300. That’s basically RMB 75 x 4 trip segments at an hour per segment, plus waiting time. I doubted I could do much better with a taxi driver bargaining session, so I went with convenience and it was all a done deal. Things were falling into place much more easily than I expected. Meeting time with driver was set for 16:00 and return anywhere from 19:00-20:00, so I went out to kill a bit of time, looking around and making a sketch map of Xinjie for future reference (internet map resources on this place are pretty slim pickings).

At 16:00, driver and car showed up. Actually, a decent little minivan with higher clearance than a standard car/taxi, which would prove to be very wise since the main road between town and terraces has a nasty 3-4 km stretch where it’s being reconstructed. (Heads-up if you will be in Yuanyang before completion around February/March 2012). We arrived at Laohuzui Terrace just after 17:00, entry fee payable there at RMB 30. As a UNESCO site, it’s well-kept with no tackiness, and good paths to the lower viewing platform (I didn’t go, too many steps), and the upper viewing platform, enough for my needs. Not too many other tourists around, a small Chinese tour group or two. Walked out to the overlook and....oh my God...the professional photos I’ve seen on the internet are spot on. These things are stupendous. And my timing was good, as the weather had cleared up and there was no rain or fog (fog can be a real problem at Yuanyang when trying to view the terraces). And a lovely clear sky and dropping sun. The harvest had been completed and the fields already flooded with water for the winter, so the photo opportunity was perfect. A good number of the other Chinese tourists there had serious cameras and tripods. If you have a tripod, this is one place to consider bringing it. I was one of the last to leave before closing, and we got back to town a bit after 7 pm. Compared to Beijing, sunset is a bit later down in these parts for any given time of year.

Next morning was up very early for a 05:30 pickup. Unlike previous day, there was next to no traffic on the roads. At the turnoff outside town for the terraces, the only thing open was....the ticket booth! Driver stopped so I could pay my RMB 60 entrance fee (for two terraces) and on we went, caravanning with a couple of other cars and minibuses also doing the same as me. Arrived at Duoyishu around 06:30 and waited. Duoyishu viewing area has level after level of viewing platforms, all well done so that maximum number of photographers can get a good view without getting in each other’s way. Also an enclosed lounge area, decent bathrooms, etc. Clearly there are benefits to having UNESCO status and keep the schlockiness out. And the entry fee does go to maintain the place, and maintain it well. Another 2-3 dozen people showed up with cameras and tripods, but plenty of room for all. As the sun came up slowly, oh my goodness—words cannot express the feeling when you see these Terraces just come slowly to life, as the light starts making the reflections on the water glow. Spent about an hour there taking various sequences as the light got stronger and higher. At the risk of sounding corny, it really was a magical moment (and cynical, jaded traveler that I am, I don’t impress easily.)

After that, driver drove me back to Bada Terrace site, though first we had to make a stop at an intervening rather large village where he had to make a stop at his house/shop. Interesting village, with every shophouse having something fascinating going on: this one had a whole cow that was being butchered; in the next the guys had a still and were making moonshine whiskey, in the one after that a group was arguing over lottery ticket numbers. Very entertaining and not on the planned “tour.” We got moving again and went to the Bada Terraces which are a bit different with an access path and simple lookouts, but still well done. Bada was interesting because at the time I went, its terraces were in different stages of preparation: harvest completed and flooded on the lower parts, harvest completed and brown earth being prepped in the middle part (no water), and harvest still being finished at the top parts. I was struck by how each of the Terrace areas looked a bit different from the others. My driver also stopped at some signposted lookouts for other minor terrace areas, where there is no entrance fee to gawk, just nice views. Due to fatigue, I passed on an opportunity to stop at the Qingkou Hani Folk Village. I thought it was slightly contrived, and at any rate I’ve seen the real deal Hani (also known as Akha in Thailand and Burma) villages elsewhere. Got back to Xinjie about 10 am and said goodbye to driver and travel agent, then bought an outbound bus ticket (actually, a pair of tickets) to Kunming for following morning, and poked around town, explored, took more photos, and spent time at the internet cafe. (Yuanyang was the only place on my trip where the hotel had no Ethernet or wifi access in the room.) Found two independent old Dutch ladies wandering around and joined them for dinner at the little Sichuan place next to hotel—cheap and tasty. We had a scream of a time talking about our China travel foibles. Other than a British couple I saw wandering around the square, these were the only foreigners I saw during my two days at Yuanyang. But apparently a French guy was wandering around somewhere, the Dutch ladies had spoken with him earlier.

Bus next morning to Kunming at 09:00. Because the journey was so long, I wanted more space and comfort and decided to buy myself and my bags a pair of seats, even though it mean spending an extra RMB 136. This proved to be a very wise decision, as the bus was absolutely full up. This is the only direct bus (though it does stop at Yuanyang Nansha and Jianshui to let passengers on/off) in the day to Kunming. There are two late afternoon buses but they are sleeper-type (which I don’t do myself and don’t recommend). The British couple I'd seen the previous day were the only other foreigners on this bus. The overall trip back to Kunming took just over 7 hours, but using a different route via Gejiu that was excellent road and expressway nearly all the way. (And yes...we stopped again at that horrid outhouse for a comfort stop and to give the bus a bath. Grrr.) It was raining in Kunming, so my luck with perfect weather at Yuanyang had now run out. Hopped on a waiting local bus heading directly for the train station for RMB 5, saving a bunch versus a taxi. Poor dinner at station, bailed my rollaboard out of Left Luggage, then went inside station to wait for the 22:00 train to Lijiang.

Bottom line: This is a terrific Yunnan excursion if you can get lucky with the weather and not stuck with fog. Research conditions at the terraces for the time of year you plan to go: they only grow one rice crop a year and the stages the terraces go through, will be fairly predictable starting late fall/winter (water/flooded), early spring (water/green shoots), late spring (full green growth), late summer/early fall (yellowing/ripening, harvest). The only lousy time to go would be between harvest and flooding, which I estimate might be much of October. There are internet resources out there showing photos taken at different times of year. Summer is rainy season so be aware of that. Do not try to rush this trip, one day too many is probably better than one day too short, as it gives you a cushion in case of a foggy day, and at any rate there are plenty of villages and small towns of interest to explore, that never make it into the guidebooks.

Cost of Excursion ex-Kunming from Kunming Rail Station roundtrip:
--Public Transport: KM taxi to bus station (35) + bus to Jianshui (81) + taxis Jianshui (6 + 5) + bus to Yuanyang Xinjie (35) + double/pair of bus tkts to Kunming (136 x 2 = 272) + local KM bus (5) = 439
--Cost of Private Driver in Yuanyang for Terraces = 300
--Entry Fees: 50 (Zhu, Jianshui) + 30 + 60 (Terraces) = 140
--Hotel 3 nights: 130 + 100 + 100 = 330. Food, snacks, water, etc = 254
--Total 4 days: RMB 1463

Excellent adventure with excellent write-up. ^

Lots of great detail and information - thanks for posting! :)

Nice detailed trip report. Thanks.

The weather in Kunming in July, 2011 was pleasant and skies were clear. Pretty much similar to what you experienced during your trip.

Jianshui and Yangyang are 2 places I am yarning to visit. Your report has convinced me to hire a private car and driver for that trip.

When will you post some photos? Dying to see images from the rice terraces. Want to compare them against Longji Rice Terrace, Guangxi. (some images from the latter can be found here):

http://www.smugmug.com/gallery/12622595_r82PhG#906891275_gUiqy

Nice detailed trip report. Thanks.

The weather in Kunming in July, 2011 was pleasant and skies were clear. Pretty much similar to what you experienced during your trip.

Jianshui and Yangyang are 2 places I am yarning to visit. Your report has convinced me to hire a private car and driver for that trip.

When will you post some photos? Dying to see images from the rice terraces. Want to compare them against Longji Rice Terrace, Guangxi. (some images from the latter can be found here):

http://www.smugmug.com/gallery/12622595_r82PhG#906891275_gUiqy

I need to organize photos and figure out how to post (I don't have an online blog or flickr account or whatever--am a techno-dunce on this sort of stuff). Longsheng Terrace group north of Guilin (Guangxi province) is nice, but Yuanyang is way more impressive. Bigger, steeper, higher. And way fewer Chinese and foreign tourists since it's just more effort to get there.

Note that weather in Kunming and weather in Yuanyang are two separate issues at most any time of year. You can have beautiful weather in Kunming and the same time have rain (or fog) in Yuanyang. And vice versa, which is what happened to me on my return day from Yuanyang (picture perfect) to Kunming (grey, cold, raining) and that weather switchover didn't happen until about 30 km from Kunming.

FWIW, hiring a private driver out of Kunming is really expensive and since you go down the same roads whether in public or private transport in about the same amount of time, it's probably more cost-effective to take public bus down to Jianshui and Yuanyang, then just hire a locally-based driver at each of those locations to get better value for your money and your time. The locals also know the roads and current road conditions better than a Kunming-based driver. Any hotel in Jianshui or Yuanyang can set you up with a local pretty much on the spot, though you can always arrange in advance if you want. Best to do some advance research and show up with your list of sightseeing stops, have them help you organize a logical route. I've priced some 4-day packaged tours to this region ex-Kunming that basically covered the same thing I did, and they are asking about 5-8x the price I spent, per person. :eek: Somebody's getting a lot of markup/profit, as in this region, there's only a limited number of ways you can spend your money! If you look at my total excursion cost (one person), for a couple traveling together the incremental would only be about 50% more (mostly for bus tickets, food, entrance fees) as the rooms I had were all 2-person capable and the taxi/private car part also would stay the same. So, roughly RMB 2200 for two people to be perfectly comfortable on this 4-day trip. Let's say you splurge on hotel (relatively speaking, as the Ritz Carlton and the Westin haven't made it down this way yet), or drink a lot (!!!), or buy lots of souvenirs and kick it up to RMB 2500 for 2 people for 4 days.

Sooner or later when traveling in China, circumstances smack you around a bit, and you must always keep in mind two things: 1) You will survive. 2) You can usually find a way to salvage the situation and make lemonade out of lemons..... thus our tale as follows....

Kunming-Lijiang is a popular route on the Chinese and foreigner tourist circuit, and there are three ways to get there: direct flight, train, and road. I had ruled out the road trip, as I had just completed a long bus ride from Yuanyang, and didn’t want another one back-to-back. Breaking the road trip up in Dali for a couple of days is the classic and popular way to accomplish this distance in a humane and pleasant fashion, but I didn’t want to go to Dali on this trip. For a couple of weeks out, I had looked daily for decently discounted flights, but alas, nothing materialized. (So much for our conventional FlyerTalk wisdom and advice on booking domestic tickets in China.) This particular city pair is just too popular and all flights remained stubbornly stuck at nearly full fare, at or above RMB 1000 all-in, which was more than I wanted to pay. I had thought that after October, tourist traffic would diminish, leaving a few juicy fares to be plucked, but no-go. That left only the train, and not wanting to spend a throwaway night in Kunming, I booked the overnight Kunming-Lijiang nonstop train leaving at 22:00. There are actually two overnight trains on this route, leaving within an hour of each other. I purchased my hard sleeper ticket on November 3 at the Kunming Rail Station the day before I left for Yuanyang—for travel on the evening of November 7. At that time, a check of the official railway ticket-availability website showed there were over 500 sleeper berths still available on the train for purchase...and even more berths on the second overnight train. So I was hoping for a relatively pleasant and uncrowded experience, as Chinese trains go.

Ha. This time, the joke was on me. Once on the platform, I had a nasty shock. This was an old double-decker train. I’d been on these before but not in a while, and only on shorter-term seater routes, not sleeper. (The seat versions of these were used quite a bit on the Beijing-Tianjin route before bullet service started.). You enter these things from the platform to the middle level and there are a couple of compartments before you get to the stairs going up and down. My compartment was unfortunately down, and claustrophobic it was. In these double decker trains, the hard sleeper compartments are only 4 berths per (2 up, 2 down) rather than the standard 6, but the ceiling is low and the compartment is narrower than a normal Chinese sleeper train compartment. And the berths are even narrower. They should require going through a slim-sizer to make sure you fit, before you purchase a ticket on this train. There is little space for luggage except under one lower berth (happened to be mine, which I could fortunately hog since my compartment-mates mostly had a tiny bag or a briefcase.). Climbing into the upper berths is by those flip down pedals that require being a Cirque du Soleil cast member to ascend. It is a very dated product—and the most apt image I can come up with is that of a military “troop train.” And somehow in the last three days, nearly all berths in all compartments hard and soft sleeper had been sold and were filled up. So though I tried via the conductor, I had nowhere to go to better my situation. The soft sleeper carriages pretty much had similar issues, except the beds were slightly wider. But as with hard sleeper, the compartments are narrower than on a normal Chinese train (even the standard trains such as K, T, Z) and the distance between beds is only about 60 centimeters. Quite awkward if you are sharing with strangers, especially of the opposite gender.

Tip: I strongly recommend avoiding these miserable excuses for trains if you can, and on the overnight Kunming-Lijiang-Kunming services, this is the product dedicated to this route. There is also a day train that stops in Dali but I don’t know if it’s the same product. If you can afford the Kunming-Lijiang flight, do it, even though the airport is quite far away from Lijiang town. If you are on a budget, go by express bus (4-4.5 hours by excellent highway) to Dali and spend a day or so there before continuing on. The bus has the advantage of terminating in Lijiang town, leaving you with only a short and inexpensive taxi ride to your hotel. However, if you do find yourself having to ride this overnight rolling two-story jalopy, try to book yourself on the upper deck, since the lower deck is not only more claustrophobic and with poorer air circulation, but feels the bumps and jolts more. And yes, for a “nonstop” overnight service, this train seemed to stop and then lurch about every half-hour. In hard sleeper carriage, entry/platform level berth stacks are 1-4 (undesireable, too close to door and smokers), lower deck berth stacks 5-22, and upper deck (lesser of the evils) are 23-38. Not sure of soft sleeper carriage numbering but assume higher number is upper deck. On this train, go with soft sleeper if you can get it. Get a lower berth if you are not agile.

At least my ticket was only RMB 153 for a lower berth. I consoled myself with that as I tossed, turned, and once again didn’t sleep. I was starting to feel rather feverish and was probably the only person not under the quilts provided.

Arrived in Lijiang on schedule at about 07:30, pitch black and raining hard. Completely depressing. This particular station is a little far from the town center. Perhaps it was due to the fact that the station has just been rebuilt and reopened and therefore bugs haven’t been worked out...but there didn’t seem to be a regular taxi queue, just some kind of driveway with small blue minivans (serving as taxis) chaotically parked everywhere.. Tip: if you are arriving at this station via the overnight service, it really would be best to prearrange with your hotel, transportation and a meet-and-greet at the terminal exit. I got through the crowd and out into the rain where a local woman asked where I was going, told me to hop in the adjacent minivan for RMB 20. Which I did, joining a young Chinese couple, and off we went. They were dropped off first and then to my horror, I found I had broken one of my own “jiejie rules”---I didn’t have the hotel’s phone number! Time for another self-administered Duh! Head Slap for Stupidity. Had the street but driver couldn’t find it. I did spot one of my preselected backup hotels which was well above my target budget, so I had the frustrated driver drop me there and paid him off. Went in and told the staff my problem, they didn’t know the hotel I’d booked either, but called information to get phone and better address, and called another taxi for me. Very very nice people. This taxi driver knew where the place was and off we went. Discovered that the first driver had not gone far enough out of town. Right road, wrong direction.

If you’ve ever pulled up in front of a place and known you’ve made a mistake, well that’s the feeling I had. A few days beforehand, I had made an online reservation at this hotel via sinohotel based on guess, gut feel, and tripadvisor comments (mostly in Chinese). Bad location, creepy and dark, deserted atmosphere inside, though the sole staff member—the receptionist—was very nice. Checked in and was shown to my room which was a duplex apartment-like affair with a spiral stair up to the bedroom part. Clearly meant to accommodate family groups and the like. Very eerie and quiet, possibly because it was low season. And no promised internet. Clearly sinohotel had got the description of this one wrong. Although I wanted to be in New Lijiang (not the Old Town), this was just so far out as to have no food or shops around, and no easy taxis. Didn’t even bother to unpack, just took my stuff back to lobby and said this hotel wasn’t going to work for me, “unchecked out” and got my money back—receptionist was at least sweet about it. Left this Chinese version of “The Shining” hotel and went outside to try to find a taxi on an empty road. Fortunately it had stopped raining, sort of. Finally got a cab, went back to my backup hotel where the staff had been so nice. Was way more upscale and 50% over my budget, but the GM, front desk staff, bellboys, and everybody were top notch on hospitality, showed me a nice room and I got settled in. Just as it started to pour down rain again. At least this hotel, which seemed to have a number of Chinese tour groups, was well-equipped and had signs of life going on. And importantly, had reliable heat.

So by about 09:30, two hours after arrival on the troop train, I was able to settle in to my second Lijiang hotel. By now I was feeling really bad and knew that I was coming down with what was likely to be a bad cold and sinus infection. Hopefully not the flu. It was pouring rain again outside so I decided a hot shower and 2-3 hours’ sleep were the best idea. When traveling, you hate to waste precious sightseeing time but sometimes you have to decide to back off. After my rest, I felt even worse and decided the next week was going to need reworking.
Original plan for the balance of the trip dates. It was now Nov. 8th about midday.
--8th/9th Lijiang
--10th bus to Qiaotou, classic hike on upper trail Tiger Leaping Gorge (part way)
--11th finish TLG upper trail hike, back to Qiaotou then bus to Zhongdian (Shangrila)
--12th Zhongdian
--13th through 17th Yunnan-Sichuan highway via Daocheng, Litang, Kangding to Chengdu
--18th fly Chengdu-Beijing

With my deteriorating state, it was pretty apparent that the fairly strenuous Tiger Leaping Gorge hike on the upper trail was off the menu. I’d be hard-pressed to do this even when at my best, so better to abandon it now. Also, the long, arduous though fascinating overland route back to Chengdu via the high Tibetan areas of Yunnan and Sichuan was discarded due to not wanting to be sick in such a rough and remote area that passed through high altitude >4000 meters, as well as advice that it was getting too late in the year and the risk of snow and ice up there was too high. This routing also abandoned.

This is where not overplanning a China trip with too many locked-in reservations, and allowing for some flexibility, really is a blessing. Having no post-Lijiang onward hotel or plane reservations at this point, at least I didn’t have to cancel a bunch of prearrangements. An hour or two of thinking plus a little online checking, and I’d come up with a new plan that I thought I could manage.
--8th/9th/10th Lijiang.... I was only going to be able to sightsee at half-speed then rest each day back at the hotel.
--11th/12th Health permitting, a quick overnight to Shaxi and Shibaoshan then return to Lijiang Plan B: Health not permitting, explore greater Lijiang area some more.
--13th Daytrip from Lijiang to Tiger Leaping Gorge, only mild hiking if I felt like it at the time. Plan B: sit at a guesthouse overlooking the gorge and chat with the locals and the backpackers.
--14th Bus Lijiang to Zhongdian w/Zhongdian in afternoon
--15th Zhongdian and evening flight to Chengdu. Definitely no road trip back to Sichuan.
--16th bus Chengdu to Langzhong old town and overnight there
--17th Langzhong to Chongqing
--18th fly Chongqing-Beijing

The new plan required a bunch of backtracking in and out of Lijiang, as Shaxi is south towards Dali, TLG and Zhongdian are north. But distances aren’t horribly long and not having to pack up and move every night or so—which is tiring in and of itself—sounded better than trying to wring maximum efficiency out of an itinerary.

I need to organize photos and figure out how to post (I don't have an online blog or flickr account or whatever--am a techno-dunce on this sort of stuff). Longsheng Terrace group north of Guilin (Guangxi province) is nice, but Yuanyang is way more impressive. Bigger, steeper, higher. And way fewer Chinese and foreign tourists since it's just more effort to get there.
No worry. In due time, you will figure it out how to post photos. All the free sites are quite straight forward to use.

Note that weather in Kunming and weather in Yuanyang are two separate issues at most any time of year. You can have beautiful weather in Kunming and the same time have rain (or fog) in Yuanyang. And vice versa, which is what happened to me on my return day from Yuanyang (picture perfect) to Kunming (grey, cold, raining) and that weather switchover didn't happen until about 30 km from Kunming.

Re weather: in part Kunming is sitting on higher elevation, while Yangyang is more tropical.
Re: rice terrace. While you were there, what color was the field (crop)? Do you know which month during which they harvest? I like to hit it there right before harvest.

FWIW, hiring a private driver out of Kunming is really expensive and since you go down the same roads whether in public or private transport in about the same amount of time, it's probably more cost-effective to take public bus down to Jianshui and Yuanyang, then just hire a locally-based driver at each of those locations to get better value for your money and your time. The locals also know the roads and current road conditions better than a Kunming-based driver. Any hotel in Jianshui or Yuanyang can set you up with a local pretty much on the spot, though you can always arrange in advance if you want. Best to do some advance research and show up with your list of sightseeing stops, have them help you organize a logical route. I've priced some 4-day packaged tours to this region ex-Kunming that basically covered the same thing I did, and they are asking about 5-8x the price I spent, per person. :eek: Somebody's getting a lot of markup/profit, as in this region, there's only a limited number of ways you can spend your money! If you look at my total excursion cost (one person), for a couple traveling together the incremental would only be about 50% more (mostly for bus tickets, food, entrance fees) as the rooms I had were all 2-person capable and the taxi/private car part also would stay the same. So, roughly RMB 2200 for two people to be perfectly comfortable on this 4-day trip. Let's say you splurge on hotel (relatively speaking, as the Ritz Carlton and the Westin haven't made it down this way yet), or drink a lot (!!!), or buy lots of souvenirs and kick it up to RMB 2500 for 2 people for 4 days.
^^
Appreciate the heads-up. Are hotels equipped with aircon and shower? I like not to have to "rough" it, if I can help it.

Reading your latest post. Sorry to learn of the "woes".

No worry. In due time, you will figure it out how to post photos. All the free sites are quite straight forward to use.



Re weather: in part Kunming is sitting on higher elevation, while Yangyang is more tropical.
Re: rice terrace. While you were there, what color was the field (crop)? Do you know which month during which they harvest? I like to hit it there right before harvest.


^^
Appreciate the heads-up. Are hotels equipped with aircon and shower? I like not to have to "rough" it, if I can help it.

Reading your latest post. Sorry to learn of the "woes".

1) I will deal with photos in a bit--will have to cast about to see where best place to open an account is. I literally have a few thousand images from this trip alone to whittle down to a representative few.

2) No crop in early November in Yuanyang--harvest is nearly completed everywhere and most terraces have been plowed under and flooded to get ready for spring planting. You should internet research for photos taken of Yuanyang at different months of year--that will help you fix a travel time. I would think that the rice is ready for harvesting in late summer, though. Keep in mind that summer is also rainy season in Yuanyang and that can make visits a bit wet, misty, and slippery if you are unlucky.

3) Yunti Hotel and Yunti Shenjie Hotel in Xinjie town are equipped with private baths and showers with 24-hour hot water. In some instances, the showers are not enclosed just at one end or one corner of the bathroom with floor drain. Chinese style, and you have to be careful not to wet down the entire bathroom. Toilets are western style. The Terraced Apartments (another hotel across from bus station) I believe are also the same. Some guesthouses out at the terraces themselves also have private showers in some rooms. The more important issue is hot water availability--it may be limited hours only. Places I mentioned in Xinjie town do have air conditioning (individual room split-unit type) which will likely be needed in the April-September period only. Most of these units are also programmed to provide some heat similar to a heat pump, which will work adequately unless the temperature sustains below about 40 degrees F/ 5 degrees C (not common in Yuanyang). My bed at Yunti Shenjie also had those nifty electric sheet warmers for the bed--though they really weren't needed during the night in November (would have been too hot). Accommodation will be simple but adequate--doesn't fit my definition of truly "roughing it." I'm not into "roughing it" myself but I do prefer my private room, private bath, decent bed, and spotless cleanliness.

4) Travel woes are surmountable in China, sometimes you just have to be proactive. Hopefully that was an important take-away that readers will pick up on! When in darkness, it's best to light a candle than curse the dark (though it often feels better to first curse a bit!).


More on the trip to be added...Lijiang is next! Coming very soon.

More on the trip to be added...Lijiang is next! Coming very soon.

Can't wait for this review, I think this is my next trip to China.

Planning a Trip

When planning a trip to Southwest China, Lijiang is on most tourists’ “must-see” places and with good reason. It is very pleasant small city in a lovely setting, with a well-protected Old Town area as its centerpiece, as well as a good variety of other activities to keep the visitor occupied. Some characteristics useful to know when planning a trip:

a) This is a popular year-round destination for Chinese tourists so the town is never empty of tourists. However, the November through March period (with exception of Chinese New Year which is very busy) is the lower season and is not too crowded. There is a bit of pattern to how the Chinese tour bus crowds tend to move, and one can use this to advantage to avoid getting caught up in the worst of the throng, even during crowded seasons. Do avoid Chinese major national holiday periods though.

b) As with much of Yunnan province, probably the worst weather season is summer (especially July-August) as this is the rainy season. Much of the Lijiang area’s best attractions require being in the Great Outdoors, and significant rainfall can really put a damper on enjoyment as well as make some endeavors such as hiking, outright hazardous. While going in summer and praying for decent weather is better than not going at all, if you have a choice between visiting Yunnan/Lijiang in midsummer versus any other time, pick “any other time.” Winter does get a bit cold and particularly after dark, but it is not as bitter as a Beijing or a Xi’an, therefore quite manageable.

c) Being primarily a tourist city, expect prices for accommodation and food to be higher than for comparables in other Chinese cities of similar size. In general, the closer you get to Lijiang Old Town, the more expensive these tend to be. One large budget-snarfing item in the Lijiang area are ENTRY FEES, which seem to be everywhere you turn. Entry fees in this area for attractions and shows are high-priced and together can add up to a very expensive chunk of budget, so some understanding of the setup and also prioritization of what you want to see/do according to your personal interests, will help manage this aspect of a trip.

d) There is absolutely no need to engage a “tour” or a guide for attractions within Lijiang City itself or for the nearby villages such as Shuhe and Baisha (more later about this). You can wander about on your own quite successfully with guidebook and map, and dispense with the annoyance of somebody yammering in your ear or rushing you around per their preset schedule, so you can enjoy and savor. Lijiang can be very relaxing, well for China anyway. For sights outside Lijiang City such as Jade Dragon Snow Mountain Park, First Bend of the Yangtze, Tiger Leaping Gorge, and exploration of more distant villages, the most useful thing to have at your disposal is transportation (car with driver)—possibly a guide if your language skills aren’t up to communicating directly with driver. It is certainly possible to do all of these things independently using public transportation for significantly less money, but you will have to accept some time inefficiencies and less convenience in return for the savings. It is also possible to join-in to small or large tours (usually can arrange in Lijiang the day before you want to go somewhere). These will have bus and guide and can be cost-effective, but you will be on the tour’s set schedule rather than your own.

e) In recent years, Lijiang has received disparaging comments—particularly from a subset of visiting foreigners—about being a “tourist trap.” Lijiang is prone to having crowds of tourists and yes, the Old Town is full of shops selling schlocky souvenir merchandise, but IMO that does not make the city a “trap.” (And believe me, as a Florida, USA native, I can spot a real tourist trap blindfolded at a thousand paces.) I think for the foreseeable future, it is well worth visiting. In some aspects, Lijiang Old Town has gotten a bit too cute for its own good, and the “Ye Olde China” bit can grate on some visitors. But, under UNESCO protection, the preservation (and parts reconstructed after the 1996 earthquake damage) has been done very well, and the Old Town is lively and vibrant rather than a dead museum.

The City: Old Town

The core of Lijiang is the Old Town, also known as Dayan. This is a pedestrian-only zone and it is fairly sizeable. Most visitors tend to gravitate here for at least certain parts of their stay in the Lijiang area. The cobblestone streets form a literal maze that you can easily get enjoyably lost in, exploring for a few hours. The main square and the streets leading to it are normally the most active and crowded, but if you just walk away from that area (particularly to the eastern half of the Old Town), things get much less active and more peaceful. The eastern half also tends to be the part of the Old Town that escaped the 1996 earthquake with little damage, whereas the part around the West, especially near the Mu Family Mansion, had to be heavily repaired and reconstructed. So if you look carefully, you’ll see more truly old architecture on some of these back streets. For those of you who have been to other old preserved towns, such as Pingyao in Shanxi province or Hongcun/Xidi in Anhui, this one is quite different in appearance and feeling, as Dayan is in the traditional building style of the Naxi minority not the Han Chinese.

Similar to other old preserved towns that get a lot of tourists, if you roll out of bed early and then wander around from about sunrise to 8-9 am in the morning, before the tour groups get going, you will see the natives going about their business in peace and quiet, and have the towns to yourself. And it’s easier to imagine away the tourist-oriented souvenir shops since they are closed and shuttered at that time of morning. However, Old Lijiang is a bit different from the aforementioned towns because it is packed with restaurants and clubs, which come alive in the late afternoon and evening. During my visit the second week of November, the Old Town was actually much more crowded and busy with Chinese tour groups from about 5 – 8 pm. And some clubs go on until way late in the evening. This is a plus if you are looking for that sort of activity, or a negative for many other tourists. Tip: If you intend to stay in Old Town accommodation, ferret out the location in advance and look for reviews and comments on whether you are about to locate yourself in the noisy club zone or in a quieter part of the Old Town.

The Old Town of Lijiang itself is free—you can just walk in and while at the most-used entries there are Visitor Information booths, there is no gate/checkpoint or ticket-takers. There are quite a number of streets and alleys that lead into the Old Town. You will see mention of an “Old Town Preservation Fee” (OTPF) which is currently RMB 80. You may purchase one of these at a Visitor Booth though it isn’t a ticket per se. In theory, hotels are supposed to levy this fee on all visitors, but in practice, it seems they don’t and leave you to your own devices. Caveat: This little item becomes very important to have if you want to see pretty much any of the famous sites in the Lijiang area: Black Dragon Pool, Naxi Orchestra, Jade Dragon Snow Mountain, Baisha Frescoes, etc. This is how they get you! As most visitors plan to do at least one of these other items, not just see Lijiang Old Town then go away, all the ticket booths at these other attractions will ask to see your receipt for this OTPF and if you cannot produce it, will levy RMB 80 charge on the spot for you to purchase it, in addition to their own standard entry fee. So...if/when you purchase this OTPF, put your name on the receipt you are given, in the spot provided, and keep it handy and ready to show upon demand, until you are completely out of the Lijiang area.

The City: New Town

Lijiang’s New Town is really new, as during the 1996 earthquake, it was the then-New Town that suffered the brunt of the destruction and much of it was flattened. So most New Town buildings date from that time. There has been a lot of development in Lijiang in the last few years, with the town spreading outward in most directions. Most of the New Town is north, west, and south of the Old Town, and contains the bulk of the hotel rooms, as well as all the things normal residents of a city would want: restaurants, supermarkets, shops, banks, hospital, police, etc. Many visitors (I am one) actually prefer to stay in the less-charming but more modern New Town—specifically the part of the New Town within about a 20-minute walk of the Old Town—where quality of accommodation tends to be better, is quieter in the evening, and is more convenient to essential services and transport in/out of city. One rationale for this is that during an average multi-day stay in Lijiang, you end up spending much more of your time outside the city (villages, Gorge, Jade Dragon Mountain, etc.) so it’s easier to just commute to the Old Town when you specifically want to be there. Another rationale is that it’s just too congested in the Old Town, the guesthouses may not have the best quality heat or hot water, and it’s a bit too much fishbowl and noisy atmosphere. It’s really horses for courses on this one. With a few exceptions of international-branded hotels that are at a distance (i.e. Banyan Tree which is up in Shuhe village), hotels in the New Town that are the closest walking distance to Old Town have higher rates than hotels in the New Town that are farther away and require motorized transport. Lijiang does have accommodation in all price ranges, and except maybe in winter low season when a walk-in is doable just about anywhere, it’s a good idea to have an advance booking to ensure your preferred accommodation.

Lijiang seems to have plenty of taxis and they are pretty cheap: flagfall RMB 7, no fuel surcharge right now, distances are short enough that it would be difficult to run up an RMB 20 in-town fare. Flat fares usually charged for longer trips such as to Jade Dragon Snow Mountain (RMB 100 current standard) or for a block of time for a few hours. Lijiang City also has a decent bus system but few visitors use it. The locals also flag down minibuses that also serve as share taxis. There are two very useful and cheap services that the visitor might make use of:
1) Minibuses to Shuhe village, about 6 km north of Lijiang. These shuttle constantly throughout the day and leave/return from the New Town parking lot next to the Likelong Supermarket on Xianggelila Street, north of intersection of Fuhui Road. Usually one is leaving every 5-10 minutes when full up. Take along the Chinese characters with you for Lijiang and Shuhe—signs are in the front window. RMB 2 per person in a 7-seater van. RMB 15 for the entire van if you want to go alone and not wait for anybody. Same deal on the return. (This supermarket is the best place I found to stock up on snacks, water, etc. at good prices.)

2) Minibus #7 to Jade Dragon Snow Mountain. These are actually private minibuses and leave from a lot just south of the Mao Statue/Square, about 5 minutes’ walk from the main (water wheel) entrance to the Old Town. Big red sign out front by the sidewalk in front of the lot. RMB 15. If traveling alone or as a couple, the price beats the RMB 100 asking price a taxi wants. Minibus will leave when full (or you are willing to pay the extra empty seats) and takes about 30-40 minutes to get to ticket gate of JDSM. May have to wait a few minutes for other travelers to show up, but outbound from Lijiang best chance is between 7-10 in morning. Return to Lijiang best from 15:00 – 18:00.

Under the assumption of a 07:30 am train arrival, set up in a hotel by 08:30, and good weather, my original itinerary was for two full days in Lijiang area – one for the Old Town and the nearby villages of Shuhe and Baisha, and the second day for a trip to Jade Dragon Snow Mountain. And two hotel nights. Then two days to get up to Zhongdian (Shangrila) incorporating bus travel and an intervening hike/overnight at Tiger Leaping Gorge. As stated in a previous episode (“...Woes...”), that plan went awry due to lousy weather on the first day, and lousy health. The silver lining in this cloud was a rework of the plan, which allowed for a much better time in the Lijiang area. In retrospect, my original plan was not good and was too rushed. Try not to make that same mistake. Due to geography, the following seems to be a pretty good model for most visitors basing out of Lijiang to follow (the order of days can be scrambled as one prefers):

Day One (or partial day if arriving in Lijiang in morning or early afternoon): Old Town and adjacent in the city.
Day Two: Villages (Shuhe, Baisha, Yuhu) or some further afield. Public transport and/or bicycle for the first group, further afield best to have private car/driver lined up.
Day Three: Jade Dragon Snow Mountain Park, including Impressions Lijiang show if interested in that.
Day Four: Tiger Leaping Gorge daytrip (with or without short hike from the road). Hiking the Upper Trail really needs two days with an overnight at a guesthouse up there. If after the TLG hike, you are continuing on to Zhongdian or heading back south towards Dali without returning to Lijiang, then 3 days/nights basing out of Lijiang is doable as a decent minimum.

I do NOT recommend trying to go as far as Zhongdian (Shangrila) on a daytrip from Lijiang though you will see them on offer. I have less strenuous objections to trying to do Shaxi village as a daytrip, it’s possible but an overnight there is much better (more on Shaxi in a future post).

Old Town and Lijiang City

I would allow at least 3 hours of Old Town exploration during daylight hours. You can go back in the evening on a subsequent day after returning from your out-of-city activities—and get a different feel. Either have a decent map preprinted off the internet or guidebook, or stop by a hotel or hostel and get a map of the city including the Old Town. You’ll get lost in the maze anyway, no worries! Snack around and duck into cafes for pick-me-ups as you go, but be forewarned that food and drink is a bit high compared to New Town restaurants and cafes. There is no charge for wandering around the Old Town. There are a couple of attractions which do charge entry fees: the Mu Family Compound (RMB 60) and performances of the Naxi Traditional Music Orchestra (RMB 150-200). I skipped both, as the Mu complex has become IMO outrageously expensive to visit, was heavily damaged in the earthquake and so was essentially completely rebuilt in the late 1990’s (though faithful to the original), and I’ve seen enough old family compounds in China to last a lifetime. I decided to forego the Orchestra since I was springing for the Impressions Lijiang show and budget was a concern. (I now regret that decision—should have gone anyway.)

Near the Old Town, if you have additional time and desire (I skipped these also):
--Lion Hill Park (RMB 15)—for panoramic views over Old Lijiang
--Black Dragon Pool (free but if you can’t produce the receipt for the Old Town Preservation Fee, you’ll be hit for RMB 80 at the main gate. There are sneaky ways to get in if you approach this from the north or the backside though)—famous for the pagoda/bridge photo angle with Jade Dragon Snow Mountain in the background. IMO, if you are heading to JDSM Park at some point, this is a dispensible sight/activity as you can get your great mountain photos out by the mountain itself. This is also known as Jade Spring Park.

Nearby Villages: Shuhe, Baisha, Yuhu

Shuhe is the closest and only about 6 km away. Taxi, public minibus (per my comment in the Lijiang General post), or rented bicycle can get you there. After the previous day’s weather which allowed me some decent though damp time in the Old Town during the afternoon, the weather for this second day was glorious—blue skies and cool and fresh during the morning but not cold. Due to my increasing nasal issues, I elected to not bike to Shuhe (normally an easy pedal for me), but took the minibus for RMB 2, payable to driver upon arrival at Shuhe. Unlike the private cars and larger buses, the little minivans which mostly shuttle villagers between Lijiang and Shuhe, don’t stop at the outer entry/ticket area, but zooms around that and goes right into the little town to a rather convenient drop point. Shuhe used to have an entry fee of RMB 30, but I’ve recently been told that this has been discontinued. However, I think that I saw attendants at the car/bus area checking for that Old Town Preservation Fee receipt!

Shuhe Old Town is a smaller version of Lijiang but not quite as developed and a bit less manicured. It is quieter, the natives seem a bit more accessible, and for this reason, a lot of travelers prefer to stay in Shuhe rather than Lijiang itself. Shuhe has quite a number of well-regarded guesthouses and some very upscale hotels such as the Pullman and the Banyan Tree. Shuhe also has restaurants (a bit less expensive than Lijiang Old Town) but unfortunately, the souvenir shops and the clubs have moved in. You don’t get a lot of the big Chinese tour bus contingent here, so it doesn’t feel crowded even in the middle of the day. Shuhe is mostly about atmosphere, but one attraction—FREE/no entry—that I enjoyed was the Tea Horse Caravan Museum (or something like that). It’s down an alley and signposted, yet nobody seems to come here. I was the only visitor during the 45 minutes I spent looking around. There aren’t many English captions, but the old photographs and maps of the trade routes in this region between Tibet, Yunnan, and what is now Burma and Thailand, are really fascinating and reasonably self-evident even without English. They also have plenty of interesting objects and artifacts that are also worth a look, and a separate building on the leather industry/trade for which Shuhe has been historically known.

A couple of hours wandering around Shuhe was enough for me, and close to noon, I felt good enough to rent a bicycle from a shop I’d passed and noted, for the 20-25 minute ride out to the next village, Baisha. (RMB 15 rental plus refundable RMB 300 deposit). I stayed off the main road for as long as I could, weaving through the village lanes heading out of Shuhe Old Town and into Shuhe Extended Town. My main issue was that instead of the clear path I was led to believe, there were plenty of forks in the road. So pretty much every villager I passed, I asked Baisha? Baisha? and they pointed me down the right pathway. After about 15 minutes you get back to the main road, which is very smooth and not heavily traveled. On a fine weather day, it was a most splendid bicycle ride through villages in the valley, passing fields newly harvested, and with an incredible view of Jade Dragon Snow Mountain looming rather close by. (Note that the tour buses and cars go a different road to get to JDSM Park, leaving this secondary one a relatively safe pedal for cyclists.) After about 25 minutes I arrived at Baisha—where there are overhead directional signs to the area’s main attractions (certain temples and especially the Baisha Frescoes). My specific target were the Frescoes.

There were few vehicles in the Frescoes parking lot. But they had a place just for bicycle parking and there were a few there already. Went to the ticket booth (RMB 30) only to get my comeuppance when asked to produce the Old Town Preservation Fee receipt. As I hadn’t bought one thus far, I was stuck and shelled out an additional RMB 80. Which for Frescoes only, RMB 110 total wouldn’t have been remotely worth it, but I knew I’d be needing that OTPF receipt for the next day’s visit to Jade Dragon Snow Mountain and the Lijiang Impressions Show. The main fresco area was small but impressive (though ferociously guarded to prevent photo-taking). But I thought the complex needed a bit of work, especially in the groundskeeping realm. And the area adjacent to the back gate has a lot of ladies selling textiles that frankly, looked like better quality and more authentic than anything I’d seen in Lijiang town. Certainly the prices were better. (I’m a fan of minority textile work and collect various pieces.) By itself, coming to Baisha just for the Frescoes is on the bubble for being worth it. However, adding in a look around the village and the fields, check out the Naxi Embroidery Institute, possibly a visit/consultation to the famous Dr. Ho and his clinic (look it up on internet, but get there quickly, the guy is older than dirt and can’t last much longer!), summed up, makes for a very nice, relaxing outing.

Ordinarily I’d have been able to pedal another few kilometers to the next village past Baisha which is Yuhu. Yuhu is where Joseph Rock, the famous Austro-American botanist, lived in the 1920’s, 30’s and 40’s, one of the first foreigners to really research this area’s natural features as well as Naxi culture. Was featured in old editions of National Geographic magazine. Had pretty strong anti-Han feelings, figuring that they were ultimately going to be destroyers of Naxi and other minority cultures. A rather fascinating historical character. His home has been converted into a small museum.

Unfortunately, I realized I was going to run out of steam if I didn’t head back to Shuhe, so I did not get to Yuhu this time. But again, another opportunity arose when a group of 4 Chinese cyclists also doing the same thing I was, joined up on the pedal back, and invited me to lunch in Shuhe with them. Turned out to be a young Customs official from Ningbo port, his girlfriend, his mother, and mother’s friend. I put myself in their hands for ordering lunch at a great (and cheap) little place just off Shuhe’s main square. It was delicious and they refused to let me contribute any funding to it. After we said our goodbyes, I took the bicycle back to the rental shop and got my deposit returned. Then found a minibus with no other waiting passengers, so rented the whole thing for RMB 15 for immediate departure back to Lijiang and a rest at my hotel for a few hours. Heading out later in the early evening for dinner in the Old Town.

Bottom Line: This is a fun and cheap independent day excursion which gives you a good flavor of typical villages in the Lijiang Valley, not too heavily touristed and then mostly by individuals and small groups. Private vehicle or taxi can take you there, but on a good weather day, a bicycle is a great idea if your knees are in good shape, and the terrain is flat (very slight upgrade Shuhe to Baisha). There is enough to explore out there (including other villages and various temples in the foothills that I didn’t make it to) to keep you busy for most of the day. Alternatively, if you are staying in Shuhe, or in Lijiang and get to Shuhe around 9-9:30 am, you can do these villages by early afternoon, skip the extra villages and temples, have lunch at Shuhe, and then still have time to do something else. With a vehicle at your disposal, you could go in a different direction out of Lijiang and visit other villages, First Bend of the Yangtze (Shigu), etc.

Yulong Xue Shan, as it’s known in Chinese, is very scenic and one of the area’s premier tourist attractions; it has also become quite expensive to visit, so be prepared. The Park actually contains a series of peaks, the most famous being the iconic Shanzidou which can be seen from Lijiang City itself. You can go by quasi-public minibus, by taxi, by private car engaged for the day, or on a tour. Before the more detailed information, let’s get a summary of fees (as of November 2011) right out front:
--Transportation to the park: cheapest is public minibus #7 one-way at RMB 15, taxi one-way is about RMB 100, private car/driver waiting for you RMB several hundred+, and tour bus included in overall price.
--Park Entry Fee: RMB 105.
--Old Town Preservation Fee: RMB 80 (show receipt if you already purchased and you won’t be hit for this again)
--Cable Car Fee for High Peak/Glacier (Ganhaizi then up mountain): RMB 160 round trip
--Cable Car Fee for either Cloud Meadow (Yunshanping) or Yak Meadow (Maoniuping) or Blue Moon Valley (Lanyue); RMB 60 round trip
--Shuttle Ecobus Fee (now required to get from Visitors Center to Cable Car staging): RMB 20 round trip.
--Impressions Lijiang Show Fee: RMB 190 regular seating, RMB 260 VIP.

So, somebody who wants to come and head up to the most popular venue, the high mountain, would have into this venture RMB 105 + 160 + 20 + transport at a minimum. Plus OTPF RMB 80 unless previously obtained.

Regardless of transport method, all vehicles will be stopped at the Park entrance gate and attendants will come around to collect the Park Entry Fee and (if you can’t produce your OTPF receipt), that one as well. After monies have been collected and tickets issued to you, your transportation will continue on a few km, to the parking lots for the various Visitors Centers. This is where it gets confusing. If you are on a tour or using a private driver that knows what your plans are, they’ll take you to the right lot for your destination. If on minibus #7 or a self-engaged taxi, you’ll need to tell them where you want off as follows:
--For Impressions Lijiang Show, get off at first lot (Parking Lot #3). If you already have shuttle bus/cable car tickets (obtained from an agent in advance) for Cloud Meadow or Yak Meadow, also get off here. If you follow the lot around to where it turns into path, you’ll see the amphitheater for the show, the ticket booth for show tickets, and also the support buildings for queueing for the Cloud and Yak Meadow shuttles.
--For the high Peak/Glacier with advance tickets, and for all shuttle/cable car tickets to be purchased on the spot, get off at the second entry. Ticketing booth for real-time sales will be just on your right inside the entrance. The building at the back with the totem-pole looking thing on the top is the Visitor Center/queuing area for shuttles for the main Peak (the expensive one). For just-purchased shuttle/cable car tickets for Cloud/Yak Meadow, use the road/path that curves to the right of the totem pole building to get around back to those staging areas. For just-purchased shuttle/cable car tickets for Blue Moon Valley, when facing the totem pole building, to your left is a small non-public parking lot—cross it to the other end and follow a path to the next entry/parking area. Just across from the path outlet is a busy doorway into another building complex that contains a ton of restaurants. Elbow your way all the way to the other end and the queuing area for Blue Moon shuttles will be there, as will another large parking lot.

This is the current set-up, and to me seemed a bit of an unnecessarily convoluted organization, especially for independent foreign travelers. However, most gate or booth staff can point you in the right direction, non-Chinese speakers should have handy the place they want to end up in Chinese characters.

There is plenty of information on the internet about the various areas within JDSM Park, so readers can delve deeply on their own. In general though;
--Ganhaizi Grassland/Glacier/High Peak is the most popular and most expensive to visit, but has some stupendous views. The cable car will take you to a point where you still have some uphill walking to do if you want. Altitude is nearly 4500 meters, and some people have trouble with this. Oxygen canisters are available for sale should you need it. It will be cold and you will need a heavy coat, even if the temperature in Lijiang and in the base of the mountain/staging area is comfortable. Coats are available for rent, useful if you are coming during non-winter months and wouldn't normally be traveling with your own coat.

--Cloud Meadow is very popular and can get really crowded with big Chinese tour groups. 3200 meters and some hiking available.
--Yak Meadow is farther away—shuttle buses take as much as 25-30 minutes longer to get there, but this makes it the least crowded of the feature areas, and also the best for hiking if you have the time. 3650 meters.
--Blue Moon Valley is getting more popular, has a series of very blue lakes and some decent hikes available.

Queueing: Expect queues to get on the shuttle buses that take you from the appropriate visitor center to the actual cable car area. Possibly little or no queues in winter non-holiday periods. To control access in some sort of rational way, visitors buying shuttle/cable car tickets for the feature areas are given time slots for departure from the visitors center. Normally, tour groups will be shepherded through first as their slots are part of their pre-arrangement. But independent travelers will receive a time slot where they can be fitted in, capacity permitting. During busy season, the wait to get on a shuttle bus to the cable cars can be a couple of hours + for an independent. To avoid this, be prepared to get to the Park when it opens (08:00, I think) and get tickets so you can head up to the place of your choice immediately, before the groups arrive. This is less of a problem during winter visits with fewer crowds.

Return Transport: For the independent visitor who took public transport (minibus #7 or taxi) out to the Park, transport back to Lijiang city can be somewhat annoying. First of all, very little shared transport heads back from the park until about 15:00. And taxis are also sparse until then. Lots of people heading back 15:00-17:00. So, if you want or need to return to Lijiang city earlier, you may have to wait awhile to scrape up enough people to share a minibus or taxi, or be willing to pay about RMB 100 to get yourself back with no other passengers. During the lunch period (noon-13:30 pm), drivers are all eating and/or snoozing, so you will see tons of parked minibuses and taxis with nary a driver to be seen. During this time, standing by the side of the main Park road and flagging down any empty taxi, or anything that looks like it might be heading to Lijiang is a strategy that has a 50/50 chance of working with a less-than 20-minute wait.

If you aren’t on a tight budget, and/or have at least 2-3 people to share the cost, I’d recommend saving return transport time and angst and at least hiring a private driver for the day to take you there and pick you up. Preferably while waiting out there, in case your plans require an earlier return to Lijiang than you had originally planned. Imperative to have a mobile phone and have the drivers phone number as well. I’m not normally a tour groupie, but if you can locate a day tour that is going to where you want to go within JDSM Park, it might be worth considering. Based on raw costs identified above, you can calculate if the all-inclusive tour price has enough value-added (and convenience) to make it worthwhile.

Impressions Lijiang

This is an extravaganza produced by Zhang Yimou of cinema and Beijing Olympic Opening Ceremonies fame. It takes place in a purpose-built amphitheater with Shanzidou peak looming in the background above. The cast consists of about 500 male and female members—mostly minorities from the area—who perform a cultural show of various songs and dances. I went to JDSM Park specifically to see this show, and quite enjoyed it even though it is a bit pricey. I would recommend it to others, especially if you have a nice day. The show goes on rain or shine (on a rainy day, rain gear is distributed to the audience as no umbrellas are allowed.) The day I went was stunningly beautiful—not a cloud in the blue sky—and not too cold. The mountain in the background had a good deal of snow on it already, which is a plus for visiting in late fall, winter, or very early spring. My criticisms of the show are not dealbreakers: a) too short; it was not quite 70 minutes and I think the price justifies 90 minutes; b) not enough big musical numbers from the ladies, I thought the various show numbers were a little too male-dominant (though still excellent); c) weaker ending than I expected given Zhang Yimou, I wanted a Big Bang finale.

Tip: There is no need to spring for VIP seating. If you buy the regular seating at RMB 190, then about 20 minutes ahead of show time, enter the amphitheater, you’ll pretty much have your pick of seats. Doing this, I got perfect seats at the center aisle, towards the back of the lower section (good view of entire stage area as well as mountain behind). The amphitheater tends to fill up only within 5 minutes ahead of show start. I tried to purchase a ticket in advance in Lijiang, only to be rebuffed at both hotel and Lijiang tourist information center—they said, just get at the venue. Which I did, no problem about 30 minutes before show time—there is a ticket booth outside the amphitheater. Minibus and private drivers have quasi-shady deals where they can get tickets for about RMB 170 or 180—but origin is suspect and I recommend you avoid this gambit. In busier tourist season, my guess is that one can and should buy tickets to this show in advance, in Lijiang, either directly or through an agent.

Current show times are daily, 09:00, 11:00, and 14:00. But this can change so you must check with hotel or visitor’s information in Lijiang once you arrive in the city. It is logical to combine a trip to the show with a trip to one of the Park’s feature areas—so if you want to do this, go for the 09:00 show and head out early from Lijiang (07:00 for the minibus #7, by 08:00 for private car). Or get to the Park very early at 08:00 opening time to head to Mountain or Meadow, then go for the 14:00 show.

One final and most important piece of advice: If you are in Lijiang City looking at Shanzidou peak and the top is covered with clouds, do not waste your time or money going up the mountain, as you won’t be able to see anything except your immediate surroundings. Even the lower Meadow areas are not optimum when the weather isn’t clear, so skipping the Park that day might be the best plan. The corollary to this is that you should be flexible enough in your day-by-day plans so that if you get a really nice clear day as seen at sunrise, rearrange if you must and use the good day to see this Park.

Great Lijiang reviews, will be useful next trip for me.

jiejie,
You have done so much detailed journaling, its incredible. Wish I had read this before my last July trip to Lijiang.
The Jade Dragon Snow Mtn was not out while I was in the park. The lower park at the blue water lakes area was beautiful. I went up to the Spruce Meadows, and found it so-so. Any meadows in Alaska would beat that by miles. We left the park late afternoon when it started pouring rain.
As soon as we arrived back to Lijiang, the sun broke out and voila, the mountain was out. I stopped the driver and hopped out on curbside and shot a whole bunch of pictures.

Nice work. This will benefit a lot of FTers who plan to do Lijiang and beyond.

When I was there, the airport road was under construction (or reconstruction). It was a mess and dusty! Is it finished now?

I did not use the Lijiang airport on this trip, but from others who did, I didn't hear any complaints, so I'd guess it is finished. At any rate, if you are flying in or out of Lijiang, you have to just play with the cards you're dealt, as there aren't a lot of options!

I hope that at least some FT'ers are getting some benefits, ideas, or at least some laughs at my travel maneuvers. :)

more to come now....

Due to a change of trip itinerary from Lijiang onward, the lengthening of my stay in the general Lijiang area, and Tiger Leaping Gorge reduced to a daytrip rather than a 2-day overnighter out of Qiaotou, I needed to find something interesting to do that wasn’t too physically strenuous since my stamina wasn't great. Shaxi and Shibaoshan fit the bill to a “T.” Not too far away by public transport, interesting, inexpensive. I particularly wanted to visit Shaxi on Friday, when the regional market is in full swing and the various villagers from the different ethnic groups all congregate there. More about Shaxi in the next post, but first some logistical thoughts.

If you are of the Jiejie persuasion and not prone to detailed advance planning for China/Asia travel, Lijiang is a good place in a longer China trip to take stock, reassess, and also make onward arrangements for the rest of your trip (Chinese national holidays excepted). And particularly during late fall and winter if original plans are for travel northbound beyond Tiger Leaping Gorge, it can make sense to leave that part a bit loosey-goosey, first arrive in Lijiang, and then assess the weather situation for Zhongdian, Deqin, and some of the remote parks before committing to push on. In case of bad weather, snow, ice, etc., scrubbing the original mission and then implementing Plan B is easily done from Lijiang. (Remember Jiejie's second most important rule: always have a Plan B).

For my Plan B, I used Lijiang Phase 1 of my stay (8th, 9th, 10th of November) to sightsee as already outlined in above posts, but also some downtime to:
a) Confirm that Zhongdian/Shangrila still had decent weather and no snow, so it was a “go” although not to be a lengthy visit. And confirmed that my health issues aside, going further to Deqin/Meili and/or the Yunnan-Sichuan highway via Litang to Chengdu, was inadviseable this late in the year due to start of snowfall and risk of getting stuck.
b) Check out flight availabililty and fares from Zhongdian to Chengdu, and buy a ticket at the local China Eastern office just up the street from my hotel (same price as ctrip.com but without the credit card charge or DCC). Purchased this ticket on Nov. 9th for travel on Nov. 15th.
c) Research hotel/hostel options for Zhongdian and book one night at a splurge property right next to the Monastery (Songtsam Hotel).
d) Book one night at a Chengdu Hotel since my plane arrival was evening.
e) From what little I could find on websites, made a sketch map of Shaxi and Shibaoshan to take along in my master notebook.
f) Write names and addresses and phone of 3-4 Shaxi guesthouses, but no booking (decided to use walk-in method so I could first inspect the premises). Also in the master notebook.
g) Advanced Purchased a pair of bus tickets (again for me, my daypack, and my comfort) to Jianchuan the day before travel to guarantee space on the first bus out.

At that point, still didn’t have last 2 days of my trip figured out, nor a booking to get back to Beijing. But logistically in a good place.

The other part of Plan B was to insert the 11th and 12th of November as my overnight trip to Shaxi and Shibaoshan, to take advantage of the 11th being Friday and market day in Shaxi, then Shibaoshan on morning of the 12th, then return to Lijiang by late afternoon to deal with arrangements for Tiger Leaping Gorge daytrip for the 13th and northbound bus to Shangri-la for the morning of the 14th. This required a bit more time on the road in a bus seat, but it allowed me to just take a daypack to Shaxi, and leave the rest of my luggage with the bellmen at my Lijiang hotel until my return the following afternoon for Phase 2 and another 2 nights. This ended up working out quite well.

Here is another couple of those interesting and mostly-undiscovered places that really add some variety and dimension to a China trip. And are not repetitious with other places you may have already seen. These places, which are in close proximity, have not been heavily marketed destinations for tourists, so there is not a large body of real-time information out there on the internet. The following might help out, first some descriptions and thoughts on what’s there, then logistics of how to make it happen.

Heads-Up: Construction is underway on a major new expressway that will link Lijiang-Jianchuan-Dali, making Shaxi and Shibaoshan much more accessible to the big bus tours, particularly for daytrips...and we all know what that means. From the looks of it, they still have a good 2+ years of work to do before this gets close to operational. So there's a case to be made for getting to these places sooner rather than later if you can.

Shaxi

Shaxi is located between Lijiang and Dali, not on the main highway but on a now-secondary road. While “Shaxi” is commonly used by both locals and visitors used to mean the specific village of Sideng, it also refers to a large and very nice valley dotted with small villages and farmland. The predominant ethnic groups here are the Bai and the Yi. There are relatively few Han Chinese. Shaxi is particularly notable for being the last existing example of a former important trading post on the Tea and Horse Caravan trail (ancient trading routes covering parts of what is now Tibet-Yunnan-Burma) that still has a basically untouched old town with traditional rammed-earth and mud brick architecture. This is not your Old Town Lijiang, but the real, mostly unreconstructed deal and without the crowds and the souvenir shops. With a location on a secondary road which requires a bit of thought and effort to get there, and with little tourist infrastructure, Shaxi has fortunately (from my perspective) not made it onto the radar of the usual agents nor the big bus tour groups. During my visit in the second week of November, there were next to no visitors, and I was told even in warmer weather, not too many. So if you want to avoid the Chinese tour groups wearing matching caps and tour guide with bullhorn...this is your place!

The natives go about their everyday business, allowing you to take a voyeuristic peek. Being a Bai town, it is different in appearance from Lijiang which is a Naxi town. The main road in this very small town has the minibus parking lot, lots of small shops for buying groceries, household goods, electricals, post office, bank, main market, etc. Also a couple of guesthouses and a very small selection of restaurants and cafes, some of which are closed Nov-Feb. Running perpendicular to the main road is a cobblestone street (pedestrian only) heading toward the river, which is the main path of Shaxi Old Town. This street leads to a very interesting old square, with temple on one side, and an very unique ancient elevated stage on the other. With some other small establishments surrounding the square (in November, mostly shuttered and closed). Small cobblestone lanes lead off the square in various directions, and the old architecture (now in various states of disrepair) is wonderful. Lanes lead to the old south gate and also down to the east gate and the river that runs behind the town and---uncommon for China--a very clean-looking river. There are more guesthouses located in the Old part of Shaxi than the new. Beyond the physical aspects, I found the square fascinating since in the morning, most of the town seems to gather there for breakfast. Tables are set up, and I saw cooks coming out of a doorway (obviously a kitchen) with trays and trays of food. Old people and kids/families eating first, the unattached men waiting on the fringes for their turn. I have not seen anything quite like this before in modern China—it appeared to be either a Bai tradition for this village, or possibly a holdover from the earlier commune days of the PRC.

Tip: A main draw of Shaxi is the regional market held every Friday, with peak action between about 10 am – 2 pm. Villagers from all over the area come, in full minority dress gear and with baskets on back, to shop and trade. So if possible, schedule a Shaxi visit to coincide with this market.

Although I have previously seen internet mention of an RMB 20 entry fee into the old town of Shaxi, I didn't pay anything nor did I see any sort of ticket booth, kiosk, or roving villager demanding payment. So perhaps this never existed, or doesn't exist anymore, or is a seasonal thing and in low season, nobody cares. That said, there are ways to enter the old town from the river or from the side as well. There is an entry fee (RMB 40) if you want to go inside the old temple on the old town square (I skipped this).

Shibaoshan

Shibaoshan is one of China’s earliest National parks, with status dating from the early 1980’s. It is very quiet, very well-kept, and actually has true old-growth forest since locals and Chinese business concerns with logging interests were mostly kept out of there. During my November visit, the leaves were still changing color and it looked a little bit like the Appalachian mountains of the USA. Shibaoshan is notable for a couple of temples and especially for a unique series of rock carvings and statuary that have been remarkably well preserved—the Shizhong Grottoes which were carved by the Bai in the 800-1100 A.D. time period. Shibaoshan also contains the Baoxiang “Hanging” Temple perched on the side of a rather formidable hill, and accessed via lots of steps—it is not similar to the “Hanging Monastery” found near Datong in Shanxi Province. And a couple of other temples and some very, very ancient living trees. There are a couple of small villages inside the boundaries of Shibaoshan as well. Access to Shibaoshan is by road, with the turnoff into the park located between Shaxi (Sideng) and Jianchuan. There are also ways to hike into Shibaoshan park, and guesthouses/hostels in Shaxi offer such things if you have the time and inclination. I believe from Shaxi to Shibaoshan is about 2-3 hours of pretty easy hike (20 minutes by road). The entire Shaxi valley looks like very enticing territory for interesting yet relatively non-strenuous walks and bikes.

Entry into Shibaoshan (at least from the main gate/vehicular access) is RMB 50. Important: the main feature of the park, the Shizhong Grottoes, are CLOSED to visitors this winter from November to mid-February 2012, as they are doing some work there. If you are in the area and want to go before the Grottoes reopen, then at least try to argue and negotiate a lower entry fee (RMB 30 or 35) to compensate. There is little warning anywhere about this closure, most visitors find out when they rock up to the gate. Unfortunately, once inside the Park, my efforts to try to find the workmens’ route to the caves (visitors route is locked off), did not succeed, so I went away with my cave urge unfulfilled. I still enjoyed my visits to the other temples and also the beautiful and peaceful surroundings themselves, though. Once the caves reopen, I would allow 3-4 hours inside the park to see it properly.

General and Logistics

1) There are few English speakers anywhere in this area, and while not a necessity, some Chinese language ability is helpful. Note that most people will be speaking local dialect--which I found basically incomprehensible, though people could understand my Mandarin and some locals could speak reasonably "standard" Mandarin.

2) There is no luxury hotel (actually there aren’t any hotels), but adequate accommodation is available in guesthouses. Some guesthouses close for winter around November 1, but open ones includes Tea and Horse Caravan Trail Inn (which I stayed at—simple but comfortable double room with ensuite w/24 hour hot water and wifi, nice courtyard house setup, RMB 120 which is on the high side for this town). Horse Pen Hostel and 58 Yard Hostel were also open, maybe 2-3 others. Dragonfly Guesthouse which is a bit isolated and out of town, but one of the more “swank” guesthouses, was also open since I bumped into someone a few days later at Lijiang who had just stayed there. If traveling during colder weather, expect none of these to have central heating though most will have electric quilts on the beds. In late fall and winter, it is chilly and particularly in the morning and after sun goes down. Most do have some sort of split-unit air conditioning for warm weather visits.

3) There are not too many places to find food, though some of the hostels and guest houses do serve meals upon arrangement. A good little open-air local place on the main road right in the middle of town is the Orange Restaurant. They have part of their menu done in English but if you know a little Chinese, you can sort of describe what you want and they'll make it up. Very tasty and very cheap, actually one of the better meals I had in Yunnan on this trip.. I did see another restaurant at the other end of town which was more upscale—well it was in an enclosed building (!), but didn’t go in. Also some small places in the old town, but expect more snacks/limited menus. You won't starve, though, so no need to bring a case of power bars down from Lijiang! You’ll need to adapt to villager time which goes with the sun. So prepare to eat dinner relatively early and also go to bed fairly early. For morning breakfast, I paid a visit to the nice lady at the local bakery on the main street, which opens fairly early, and got some tasty muffin and cake like things to tide me over. Some guesthouses do more extensive breakfasts if you are into those, though you may have to indicate your intent the evening before.

4) This is another one of those places where everything is done in cash RMB, and you can’t get any here, so bring everything you need with you.

5) Guesthouses in Shaxi are probably the best for arranging local hikes, river trips, etc. And this is best done in advance when getting information/making reservations. Most of the Shaxi Guesthouses have their own websites, an internet search will bring up a bunch of possibilities.

Planning a Trip and Getting There

Although either Shaxi or Shibaoshan can be done as a long daytrip from Lijiang (or from Dali), it is exponentially more preferable to do this as a 2-day “module” from either of those larger cities, staying overnight in Shaxi. To see both places, a daytrip isn’t enough time and you need to do the overnight. Shaxi is very quiet at night, no neon, no bars or clubs, etc. Very peaceful.

Access is by road, either private car or public transportation. Private car all the way from Lijiang or Dali will be expensive, and for an overnight rather than a daytrip, doesn’t seem to make a lot of sense. On public transportation from either Lijiang or Dali, you’ll need to catch a bus to the closest sizeable town: Jianchuan. From Lijiang, buses used are the 20-25 seater small shuttle type, take about 2.5 hours, and costs RMB 20. I went to Lijiang bus station the afternoon before the day I wished to travel, got information on times, and purchased ticket for the first Jianchuan bus the following morning at 08:20. If you want to do a daytrip to Shaxi and return to Lijiang the same day, you must get the first bus out. From Jianchuan back to Lijiang by public bus, cost and time frame is same, there are 2-3 morning buses and afternoon buses at 13:30 and 15:30. I did have private taxis outside both Lijiang and Jianchuan bus stations, offer to drive me the distance to the other, for prices one-way ranging from RMB 200-280. So, for a group of 3-4 people traveling together, this is actually a reasonably cost-effective option. Originating from Dali is going to have similar setup to Jianchuan and similar metrics, and as usual, most Dali buses are going to be leaving from Xiaguan (New Dali) not the old town.

At Jianchuan, you’ll need to change to a minibus to get the rest of the way to Shaxi. This is not difficult, as the minibuses will be congregated in a parking lot just south of the bus station next to the main road. The 7-seater minivans charge RMB 10 per person to Shaxi and go when full, or RMB 70 if you want to buy the whole van out and leave immediately. I joined up with a group of 4 other young westerners who happened to be daytripping Lijiang-Shaxi-Lijiang, we split an empty waiting van between us and got going at once. It takes 45 minutes to get from Jianchuan to/from Shaxi. The turn-off to Shibaoshan Park entrance is about half-way between the two, down this highway, and well-marked. The road quality is good and smooth and lightly traveled south of Jianchuan, and as you get near Shaxi is quite pretty and though a little winding, is not scary or particularly unsafe. On the way, you’ll pass a couple of stone-working villages—there must be white marble quarry somewhere nearby—so if you were hankering for a marble headstone or a buddha or birdbath or something, here’s your chance. Minibuses all end up in a lot right in Shaxi, and the town is so small, it’s very easy to find your way back when time comes to head back to Jianchuan. There will be more minibuses plying the route before lunch than after lunch. A non-Mandarin speaker can manage the transportation by having the characters for "Jianchuan" and "Shaxi" written down. The locals will understand where you want to go.

Shibaoshan: I’m not aware of any regular public transport heading to/from Shibaoshan, though of course the minibuses in either Jianchuan or Shaxi could take you there and drop you for a price. Jianchuan has regular taxis that could also be negotiated with for this. As inside Shibaoshan park requires a vehicle to cover the distance between sights (unless you are a monster hiker), you might consider a private car rental for this segment. At my Shaxi guesthouse, I inquired about getting a driver the next day to take me from Shaxi to Shibaoshan, drive me around/wait for me at sights, and then drive me from Shibaoshan to the Jianchuan bus station, for total of about 3-4 hours of his time. Guesthouse owner picked up phone, made a local call, and in a few minutes I had my private ride for following day for RMB 150, which was worth it to me even though I had nobody to split it with. Tip: This is a pretty standard way of getting what you need in small-town China--all the locals know each other and they can work the phones quickly and scare up what you need in a hurry--usually from a family member or friend. It's just a matter of price. So don't worry if there's no commercial travel agent around, just ask at the guesthouse.

You can also visit Shaxi/Shibaoshan as a sidespur on a one-way Dali-Lijiang routing (or vice-versa). Again, you’ll need to bus to Jianchuan rather than the express bus between the two. There are also buses between Jianchuan and Kunming, though what I saw were sleeper buses—I expect this journey would take about 8 hours or so. Also existing are Zhongdian (=Xianggelila = Shangrila) to Jianchuan buses. These stop in Qiaotou on the southbound. This is a very useful bus connection if you are traveling from Shangri-La (or Tiger Leaping Gorge) southbound towards Dali, have already seen Lijiang, and do not wish to return there. The Zhongdian-Qiaotou-Jianchuan bus would be a real time-saver over anything going first back to Lijiang, as that turnoff eastward to Lijiang from the main north-south road, is very heavily trafficked now. Shangri-la to Jianchuan direct (or vice-versa) should be a total of about 4 hours by bus, with a short stop in/around Qiaotou. Didn’t get the cost but probably about RMB 50.

Cost of Excursion ex-Lijiang from Lijiang Bus Station round-trip:
--Public Transport: double/pair of bus tkts to Jianchuan (20 x 2 =40) + shared minivan to Shaxi (14) + double/pair of bus tkts to Lijiang (21 x 2 = 42) = 96
--Cost of Private Driver from Shaxi->Shibaoshan->Jianchuan = 150
--Entry Fee at Shibaoshan: 35 (negotiated down from standard 50 due to grotto closure)
--Guesthouse 1 night: 120. Food, snacks, water, etc = 56
--Total 2 days (actually about 33 hours total): RMB 457.
(Traveling with a companion would have required an incremental of less than RMB 200 additional, sharing double room and private car, or about RMB 325/person).

Upon arriving back from Shaxi via Jianchuan at the Lijiang bus station on Saturday afternoon November 12 about 16:00, I immediately walked around to the ticket selling hall and asked the information booth about buses to Zhongdian (Xianggelila/Shangrila) for Monday morning. Nice lady looked up on her computer and wrote down all the buses going before noon. First out at about 07:20. Then, remembering there were various kinds of buses from humble to exalted on this route, I asked her which ones were the nicest big buses—and she said “Ah, first one of those is at 08:50. RMB 67.” So I went to window and bought a double/pair of seats for Monday morning on the 08:50. Tip (previously given but bears repeating): For intercity buses, it’s a great idea to get that ticket at least the day before, to lock in your preferred time of departure. Then, I headed to Old Town to square away plans to get to Tiger Leaping Gorge for the next day, Sunday. I had already made the decision to do TLG as a daytrip, it was just a matter of figuring out how to make it there and back.

Gorge General Description and Layout

Tiger Leaping Gorge is one of the feature attractions in the greater Lijiang area. The staging town for TLG is Qiaotou, which is primarily a transport junction with some small hotels, guesthouses, restaurants, support facilities, etc. at the confluence of the Yangtze and Jinsha Rivers. It currently takes about 2.5 hours to get from Lijiang to Qiaotao. The road is decent but not expressway-caliber. It is also under reconstruction in some places so prone to some slow-go spots and minor backups. An upgraded higher-speed road is being put in place but is probably 2-3 years away from completion. Some travelers do the Gorge coming from the opposite direction, from Zhongdian heading southbound, and that is doable also. Bus or car from Zhongdian takes about two hours to Qiaotou on good quality 2-lane road with nice scenery on the way and much less traffic than Lijiang-Qiaotou.

The main thing to decide before you physically arrive at the Gorge (actually, decide when you are setting up your itinerary or when you get to Lijiang or Zhongdian) is whether you are going to do a daytrip or whether you are going to do more extensive hiking in the Gorge, which requires at least one overnight in a guesthouse along the trail. There are schematic maps of the Gorge area on the internet, but a bit of description is useful to help make this decision. Keep in mind the river at this point is essentially running southwest to northeast. From Qiaotou in the west and heading eastward, you have the Upper Gorge Area, then the Middle Gorge, then the Lower Gorge as you get to the village of Daju and the point at which ferries can cross the river (except in very high/rough water periods). The Middle Gorge is generally regarded as the most spectacular, as the narrowness of the Gorge at this point along with the steep drop/fall rate of the river, makes for some thundering white water even in dry season. It is considered unnavigable by boat or raft.

1) On the south side of the river is a good roadway that leads to the original scenic overlook of the Upper Gorge, and goes no further. Many tour buses and private cars go to this point, mostly for looking, as there really aren’t hikes you can do from here. The big draw is the rock the legendary Tiger supposedly used to leap across the Gorge.

2) On the north side of the river there is another roadway (relatively recently completed) that goes all the way past Upper, Middle, and Lower Gorge areas, and then heads northward towards Haba Snow Mountain and back up an alternate secondary road to Zhongdian. Big tour buses only go about 10 minutes down this road from Qiaotou, as far as the new parking lot/overlook at the Upper Gorge and no further. Many crowds and most of the Chinese groups seem to end up here. They really want to see that legendary Tiger Leaping rock! There are steps down to a platform below the parking area overlooking the river but again, not the location for long hiking. Past this point, the road is still good but narrows a bit, so vehicles traveling to the Middle Gorge and beyond tend to be smaller buses, minivans, and private cars. At the Middle Gorge area, there are guesthouses along the roadway. There are also trails leading down to the river itself, suitable for hikes of 2-4 hours that can be incorporated into a daytrip. And the upper trail also outlets here, for those who have done (or wish to start) the overnight long hike. From Qiaotou, it takes about 30 minutes by vehicle to get to the Middle Gorge section. Note: the terrain along this road is not stable, and is subject to rockslides and loose falling rock at any time, although many places have rock-catching barriers up. Rainy season is particularly dicey. It always pays to check in Lijiang (or Zhongdian) the condition of this road, just before you plan to head out, to see if there are any blockages. Several years ago this was pretty much only a hiking trail, known then as the “Lower Trail” to distinguish it from the Upper Trail (see below) but now that it has been converted to a road, it’s often referred to as the “Lower Road.”

3) Also on the north side of the river: the Upper Trail which is hiking only. This trail begins in Qiaotou (by the school near Jane’s Guesthouse) and wends its way upward and eastward to the Lower Gorge area, with various paths leading downhill to the Lower Road. The most popular route for hikers is the section from Qiaotou to the Middle Gorge, heading east-bound, then heading down to the Lower Road and catching a vehicle from the Middle Gorge back to Qiaotou. Most hikers in decent shape can do this in about 8 hours of walking, normally split half one day and half the next day, with an overnight spent in one of the guesthouses on the trail. Extremely fit hikers staying in Qiaotou and getting an early start have been able to do this all in one day, but not recommended unless you are in very good shape and conditioned to long hiking. It is also possible to do this hike in reverse (westbound) by taking a vehicle to the Middle Gorge via the Lower Road and then heading up to the Upper Trail back towards Qiaotou. The advantage of the westbound method is that on the most challenging part of the hike (the 28 bends), you are mostly going downhill when headed west. Regardless of direction, do not underestimate this hike even though it is not a huge technical challenge. If not in good shape, or if you suffer from fear of heights, it’s best to forego. For safety reasons in case of illness or injury on the trail, do not do this hike alone. If traveling alone, usually there will be some other hikers around, so buddy up. Rainy season can be hazardous, so the least popular time for this hike is July-August. Do not attempt this hike if it is raining or has been raining—it’s too slippery and a fall could be fatal. This has been one of the most popular hikes in China for foreign backpackers for a long time, and now young Chinese backpackers are joining them. But still never crowded. If you do this hike you need to travel light with only a small daypack and take plenty of water—larger packs and luggage can be left for a nominal fee in Qiaotou at Jane’s Guesthouse, to be picked up later once the hike is completed. There are enough guesthouses spaced along the Upper Trail that you’re never more than about an hour-ish away from shelter and food. Villagers also offer horse rides on certain of the tougher parts, for those who are too pooped to keep walking.

Daytripping

Since I suspect most FT readers will be more likely to do the Gorge as a daytrip from Lijiang as I ended up doing, I’ll identify your general daytrip options:

a) Hire a private car to take you there and back, including stops at TLG where you prefer. Per your specifications, you can either go to overlooks only, or do some short hikes from the Middle Gorge, usually down to the river. The driver will wait for you. Lunch at Qiaotou or one of the Gorge guesthouses on the lower road. This will be the most expensive method, my guess is for car + driver (no guide or other stuff included), probably about RMB 700-1000 depending on car type, length of time of trip, etc. Note that technically, Lijiang-based commercial livery vehicles such as taxis are not allowed to cross the river and take passengers into the Gorge, but an anonymous private car with non-livery license plates should be fine.
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b) Join an all-inclusive tour. Most of these go to the scenic overlooks at the Upper Gorge but no further, and have a guide, Gorge entry fee, and lunch included. Most Chinese visitors “do” the Gorge this way. Big bus tours doing the daytrip should probably be in the realm of RMB 300-400 per person. The Visitors Information Center and tour agents around Lijiang Old Town can book these for you, but it may be a challenge to find a dedicated English-speakers’ bus going. Not that you really need English commentary, if you have done a little internet advance research. It’s a natural site so is pretty self-evident!

c) Public transportation. From Lijiang bus station, buses to Qiaotou cost RMB 17. Most buses will actually be heading for Zhongdian (Shangri-la) but will stop in Qiaotou to let people off. From Qiaotou, there are shared minivans that can take you along the north Lower Road to the Upper Gorge lookout or the Middle Gorge area, for about RMB 15 or 30 per person, respectively. (one-way prices). You’ll be on your own to pay your own entry fee and to arrange your own time/activities after the drop-off. Minivans will also head the other direction to Qiaotou, they congregate at the Upper Gorge parking area. From the Middle Gorge, best to ask at any of the guesthouses along the roadway when the minivan comes by (most guesthouses also do this shuttle service to Qiaotou). This method is the cheapest but compared to d) below, not by much, and it is the most hassle.

d) Special hostel bus. This is the method I ended up selecting. On my first afternoon in Lijiang, I stopped by the Lijiang International Youth Hostel in the Old Town to see what was on offer. For RMB 110 per person round-trip, Tina’s Guesthouse (located on the road in the Middle Gorge area) runs a decent medium-sized bus from the Old Town to Tina’s. You pay your own Gorge entry fee and buy your own lunch. Leaves at 08:00 am daily, arriving around 11:00 am at the Middle Gorge. Then leaves Tina’s at 16:00, returning to Lijiang 19:00. In between, is enough time to hike from the road down to the river and back, and to rest and grab a meal at Tina’s or one of the other guesthouses nearby. This same bus also offers one-way transportation (either to or from Lijiang for RMB 55, and also from Lijiang to Qiaotou one-way for RMB 35 for those hiking the Upper Trail. It’s actually well-organized and takes the hassle out of the transportation part. A number of Lijiang hostels feed into this bus, but you don’t need to stay at any of them to take advantage. Purchase a ticket at IYH or other Lijiang hostel the day before you want to go, they’ll give you a ticket and tell you where the pickup point is. There are other Gorge hostels that also can arrange transportation from Lijiang to the Gorge for you privately, though they tend to cater to travelers planning to hike and stay at their guesthouse.

Entry fee to the Gorge from Qiaotou is RMB 50. There is a designated place in Qiaotou where cars and buses stop before entering the actual Gorge roads. An attendant normally will come to the car or hop on the bus and collect fees and issue tickets to all visitors, so if arriving in a vehicle, you don't have to go searching around town for the right place. Most of the join-in full tours will include the fee in the all-inclusive tour price, and the guide will deal with the fee collection/ticketing on behalf of the tour members.


Middle Gorge Road-to-River Hike

On the morning I took the Tina’s Guesthouse bus from Lijiang, there were only 8 of us heading out: myself, 4 other foreigners who all got off at Qiaotou to do the Upper Trail hike, a young Chinese couple, and a solo Chinese guy from Wuhan with some serious camera gear. Me and the Chinese were all doing the Gorge as a daytrip only, heading specifically for the Middle Gorge to hike down to the river...though I was feeling pretty good for someone with a head cold, I had my reservations as to whether my lungs and knees could handle it. We arrived at 11:00 and the couple wanted to rest and have a snack before setting out, so I buddied up with the Chinese fellow and we headed over to the trailhead leading down. Note: the various paths leading down to the river are owned and maintained by local villagers and guesthouses, so they charge a “toll” of RMB 10 per person if you want to use their path. Pay up, you have no choice if you want to go. They actually do a decent job of maintaining these paths. There are a LOT of steps down and a couple of ladders as well. While the local villagers said it only takes a half-hour to get down, the reality was it took me just over 1 hour to get to the lowest big rest platform, which was not the very bottom/end of the path by the river, but enough for me, as I was very tired and my legs were like jelly. This platform is still about 100 meters above the water, but you can see and hear the white water quite clearly, and get some great photos. It’s about another 15-20 minutes’ hike down to get to the end platform next to the river. (Note that this final platform right at the water can be hazardous, people have been killed down there by getting cocky and careless and falling into the water. It’s especially risky between May and September, with snow melt and then rainy season runoff and higher water, so take heed and take care if you head to the bottom.) Even in November “dry” season, that water volume was pretty darn impressive. The Prince of a Chinese fellow had thoughtfully given me his walking stick to help me down the long descent (also his hand and his shoulder for many a time, bless him), but I told him that I’d not continue to the very bottom, just take photos from here and rest, then gave him his walking stick and wished him luck...and that I’d see him back up on the road later in the afternoon.

By then it was about 12:15 and was actually getting pretty warm inside the Gorge, as it was a beautiful sunny day. November is actually an excellent time to hike in this area of Yunnan. But make sure you have some sunscreen with you, especially for your face. I had already taken off my light fleece from the morning cool in Lijiang, and now also my heavy cotton overshirt, so I was down to a T-shirt. The villagers staff the rest platform and sell cold bottled water, juices, fruit, and of all things...Snickers candy bars. (I normally hate Snickers bars but bought one and it was heavenly.) The Middle section certainly lives up to its reputation as being the most impressive part of Tiger Leaping Gorge, so for a daytrip, this is definitely a better place to come than the Upper Gorge if you want to get a bit of hiking in.

That said, this is actually a fairly dangerous hike, probably more so than the Upper Trail. The path and steps are in decent shape but are highly irregular as they are carved naturally out of the rock. But fortunately, very solid rock without many loose spots. Most places, especially the trickier places on the path, do have some sort of cable hand rail which is a godsend. There are small, crude wooden rest pavilions along the way, where you can catch your breath and rest your legs, and buy a cold water or juice from a villager. Do not attempt this hike down to the river if there has been rain or snow. Do not attempt this hike if you have knee issues, or potential other cardio or lung issues. Remember that if you get into serious difficulties, it will be very, very difficult to get you out if you are on the bottom 2/3 of the path. In November, there were not hordes of hikers on the path or down by the water. I think maybe I counted 2-3 dozen maximum at all points along the trail or rest or at the river, during my time there. Certainly only a couple of people passed me and my Chinese buddy on the way down, and on my solo climb up, maybe another 6-8 total heading down and about the same passing me on the way up.

I knew I would be slow on the way up, having to stop about every 10 meters and catch my breath and rest my legs. I figured it would take me about 2 hours to get back up, as you’re essentially climbing the equivalent of more than a 100-story building. Looking up from the bottom is impressive though discouraging. At one rest platform, the villager grinned and said I was now half-way up. Oh brother, I was about to die. I must have been looking ragged, because locals started coming down the path and asking me if I wanted a horse...100 RMB. I said No and walked another 5 minutes. A different villager offered a horse for 90 RMB. Again a No from me and trudged on. When I estimated I was probably about 2/3 of the way up...and it was now about 1:50 pm and I’d been climbing for about 70 minutes already, I turned around a bend in the path and a little old man was there with his horse, grinning away. RMB 60. I said “SOLD!” and climbed on, scared to death for the first couple of minutes, then it started to be fun as I imagined myself in the scene from the movie “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid” where they are riding horses up that steep rocky hill trying to get away from the posse. Except these little horses were probably closer to burros, and were surefooted enough to actually climb steps with nary a slip! I’d seen this breed in action at Shibaoshan delivering construction supplies up similarly steep paths to the Hanging Temple, and I was reasonably certain that at the equivalent of about 5 big bags of cement, my weight was manageable by this horse. So remembering Butch and Sundance, I leaned forward over the horse’s neck to help with center of gravity, while the villager led the horse on a lead, one flight at a time, the horse resting for about 30 seconds between flights. It took the villager and his horse only about 20 minutes to get me back up to the start of the path and the road. I hopped off, kissed the (flat) ground, paid the man and took his picture (and the horse). The best RMB 60 I have ever spent. It was now about 2:15 pm.

Five minute walk back to Tina’s Guesthouse and a surprisingly decent and not-too-expensive lunch on the outdoor terrace. Lots of foreign backpackers were hanging out, obviously just down from the Upper Trail. Just rested and chatted with other travelers until time to get on the bus back to Lijiang. My younger Chinese hiking buddy got back about 3:15 pm, no doubt ascending much more quickly than me (and probably thankful he didn’t have to deal with my diminished middle-aged capabilities on the ascent.) Bus ride back to Lijiang exactly as stated, 16:00 arriving back at 19:00, and it went back with a full complement of 25 people, mostly foreigners. Return route though Lijiang went close to my hotel so I asked driver to drop me off at a convenient intersection in New Town rather than going all the way back to Old Town, which he graciously did.

At the end of the day, I was feeling quite accomplished and pleased with myself for doing the hike and seeing some of the best of the Gorge scenery up close and personal, without incurring serious injury. And without having to endure crowds of Chinese bus tour groups.

Total cost for this TLG Daytrip ex-Lijiang:
Roundtrip Transportation by special bus (110) + Gorge Entry Fee (50) + Trail Toll (10) + Refreshments and extra water enroute on trail (20) + Horse Ride (60) + Lunch at Guesthouse (43) = RMB 293.

jiejie, this TR gets better and better. ^

Note: Zhongdian is the traditional Chinese name for this town, which provincial authorities renamed a number of years ago for marketing/tourism purposes to Xianggelila (new Chinese name) which sound mimics “Shangri-La” after the James Hilton novel. Most of the locals still call the place Zhongdian and older road signs will also use this name. Buses and newer signs will use Xianggelila in Chinese characters. In this post, I’ll stick with using Zhongdian, just make note that it’s all the same place.

Journey to Zhongdian

On my last brief morning in Lijiang, I packed up with a tinge of regret—except for the troop train getting here, the inauspicious arrival in the pouring rain to a suspect first hotel, and picking up a horrible cold, the place had grown on me! But new adventures were waiting, so I had early breakfast, and said my goodbyes to the great staff at Lijiang’s Golden Spring Hotel, especially the GM and the bellboy group that had been so good to me. GM gave me his card and told me for my next stay in Lijiang, to personally call him in advance to arrange things. Taxiied to bus station with all my gear, in plenty of time to catch the 8:50 bus to Zhongdian, which as previously posted, I’d bought a pair of tickets a couple of nights previously for RMB 67 per ticket for a total intercity transport cost of RMB 134. As promised, the bus was a very nice big touring-type bus, and I had the pair of seats immediately behind the driver but elevated above his seating level—giving me a great view out the windshield. The bus went out pretty full up, and once again I patted myself on the back for purchasing two seats for this longish ride. We left on time and were in Zhongdian bus station at 13:10 pm, a total of 4 hours and 20 minutes which included a 10 minute comfort break about halfway, just outside Qiaotou. All in all, an easy, pleasant, and comfortable bus journey—so don’t be afraid to use this method of travel for the Lijiang-Zhongdian route. North of Qiaotou, the road was very good (2 lanes) and more lightly travelled. Rather attractive scenery, with some gorges, rivers, and small hydroelectric dams and power stations. The road can be winding but not stomach-churning or scary. I think this route is an improvement over the old back road that still exists further to the west of this one, and which still takes quite a few extra hours by the local chicken bus. As we climbed up in altitude, the rocky gorges turned into upland rolling hills and plateau, with grassy prairies now at various shades of brown due to late fall season. Houses and farms were looking distinctly Tibetan.

We entered the town—actually now a small city—on a brand new wide boulevard. Zhongdian also has an Old Town and a New Town, and on this boulevard, a Very New Town. Brand new, large educational buildings, governmental buildings, commercial buildings, and even a Sheraton Hotel under construction. Clearly, this place is in a boom mode and it didn’t look like it was all for tourism. Driving past the Very New town into the regular New Town, it seemed a mix of nondescript Han modern building, along with some lower rise modern structures with “Tibetan” characteristics. Not exactly ugly, just a bit soulless. Once alighting at the bus station, I found a taxi outside with nice lady driver. As I was going to a hotel in the precinct of the big Ganden Sumtseling Monastery which was a few km out of Zhongdian proper, she wanted RMB 30 flat rate not the meter. I was OK with this, as I’d been given a previous heads-up that this is standard for all taxis going from middle of town to the Monastery. It’s not just distance (which is only about 15 minutes away), but a little extra hassle as follows...

Monastery and Surrounding Precinct

The Ganden Sumtseling Monastery (in Chinese “Songzanlin”) is the biggest single drawing card for tourism in Zhongdian. It’s a functioning monastery and study center for several hundred monks of the Yellow Hat sect of Lamaism—which the D@lai L@ma is nominal head of--at least outside China. (Bear with me, my keyboard character substitution is purposeful here to avoid Great Firewall auto-filters for those accessing this website from inside China without VPN). It is a stunning complex built on the side of a slope and resembles the form and appearance of the Potala in Lh@sa, just smaller. Until 2009, visitors could take transport or bus to the monastery itself and pay an entry fee of RMB 10 to access. By mid 2009, this had changed and greed has taken over. Entry is now RMB 85, and about 2 km before you get to the monastery and the adjacent village, you are stopped at a very strict checkpoint with barrier, your transportation drops you off, and you enter an adjacent new Visitors’ Center where you purchase a ticket, go through a turnstile, and then board special tourist shuttle buses that continue on the “secure”side of the rest of the way into the village and to the Monastery entry itself. The RMB 85 entry fee is an eye-poppingly high increase, and I heard mixed stories from various locals on exactly who is getting the benefit of all this revenue stream. I’m not sure what to believe.

As I had booked a hotel (Songtsam) that was actually behind the checkpoint in the secure area, and only a short walk from the Monastery, my entry procedure was a bit different. My hotel rate included a “complementary” pair of tickets (though as a solo, I only needed one). When the taxi pulled up at the checkpoint, I told the guard where I would be staying and on his clipboard, there was my name under the hotel’s list of arriving guests. I was most surprised when he used good English and invited me to come inside to get my complementary ticket, only took a couple of minutes, then I was allowed to get back in the taxi, gate raised, and driver took me onward through the village to the hotel. No wonder the taxi drivers charge flat rate for this rigamarole! Note: if you are staying in accommodation on the secure side of this checkpoint (and there are at least 3 places that I saw that fit this description—Songtsam, Songtsam Retreat, and Xi Ke Guesthouse), you must keep your ticket on you so that if you leave the “protected area” to head into town or to national parks or wherever, then return, you can show your ticket to the guard and get waved through in your private car, taxi, or public bus without having to get out and do the shuffle or pay again.

I had taken a chance on this hotel based on internet descriptions and reviews, so didn’t know what to expect. And wondered about my decision to stay by the Monastery rather than in the center of town (New or Old). It was oodles more expensive than anywhere else I’d stayed on this trip, but I thought for one night on this trip, a splurge would be nice. I was not disappointed. The hotel was in a large, older home that had been augmented and refurbished (I later found out from the GM that it is the ancestral/family home of the Tibetan Owner, who was actually born inside). 24 rooms and definitely a boutique place. Shoes come off at the entryway and you are issued slippers to wear inside, even in the public areas. Absolutely gorgeous with Tibetan antiques, wood floors and trim, just WOW. Sort of an Anti-hotel, check-in is simple and quick while you sip ginger tea and sit on the lobby/living room sofas. A few staff members spoke English from simple to excellent. My room was one flight up (there is no elevator) and at the end of the hall—it was actually a suite with a living room very nicely furnished with antiques, bathroom (quite small with no tub but serviceable, since these had to be retrofitted into an older home that wasn’t designed for modern baths). Then a very nice bedroom with a full wall of windows (and a balcony with door) that overlooked the lake and hills in front of the monastery. One of the most comfortable beds (big king size) that I’ve ever slept in anywhere in my life. And heat, real heat, that kept the suite very comfy. In mid-November, nighttime temperatures in Zhongdian do get down to freezing, so you need reliable heat and preferably not just electric quilts on the bed. Also had working and quick wi-fi. It’s the sort of place that you immediately walk in and the tension and stress of China travel just melts away. For me, this hotel was a real treat and in some ways, a sightseeing attraction in and of itself! I didn’t second-guess myself on the expense any further.

I was set up in the room very quickly and ready to head to the Monastery by 14:30. It was only a 5 minute walk to the entry of the complex. By now, my legs were really letting me know how deeply they resented that hike at Tiger Leaping Gorge the previous day. I could still walk (stiffly) on a relatively flat surface, but trying to negotiate any steps up or down was like having knives stuck in my quads. So as I entered the monastery archway at the bottom of the hill, I looked up and saw... at least a hundred or so steps leading up to the top where the main temples were. I nearly started bawling. Then remembering where I was, did some closed eyes, deep breathing, and channelled myself into the meditation zone. Then took the steps slowly and 10 at a time, walking up diagonally and resting on the way. Mind over pain, I did get up to the top platform where the best stuff was. There were some visitors around, a small Chinese tour group at the entry and one at the top of the platform, then some scattered couples and solos like me. Monks were going about their business. As you walk up the side of the hill, you pass smaller buildings which are mostly residences for the monks, cascading down the hill between the top temples and the entry. It’s actually pretty impressive and all quite accessible. You can wander about quite freely and nobody hassles you, although of course I made sure not to accidentally bumble through any private residential doorways.

Now for a disappointment, one of the bigger ones of the trip: the Main Assembly Hall (Prayer Hall for all the monks) was off-limits as construction was underway. Actually, this is a bit of a controversy. The original Main Assembly Hall was torn down in 2008-2009, as apparently the senior monks (and/or the government....the story of who was behind it all is murky) decided in the interests of greater tourism, they needed a completely new Hall. Oh my goodness, I was horrified when I heard this. But what’s done is done. This New Main Hall is done in the original style and actually from the exterior looks good and will blend in with everything once the construction fencing is down and the cranes disappear. It also appears to be mostly complete, so my guess is that it will open to the public in 2012 sometime. If heading to Zhongdian and this Monastery, check in advance so you aren’t surprised one way or another.

Even though the Main Assembly Hall was not possible to see, the rest of the Monastery certainly had enough to keep me fascinated and should you come before the Main Hall reopens, I think the rest of the complex still justifies the effort to come and the ticket expense. There are some large feature Buddhas in the ancillary Halls and Temples, and some incredible fresco/mural work in multiple places. The atmosphere was incredibly peaceful, and even the Han Chinese tour groups there—most of whom seemed to be Chinese Buddhists and therefore were also worshipping not just gawking—were respectful. Quite a number of locals and Tibetans also stopping in to worship. Even without the Main Hall on line, this Monastery deserves at least a couple of hours of exploration. For those who cannot make it to Tibet and see the Potala itself, this Monastery is Tibetan and in the same religious vein, minus the police presence and time slot restrictions you’ll get at the Potala. By about 16:30 or so, it was getting pretty overcast, and in looking for an alternative exit that didn't involve steps, I found a road/ramp out the back upper side of the Monastery that led to the village from around the backside. This route was not as direct but easier on the legs, and gave great views of the back hills behind the Monastery (and the Songtsam Retreat Hotel which is Accor-managed). Passed the White Stupa with all the Buddhist prayer flags. Also villagers (all Tibetan) heading back home from chores, kids, etc. Some great old house and shed rammed-earth architecture along with some newer stuff. I decided not to go into the Old Town as originally planned, but stayed at the hotel just enjoying the sunset and quiet, and had a delicious but pricey dinner at the hotel’s restaurant, which is beautifully and tastefully done and even has working fireplaces. Hotel also has a computer room off the lobby—new Apple equipment with gigantic TV-size monitors, also a 2nd floor lounge/library room.

Interlude

Before completely collapsing into bed for the night, I made a decision on the final days of this trip: I would fly to Chengdu as ticketed the next evening, but not go to the Old Town of Langzhong on the 16th by bus (a 5 hour ride from Chengdu). I was tired of Old Towns and bus rides. Instead, I’d head for Chongqing by fast train, see a couple of in-town things, and spend my last full trip day at the Dazu Caves, which had been on my to-do list for some time and which was not originally on this trip's itinerary. Then fly Chongqing to Beijing the morning of the 18th. So...made the final hotel arrangement for 2 nights in Chongqing via sinohotel.com and then an online air ticket using travelzen.com. Travelzen had a price for the flight I wanted that was surprisingly about 12% cheaper than ctrip.com, plus they don't levy a foreign credit card surcharge. Went to bed knowing all the intercity transport and accommodation logistics except the Chengdu-Chongqing train segment, were now completed for this trip.

Zhongdian Zen-Out and Zhongdian Old Town

The next morning, my lukewarm plans to head for one of the nearby national parks/scenic areas such as Bitahai or Napa Lake, were dumped as soon as I woke up. My leg muscles were still in bad shape and parks/scenic areas = steps and climbing. I decided that after breakfast ( a nice one included in the hotel rate), I would walk the Monastery’s boardwalk around the lake that fronts the Monastery, hotel, and village. It was mostly flat so I could handle it. Very peaceful and at 8-9 in the morning, nobody else around. The fresh air is amazing and my lungs were happy even if my legs were not. I Zenned my way around the lake, getting some great pictures of the Monastery from various angles. Rolling hills beyond. Fortunate again with blue skies and no wind. Birds, cows, yaks in view, then return to hotel via the village. After spending some quality time relaxing around the hotel, I checked out and had them hold my luggage for my return in the afternoon—the hotel was providing a free ride to the airport. Then set out for the Old Town. Public Bus #3 comes out to the parking lot in front of the Monastery, so it was easy to pick it up there along with the villagers heading for town. #3 terminates at the Old Town, so for RMB 2, it’s a perfect transport: cheap and foolproof.

I found the Old Town of Zhongdian quite disappointing. Most of it seems to be fairly new, and some of it is either standard Chinese blah, some of it tarted up with ersatz Tibetan decoration motifs. Similar tourist shops as Lijiang selling tourist crap. Nowhere close to as the charm of Old Lijiang. Even though it was early afternoon, there were few people or signs of life around, and a number of places had closed for winter. I thought it was actually kind of depressing, but it could have been the time of year. I’m told it’s livelier at night, and there is local dancing (visitors welcome to join in) at 8 pm every evening. I spent less than 2 hours walking around, and was not impressed by the existence of recent tourist concoctions such as The World’s Largest Prayer Wheel, et al. I did feel very glad that I had decided against staying in the Old Town, in favor of the peace and quiet of the Monastery area. I didn’t really explore any of New Zhongdian except what I could see from the bus. It appears that a lot of development has taken place in the last few years, and continues even now. I was later told (on the way to the airport) by the Tibetan GM of my hotel who drove me, that some of the new development was tourist-oriented as they were really ramping up for Zhongdian to be the new frontier/staging base for this area of Yunnan. But other development was a byproduct of the encouragement of in-migration of Han business people unconnected with tourism. Certainly the New Town appears to be in a state of Han-ification.

A Word about Altitude Sickness

Zhongdian is at 3200 meters, quite a bit higher than Lijiang at 2400 meters, and I had been a bit worried about this since I have medical issues and had heard of plenty of healthy people having altitude-related problems in Zhongdian, but in my case, I had no trouble with headaches, nausea, or anything like that. I only noticed that upon exertion, I needed to breathe a little more deeply and slowly, and take exercise a bit slower. Perhaps this is because I spent quite a bit of time at Lijiang level, and then bussed up instead of flying directly into Zhongdian from lower levels such as Beijing, Chongqing, or Chengdu. At any rate, it worked and I needed nothing to help me cope...though I did see some Chinese tourists sucking on oxygen bottles. Tip: If you are planning to go to Lhasa by flight and are worried about acclimatization, there are flights available for most of the year from Zhongdian to Lhasa. As Zhongdian is nearly as high as Lhasa, it provides a good pre-acclimatization area prior to actually entering Tibet. So if trip plans include Yunnan + Tibet, routing via Lijiang ->Zhongdian by road->Lhasa by flight is worth considering. Do note that the sun, even in cold season, is very strong and sunscreen is adviseable. And I found I got dehydrated more quickly than usual in Zhongdian compared to Lijiang, so keep a bottle of water handy.

Wrap-Up and Farewell to a Too-Brief Visit

I returned to the hotel, had a nice late lunch there including some yak meat momo’s (Tibetan dumplings), then the GM drove me to the airport in a nice 4 x 4. The airport terminal is fairly new and pretty nice—clearly they are expecting to add more business/tourism flight capacity here over the next few years. Outside the terminal, something you don’t see every day at most airports—yaks! I took some great photos of the yaks with the terminal behind, then the yaks with the control tower behind. Check-in was smooth and the flight left on time at 18:00..and nearly full, which surprised me! I grabbed the pillow seat by the window (search FT for “pillow seat” trick for domestic Chinese flights) had some nice views of the hills as we departed into the sunset. Landed in Chengdu on time, my bag was of course one of the last ones off, but managed to get to hotel around 20:00 anyway.

Bottom Line: Zhongdian city itself is now becoming just another transport hub and staging base. Based on reports of others, it stopped being a charming small town/overgrown village about 4-5 years ago. The Monastery, Old Town, and anything else in the immediate vicinity of the city probably only needs one day for most visitors to see. The real attractions are away from the city, in the scenic parks and hinterlands. And particularly, even further north in the Deqin/Meili Snow Mountain area, which is another 6-7 hours by bus from Zhongdian. Zhongdian is also the junction for the highway that goes into the mountain areas of Sichuan—the ‘back road” to Chengdu. I would like to return on a future trip to this area, and would certainly want to stay at least a day/night in Zhongdian on my way further north. But I would probably choose a more optimum time to do this; late May or June, or September-October (excluding Chinese holidays). By November 1, the weather is too cold and potentially snowy beyond Zhongdian to make decent road travel conditions a sure bet.

Had I changed plans from Langzhong Town to the Dazu Caves earlier in my trip, I would have ideally flown from Zhongdian to Chongqing directly. But having purchased the Zhongdian-Chengdu ticket, I just kept it, with the intention of using Chengdu only as a place to sleep, and to get money from one of the HSBC ATMs the next morning. After nearly 3 weeks of spending mostly cash RMB for everything, I was getting tapped out and needed a wee refill to get me back to Beijing. So, morning of the 16th, that mission accomplished, I checked out of hotel and taxiied to the Chengdu East Rail station.

Chengdu East is a relatively new rail station (last year or two) and is similar in idea/feeling to Beijing South, with provisions for high speed trains (though standard trains also use Chengdu East). It’s much cleaner and nicer than the old pit of Chengdu (North) station. So although it’s slightly further from the center of Chengdu by taxi than the North Station, I recommend that if you have a choice, make your preference arriving/departing from Chengdu East. Having checked availability online via the Chinese official train site, I ascertained there were plenty of seats still available for the 11:24 train which was the earliest I was likely to make. Arrived about 10:30 and bought a first-class ticket for this D train as a walk-up (passport needed). Got lucky and had nobody next to me, so was able to park all my bags next to me, power up the laptop and comfortably get a bit of work done on the 2 hour journey. The high-speed rail is definitely the preferred way to go these days between Chengdu <--> Chongqing.

Arrival was at Chongqing North station on-time. It had clearly been raining and was still misty and depressing. I have been lucky in life and not had to spend much time in this awful city, but each time it seems like it’s been misty (or foggy) and depressing. Got a taxi from the queue in short order—I will hand it to them: the taxi marshals staffing the Chongqing North train station queues really keep both taxis and passengers in line and moving smartly. But as with most Chongqing ground transportation hubs, the place is grubby and chaotic. Arrived at my hotel around 14:30 pm after going over countless bridges and innumerable tunnels. I was staying in Yangjiaping so not right in downtown central. Checked in and after a short rest, headed by light rail to the Stilwell Museum.

The Stilwell Museum commemmorates “Vinegar” Joe Stilwell, the US Army general who lived in Chongqing during WW2 and was Advisor to Chiang Kai Shek, as well as part of the general effort against the Japanese. The Museum is actually in his former home, and although damp from the Chongqing climate, you can see it’s still a nice house with a commanding view of the river. Interestingly, this museum has a tone of warmth and friendship of the Chinese toward the US (and vice versa), which you don’t always get from presentations in Chinese museums! Sadly, the exhibits aren’t professionally done and the old photos are deteriorating from lack of climate control in the building. But if you are into WW2 history and the Asian theater of operations, spending about 45-60 minutes at this Museum is worth a shot. When I arrived fairly soon to closing time, there weren’t any other visitors around but a (soggy from rain) red carpet had been laid out. I thought: “How nice they were expecting me!” Alas, when I checked the Visitor’s Guest Book, the person who had signed in before me...earlier that day...was Brigadier General David Stilwell! The newly-appointed Defense Attache for the US Embassy in Beijing, and a distant relative of Vinegar Joe. Well rats, if only I’d gotten to Chongqing earlier in the day, I might have bumped into the General. Logistics: by light rail, Fotuguan station then Exit A, walk down the hill 2 minutes and the gate is on the left. RMB 15. Otherwise get a taxi.

After the Stilwell, I headed downtown, where there’s been a lot of development in recent years and shiny new designer shops. I’m just not into Chongqing though, and if it has any charms, they have all escaped me. I did decide that my original idea of staying at Yangjiaping was not great, and if I had it to do over, I’d find a place downtown. Around dinner-time, it started misting a light rain again, so I ducked into a place to eat then headed back by light rail to Yangjiaping and some internet research on the particulars of Dazu, about which I really didn’t know much. I also decided that in Chongqing City, I wanted to see the Huguang Hui Guan (Guild Houses) at the end of the day, so would need to get an early start to Dazu.

jiejie, I have to ask do you do this from memory, or do you keep a really really detailed journal?

jiejie, I have to ask do you do this from memory, or do you keep a really really detailed journal?

Since I had the laptop with me--which is unusual on this sort of trip--I took advantage of various downtimes--usually every 2-3 days--to just start writing. Stream-of-consciousness style. (I'm a touch typist so at 100+ words per minute, I can do a lot quickly!) And I have a bunch of things jotted in my master notebook--mostly logistical things like schedules, prices, sketch maps, record of what I spent etc. My laptop writings ended up totally about 50 pages and have a lot more detail on people I met, incidents, etc. which have been edited out. Some of was just babbling. As this is all still fresh in my mind, memory also. But memory fades with time, particularly on the emotions experienced at the time. So based on all of this, I have pulled out, rewritten, edited, and augmented into what you see here, trying to keep in mind the FT audience.

I am aware that these posts are unusually long, and at the start, I wondered whether to just boil down to essentials such as facts and "I liked it" or "I didn't like it." However, in the end, I decided that FT'ers are big boys and girls and can skip over the thread or the posts that they feel are too long, ponderous, or uninteresting.

Since we don't have too many FT examples of how somebody actually lives through independent China travel in real-time, planning vs not planning, making decisions and adjustments as you go, locating resources, and not depending on the Westin's concierge for everything, I thought actually providing a more detailed context might be illustrative, particularly for travelers that have it within their personality to deal with China independently, but have been on the bubble about independent vs organized tour.

And there are some places on this itinerary that are not on the usual China tourist circuit and are not well-described out on the Net, but which a number of FT'ers might find a lot of merit and enjoyment.

Bear with me though, I am almost at the end of the trip! And now for our next Act, we have....

The Dazu Caves are a grouping of geographically- and thematically-related individual sites that contain marvelous sculptures carved out of rock, most of them dating from the late 800’s to 1200’s A.D. Each of the Dazu sites contains elements of Confuciansim, Taoism, and especially Chinese Buddhism in various measures. Dazu is one of the four major sites of this genre in China—the others are the Yungang Grottoes at Datong, :Longmen Grottoes at Luoyang, and Mogao Caves near Dunhuang. I have previously been to Yungang and Longmen and found them intriguing and worthwhile, yet different. And my research on Dazu revealed that these were equally fascinating yet different from each of the others. I wanted to spend the final full day of my Sichuan-Yunnan trip with something special, and I was excited at the prospect.

Chongqing is the nearest sizeable city and transport hub from which to access the Dazu Caves (Chengdu is much farther away and even more inconvenient.) But is can be somewhat frustrating getting there and back. Dazu is only about 2.5 hours from central Chongqing and one of the most important sites, and you’d think that a regular, streamlined public way for tourists to get from central Chongqing directly to the caves, at reasonable cost, would have been developed. Well, not exactly. Here are the choices I found:
1) Join-in tour by a Chongqing hostel, including bus transport, guide (Chinese language), entry fees, and lunch. About RMB 250-300, which is reasonable. However, tour time frame is 8-5 and I wanted to see the carvings at my own pace and get back earlier to get to the Guild Hall. I scrapped this idea. But if timing works, could be a value proposition for some travelers, and once at the caves, you can probably split off from the group a bit and do your own thing, then meet up later. Usually you don’t need to be staying at a hostel to take advantage of a tour.
2) Join-in tour by a commercial travel agency, including same as above, just more cost at around RMB 600-800. Same timing and pacing issues. Probably more “upscale” travelers, but value proposition makes no sense over the hostel tour.
3) Private car. Just for car/driver alone, in the RMB 1000 range and then entry fees and anything else over and above that. Way beyond my budget, regardless of how customized I could make the trip. Most foreign non-backpacker travelers choose this by default either through an agency or their hotel, but unless you have very special needs, seems to be an unnecessary throwaway of cash.
For me, this left only...
4) Public transport. There is nothing direct to the Caves, so this is a two-step process that takes a little bit longer, but not too onerous. Public bus from Chongqing to Dazu town, then change to either a smaller bus (requiring a change in bus stations in Dazu) or taxi to the Caves. While slightly more hassle with the transfer, I could choose my own times and control my own schedule, and it was cheap yet perfectly comfortable.

My Do-it-Yourself Logistics To/From Dazu

Cramming everything I wanted to do in this day required an early start. I didn’t know what the bus schedule was, but made an educated guess. Tip: For intercity regional runs between sizeable towns in the 2-hour travel range, in China usually you can bet first bus out will be between 7 and 8 a.m. So at 06:30, I left my hotel and taxiied to the Caiyunba Long-Distance Bus Station (next to Chongqing Rail Station), determined to take the first bus out and get a jump on the big tours. And indeed, first bus was at 07:20. Got a ticket for RMB 46. Bus went out about 2/3 full and arrived at Dazu long-distance bus station about 09:45 (making two short stops on the way). The majority of the journey is by fast intercity expressway to the regional town of Longguang, the last 45 minutes was on local road—very good 4-lane boulevard, but with an annoyingly low speed limit and over-concern for driving safety. Anywhere else in China, the bus could have done this in about 25 minutes instead of 45, but we poked along, admonished by overhead cautionary Chinese/English signs such as “A Bump, A Slip, A Hospital Trip” and my favorite: “Prepare and Prevent, or Repair and Repent.” Lots of traffic police around to enforce. If you ever come across any slow, careful drivers in your China trip, they probably come from here in Longguang!

Dazu town is a little beyond Longguang and it was much bigger than I expected, with a lot of construction going on at the fringes. I spotted a number of hotels and guesthouses that don’t yet seem to be in guidebooks or on the internet....so for people who want to really spend more time in Dazu for the Caves, an overnight is certainly possible and would have the advantage of getting at the gate early and having a couple of blissful tour group-free hours to look around. Upon arrival at the Dazu Long-Distance Bus Station at 09:45, I followed my fellow passengers out the exit, turn right around the long side then turn right to the front of the building, went in the main entrance to inquire about tickets back to Chongqing, and was told that buses Dazu --> Chongqing leave every 30 minutes until 18:00, so no advance purchase-- just buy for next bus out when I got back from sightseeing. Then went back outside and spotted a waiting taxi out front. Told him my target of the primary cave site, Baodingshan, and off we went. By meter approximately 30 RMB and 10-15 minutes (Baodingshan is about 13 km from the bus station/downtown). I recommend other travelers taking public transport do the same. There are apparently sporadic local shuttle buses for less money than the taxi, but you have to go to a different bus station which is inconvenient, eats up time, and I thought rather pointless way to try to save money for most visitors. Grab a cab, of which there seemed to be plenty in Dazu, at least mid-morning..

Upon arrival at Baodingshan parking lot about 10:30, there were only a few minivans (privately engaged by small groups) waiting in the parking lot, so the tour bus crowds had not yet arrived--this was good. There were also NO public transport vehicles (minibuses or taxis) waiting around--this was not good. My driver gave me his business card/phone number and told me to call him if I got stuck and needed a ride back to Dazu town. After doing my ogling of the caves and temple (more details on this in section below), I went out to the parking lot (just before 13:00) and....no public transport vehicles. Anywhere. I walked out to gatehouse and waited by road to figure out whether I wanted to recall the original taxi driver...when the guard in the gatehouse stuck his head out the window and called me over. Told him my transport trouble and he said he could get me a driver right away--RMB 40 and leave immediately. Which I agreed to—while a bit higher than meter, if I’d recalled the original taxi driver I would have been honor-bound to pay for his trip out (empty) plus the return to town...or RMB 60! The guard—a rather jolly fellow--picked up his phone and 2 minutes later, an empty minivan comes up to the gate, guard verifies the price with driver and off we went. Tip: This is a perfect example where having a foreign face, sticking out like a sore thumb, and looking puzzled is a good thing, guaranteed to get you noticed. And most smaller city/small town people will ask you what’s up, or are approachable enough for you to make the first move and seek help. This is where a bit of Chinese language ability is useful, or alternatively, have your Mandarin phrasebook with characters handy and be able to play charades. The driver dropped me off at Dazu bus station at 13:20, and I bought a ticket for the 13:40 bus to Chongqing for RMB 45. My bus left precisely on time (full up) and arrived back at Caiyunba Bus Station in CQ at 16:00.

Dazu Site: Baodingshan

The area around Dazu town contains five significant sites at various distances and directions away from the city: Baodingshan, Beishan, Nanshan, Shizhuanshan, and Shimenshan. It would probably take two full days to get around to all of them, and most non-scholarly visitors do not bother. The last three have a lot of Taoist themes and are at some distance away from Dazu (20-25 km), but the first two are closer and much more popular and accessible. Happily, they also contain the most spectacular of the carvings and are of most interest to the average visitor. Because of my intent to get back to Chongqing and see the Guild Hall, I decide to forego the Beishan site which is only about 1-2 km north of central Dazu. Instead, I focused on Baodingshan which is to the northeast of Dazu town, and the Shengshousi Temple which is adjacent to Baodingshan. If you have a full day and want to see Beishan also, have transport take you directly from Baoding to Beishan, after which you can either find other transport back from Beishan to Dazu town, or walk back the 1.5-2 km. (Baodingshan to Dazu town is not walkable.)

Immediately adjacent to the Baodingshan parking lot/staging is a support “village” (modern construction) which has snack shops, restaurants, souvenirs, etc. At 10:30 when I arrived, there were no big tour buses there yet, and surprisingly few people at all. I snapped a photo of the big site map displayed out front, and using it as a guide, followed the road through the village, past the school, and up the hill to the actual Park Tourist Center and Ticket Booth...a very pleasant 10 minute walk in the cool of the morning. There are also electric trams that can span the distance for a small fee, but I didn’t bother. The Tourist Center has English speaking guides theoretically available. I didn't use, so I'm not sure if such guides need to be booked in advance, nor did I check the cost. The Chinese-speaking guides--when I listened in from time to time when a small-group tour was within earshot--seemed to be well-versed in the carvings and could point out interesting features and decent explanations.

Entry Fees are not cheap but are flexible, you can buy entrance to one site only, or combined tickets for a slight discount. In RMB, standard prices are:
--Baodingshan only, 120
--Shengshousi Temple only, 20.
--Combined ticket Baodingshan + Shenghousi: 130. This is the option I chose.
--Beishan (next most popular site) only, RMB 90.
--Baodingshan + Beishan, 170.
--Baodingshan + Beishan, + Shengshousi, 180.

Not sure what sorts of fees are at the more remote sites of Nanshan, Shizhuanshan, Shimenshan.as they were not posted. I believe they are payable at those sites only, and are pretty low, in the RMB 5-20 range each. But these three are more limited in scope. I have also heard that from December-February low season, all Dazu entry fees are reduced by about 25% off the standard prices.

I cannot stress strongly enough the advantage of getting there as early as possible. The other sites are less-visited, but at Baodingshan, while the 8:00 (or 8:30) opening until about 11:00 is fairly sparse with visitors, after that the tour groups start rolling in and as Baodingshan is not a large area physically, jostling with large groups could be aggravating, and particularly for taking the best photos. If you are coming from Chongqing on public transport, you need to leave as early as possible and get there as I did, by 10:30, then immediately start doing the circuit. Just 30-60 minutes’ head start makes all the difference. If you are staying in Dazu, then getting to the park not long after opening, or at least by 9:30, is a terrific idea. A lot of tour groups were on the premises from about 11:30 up until the time I exited around 13:00. And more were piling in as I left. So if doing multiple Dazu sites, do this one first and earliest before moving to another site.

Baodingshan and Shengshousi Temple

Baodingshan is set up as a logical one-way circuit for viewing the different groups of carvings. Although there are a couple of literal “caves” available for viewing, most of the Baodingshan sculptures were carved into the open face of a giant bowl-like geological formation, with a ledge overhanging above and a forest in the middle of the bowl. Each set of carvings has an explanatory (Chinese and English) marker stone describing the basics of what’s depicted on that wall. Keep in mind that these carved compositions are the height of a 3-4 storey building, and much of the original pigment is still present, so the level of preservation is remarkable. An ancient temple in the middle of the rock carving “bowl” formation is under restoration—you can peek through the open doors and windows and watch the historians and the art restorers doing their thing. Everything is very organized and tidy, so even if you come to this site without a lot of advance research under your belt (or even a guidebook), you can figure out a lot of what is going on and enjoy the carvings as artwork. Without going into rapturous details, suffice it to say that I was blown away by the Baodingshan carvings--and I’m a fairly jaded China traveler who’s come across too many over-hyped tourist sites that proved to be lackluster. Not this time. The quality is amazing, and if you’ve had a chance to see other ancient religious sites built during the same time (i.e Angkor in Cambodia), it’s interesting to compare and contrast the level of sophistication

I’d allow at least 60-70 minutes to complete the rock carving circuit at Baodingshan, more if you have a special or professional interest in art, Buddhist imagery, etc. I spent 90 minutes but was doing it pretty leisurely. Then I recommend following the signs to the exit of that self-contained area, and walking to the Shengshousi Temple. The path to the temple follows the ledge at the top of the rock carving bowl, and you can get a good look at the Reclining Buddha part of the Wall from above. It’s only about a 5-10 minute walk to the Temple entrance. This is a very old temple and the complex is much bigger than it looks. It was destroyed and then rebuilt during the Qing Dynasty, but fortunately, not much has been done to it since then—so it has escaped the tacky technicolor “restoration” and “upgrades” that infest so many other Chinese temple sites. This is a serene temple yet gets quite a few active Chinese Buddhist worshippers. But not that many tourists, and the group tours don’t seem to come here, curiously enough. As I explored from entry to back, I kept finding hidden gems. There is yet more temple up all the way to the top of the hill at the back. Definitely worth spending another 30-40 minutes to explore, before heading back the way you came, all the way back to the support village and the parking lot. I did spot at least one guesthouse in this village, that looked OK.

All in all, despite the seemingly pricey entry fee, I thought I got good value for my RMB 130.

Cost of Dazu Daytrip ex-Chongqing, round trip from Caiyuanba Bus Station:
Transportation: bus (46) + Dazu taxi (30) + private driver (40) + bus (45) = 161
Entry Fee: (Baodingshan + Shengshousi) = 130.
Misc Snacks, Drinks, Water (skipped full lunch in Dazu) = 16
Total Cost: RMB 307.

After arriving from Dazu about 16:00, I grabbed a cab from the taxi queue and headed directly for the Huguang Huiguan (Guild Houses) which are down near the end of the peninsula, just across the street from the river. As it was now about 16:20 and the place was closing that day at 17:00 (not the usual 18:00), I had to unfortunately “speed visit.” Entry fee is RMB 30. This complex has been restored well, and is quite interesting. It’s the historical meeting/assembly place and support complex for migrants from Southern China (primarily Hubei, Hunan, Guangdong, and Guanxi) to Chongqing. The complex was used for business, social, and cultural activities—sort of a cross between a Convention Center and a Club. Among the many area of the complex are a mini-theater and opera house, various assembly halls, meeting rooms, and dining/kitchen areas. The architecture alone is worth visiting this gorgeous complex, but it also has interesting displays, tableau scenes set up to illustrate how the various areas of the building functioned, an immigration museum, and more. There are only a few of these Guild Hall structures in China, and I’d recommend this as one of the better sights of Chongqing. Allow 60 - 90 minutes inside for a non-rushed visit.

The Guild Hall is not well-located for catching onward transport. It’s not a bad idea to have a car or taxi either wait for you, or arrange to come back and get you and take you elsewhere. As I didn’t do this, upon exiting, I realized that I was going to be walking for a while. There were three possible routes and two of them were a higher speed roadway and a vehicular tunnel—neither very pedestrian-friendly. So I chose the third, which went downhill and according to my extremely lousy Chinese map, went to the point of the peninsula. I soon found myself in the loading dock area of the wholesale trade district. Piles of trucks loading and unloading boxes and bales of only-God-knows-what. Radios, TV’s, quilts and blankets, motorcycle helmets by the crate, stacks of flattened boxes, etc. It was actually quite interesting despite the stares from the workers wondering what I was doing there. I just pretended I knew exactly what I was doing and wasn’t completely lost in the slightest. Truth was, it appeared I was rapidly coming to a dead-end and would have to walk not only the 25 minutes back the way I came, but then figure out either the tunnel or the high-speed road.

And then I spotted my angels: two little schoolgirls about 12 years old with bookbags, who looked just as out of place as me in the Wholesale trade area. Unlike me though, they seemed to know exactly where they were going and I was pretty sure it was Home. Sure enough, they stopped in front of a ginormously tall stairway sequence lined with little shops and leading up to another part of Chongqing and what looked to be where I needed to go. With no other good options but the Stairway to Heaven, up I went and found myself in vaguely familiar territory, enough so I could get my bearings and head back to the center of downtown and the Liberation Monument. Chongqing, with its hills, convoluted roads, and exasperating tunnels, is one of the more difficult cities I’ve ever had to navigate. And I often get it wrong. A good and up-to-date map is a necessity for anybody wanting to wander a bit around this city on foot. I was getting tired and not in the mood for much else at this point, so decided to forego Hongyadong (bar/restaurant district with Ye Olde China-style architecture replica) and just head back to Yangjiaping for dinner and final night packing. It would have been nice on the way back, to have detoured to the river for some nice night scenes and photos of the boats, except as usual, fog was rolling in and the view just wasn’t all that inspiring.

Next morning was an early start and 5:30 taxi to airport, which was about 45-50 minutes away from where I was, even on roads with no traffic. My flight to Beijing was around 08:00. As always, the best view of Chongqing is either in the rear view mirror of the car as you speed away, or from the airplane window as you head...anywhere else. Arrived in Beijing about 10:30 and then back to real life, exactly three weeks from when I’d set out.

A most Excellent Adventure of selected parts of Sichuan and Yunnan, two Chinese provinces which are packed with interesting places and people.

A quick summation of facts and thoughts, by categories:
A. Mix of Trip Sights
B. Disappointments and Favorites
C. Hotels
D. Cost Breakdown
E. Misc.--Language Issues

Mix of Trip Sights

China has more to see than anyone could cover in a lifetime, so you must be selective when planning a trip. The most important advice I would give is: Know Thyself. Know what interests you and prioritize, and don’t feel forced to go somewhere or spend too much time somewhere just because it’s been on the standard tour forever. This is where traveling independently has it all over a preplanned guided tour and particularly a larger group tour. I know myself pretty well, and based on the my mood prior to and during this trip, tried to put different types of places in this trip, not overloaded with museums or temples, etc. The nature of Sichuan and Yunnan usually means that you won’t be overloaded with big cities, and my three (Chengdu, Kunming, Chongqing) were really used more as staging bases to access other targeted sights. With only an incidental city sight here and there as filler. My breakdown was spread as follows:

Religious: Wanshu Temple (Chengdu), Qiongzhu/Bamboo Temple (Kunming), Tianjun Temple (traditional music—Jianshui), Baoxiang Temple (Shibaoshan), Ganden Sumtsaling Monastery (Zhongdian)

Museums: Sanxingdui (nr Chengdu), Dinosaurs (Zigong), Salt (Zigong), Nationalities (Kunming), Zhu Family Garden (Jianshui), Stilwell (Chongqing), Guild Hall (Chongqing)

City Parks: Cuihu/Green Park (Kunming), Xishan (Kunming)

Old Towns: Jianshui, Lijiang, Shuhe, Shaxi, Zhongdian

Nature/Outdoors: Rice Terraces (Yuanyang), Jade Dragon Snow Mountain (Lijiang), Shibaoshan, Baisha Village/Bike Ride (Lijiang), Tiger Leaping Gorge (Lijiang)

Misc: Pandas (Chengdu), Dujiangyan (nr Chengdu), Old Teahouse and Culture Center (Zigong), Impressions Lijiang Show (Lijiang), Minority Regional Markets (Yuanyang, Shaxi), Dazu Caves.

Disappointments and Highlights

I had three disappointments due to temporary closures, in order of my upset: 1) Main Assembly Hall at Monastery (Zhongdian), 2) Shizhong Caves (Shibaoshan); 3) Dujiangyan Museum/Exhibition Center---with the latter being only a minor irritation. But in no case would I have preferred to completely scrap the plan and forego what I could still see.

The only place I went that in retrospect, I could have found a better use of time and money, was Xishan at Kunming. And that was a place I had a feeling I’d find underwhelming. Not a bad place, but overhyped for what is essentially a hike up a hill with some chairlift and cable car rides, for basically repetitious views. My advice to others is to treat Xishan as a City Park type of outing rather than as a Mountain Visit, and your expectations might be more in keeping with reality. Besides that, I was happy with every single choice I made on the itinerary, and felt that the itinerary changes made along the way were appropriate, given the situation once I became ill with a very bad cold.

My personal highlights on the trip were (in no particular order): Pandas, Dinosaurs, Yuanyang Terraces, Shaxi Village, Tiger Leaping Gorge (except for my legs for the following 48 hours), Ganden Sumtsaling Monastery + Songtsam Hotel, Dazu Caves, and dinner in Chengdu with mnredfox. With Honorable Mentions to Jianshui, Shuhe/Baisha Village Exploration and Bike Ride, Impressions Lijiang Show.

Hotels

I used hotels with private room (usually a double) and bath, generally simple but clean and comfortable. All had 24-hour hot water, TV (generally Chinese only) and free internet—except no internet in Yuanyang. I can tolerate lack of fluffy bathrobes and chocolates on the pillow, but cannot abide lack of cleanliness. Cost per night all-in, (RMB) Except as noted, all were reserved through sinohotel.com and paid at hotel on arrival.
Chengdu x 3 nights—Jinjiang Inn Jinxianqiao (189) This is a chain, urban motel-style.
Zigong x 1 —Xiong Fei Holiday Hotel (229)
Kunming x 2 —Enjoying International Hotel (198)
Jianshui x 1—Fairyland Hotel (131) A Yunnan-based chain, urban motel style. Walk-in.
Yuanyang x 2—Yunti Shunjie (100). Walk-in.
Lijiang x 5, split 3/2—Golden Spring Hotel (370) Back-up replacement after abandoning Sunny 100 Business Hotel. Walk-in + sinohotel.
Shaxi x 1---Tea and Horse Caravan Inn (120) Guesthouse, walk-in.
Zhongdian x 1—Songtsam Hotel (900). Reservation via ctrip.com
Chengdu x 1—Jinjiang Inn Wanshufeng (189)
Chongqing x 2—Jinjiang Inn Yangjiaping (149)
2 other nights spent not sleeping on a sleeper train

I was fine with all my choices except the Chongqing one, largely due to location. That JJ Inn is an older property though my room was fine. It is also a bit too noisy. The Lijiang Golden Spring was way out of whack with my Lijiang budget of 250, but it was an emergency backup and once ill, I needed a place with amenities and good heating. As stated upthread, the Songtsam was a very special place and my splurge experience.

Cost Breakdown

By now it should be apparent that I travel simply but not at backpacker rock-bottom level. In percentage terms, my costs came to:
Internal Airfare (3 tickets): 20%
Intercity Travel Train and Bus: 12%
Local Transportation: 12%
Accommodation: 33%
Food and Drink: 12%
Entry Fees: 8%
Miscel: 3%

--My internal airfare was a bit higher than it should have been, as I paid for a high booking class/fare on one ticket since I needed the incremental miles for a status level.
--I'm not a big eater, eat mostly at local Chinese neighborhood-type places (with a couple of western exceptions in Kunming and Lijiang), and had very little alcohol
--Miscellaneous = laundry, Left Luggage, etc.


Misc—Language Issues

My Chinese is serviceable though not stellar, and while helpful, certainly wasn’t a make-or-break factor in being able to pull off this trip. A little language ability gives one a comfort level that is still somewhat illusory when you’re in a new area, as you still don’t know the local “system.” Even Chinese visiting from another part of the country are in the same boat. Somebody without Mandarin could do this same trip. Where I found some language ability helpful specifically:

1) Getting what I needed (hotel room, food from the menu, bus ticket, etc.) a bit more quickly than somebody without any Chinese language knowledge For instance, I could accomplish something in 1 minute by speaking and not needing to have characters pre-drawn for me, whereas somebody needing to use a phrasebook, a destination in characters, and charades might take 5 minutes to get the point/question across. A non-speaker would get to the same place, just a bit slower with the transaction. I ran into other foreign travelers with little or no Mandarin who were doing similar trips to me, with little difficulty....just need a little more patience.

2) Dealing with taxis and drivers. For taxis in cities I don’t know well, I’m at their mercy since I don’t know the route (esp Chongqing!), all you can do is pronounce your address or landmark and hope they get there. A phone number of your destination and a mobile phone are key tools for both Mandarin and non-Mandarin speaker. For private drivers, and particularly at Yuanyang and Shaxi-Shibaoshan, it was nice to be able to chat with the driver even though their Mandarin was Yunnan dialect and difficult to understand. It just made it better than having to sit in silence, and I could ask things about local life, as well as suggest quick little diversions and stops to make.

3) Chatting with fellow travelers. My Chinese hiking buddy at at Tiger Leaping Gorge, the two Shandong soldiers on recreation leave heading for Dujiangyan, the Dazu teacher I sat next to back to Chongqing, fellow overnight train passengers, etc. This was actually where I found the most reward in being able to communicate in even simple Mandarin...though from a trip logistics standpoint, the least essential.

So while helpful, it is not necessary to be a Chinese speaker to do an independent trip, even one that’s a little off-the-beaten-path. Non-speakers will just need to be patient and use a lot of humor, and don’t get frustrated...get creative. I think this really comes down to the personality of the traveler


I hope that from this thread, FT’ers that managed to “hang on” for the vicarious ride might pick up some ideas and tips that will help in crafting their own China adventure. And remember Jiejie’s two most important rules:
1) Always keep enough money on you. Cash. Cash = options, even on short notice.
2) Always have Plan B.

Comments and questions are both appropriate and welcome on this thread.

Since I had the laptop with me--which is unusual on this sort of trip--I took advantage of various downtimes--usually every 2-3 days--to just start writing. Stream-of-consciousness style. (I'm a touch typist so at 100+ words per minute, I can do a lot quickly!) And I have a bunch of things jotted in my master notebook--mostly logistical things like schedules, prices, sketch maps, record of what I spent etc. My laptop writings ended up totally about 50 pages and have a lot more detail on people I met, incidents, etc. which have been edited out. Some of was just babbling. As this is all still fresh in my mind, memory also. But memory fades with time, particularly on the emotions experienced at the time. So based on all of this, I have pulled out, rewritten, edited, and augmented into what you see here, trying to keep in mind the FT audience.

I am aware that these posts are unusually long, and at the start, I wondered whether to just boil down to essentials such as facts and "I liked it" or "I didn't like it." However, in the end, I decided that FT'ers are big boys and girls and can skip over the thread or the posts that they feel are too long, ponderous, or uninteresting.

Since we don't have too many FT examples of how somebody actually lives through independent China travel in real-time, planning vs not planning, making decisions and adjustments as you go, locating resources, and not depending on the Westin's concierge for everything, I thought actually providing a more detailed context might be illustrative, particularly for travelers that have it within their personality to deal with China independently, but have been on the bubble about independent vs organized tour.

And there are some places on this itinerary that are not on the usual China tourist circuit and are not well-described out on the Net, but which a number of FT'ers might find a lot of merit and enjoyment.

Bear with me though, I am almost at the end of the trip! And now for our next Act, we have....

Well, I agree. I like how you broke it down into sections. I'll get this linked in our sites to see in our guide.

So while helpful, it is not necessary to be a Chinese speaker to do an independent trip, even one that’s a little off-the-beaten-path. Non-speakers will just need to be patient and use a lot of humor, and don’t get frustrated...get creative. I think this really comes down to the personality of the traveler


I hope that from this thread, FT’ers that managed to “hang on” for the vicarious ride might pick up some ideas and tips that will help in crafting their own China adventure. And remember Jiejie’s two most important rules:
1) Always keep enough money on you. Cash. Cash = options, even on short notice.
2) Always have Plan B.

Comments and questions are both appropriate and welcome on this thread.

So true on the two rules & being creative.

question, why do you use sinohotel & not C-trip ?. is it the payment option ?

Could of used a Yunnan golf course highlight !.

So true on the two rules & being creative.

question, why do you use sinohotel & not C-trip ?. is it the payment option ?

Could of used a Yunnan golf course highlight !.


IMO, Sinohotel's online booking process is easier to deal with and less rigamarole. They show the all-in price, whereas there's some taxes/fees added on the ctrip site after you select your room...which I find annoying even though ctrip does clearly state that taxes/fees are extra. And sinohotel standard payment is normally "At hotel" with credit card guarantee only for late arrival...of which I only had one instance of that. C-trip usually wants credit card guarantee regardless. This caused a bit of angst on this trip when I used C-trip to book the Songtsam Hotel in Zhongdian (not offered through sinohotel)--as I got a contact via my family in the USA that the bank's Fraud Squad wanted to talk to me about this charge. Which was only a block, not even a charge. Oh it got settled, but not what you want to deal with from the backside of nowhere. I normally don't have issues with the Fraud Squad trying to reach me, so I'm not sure what triggered their interest this time. Unlike most FT'ers, I am not fond of using credit cards in China though I will use them at branded establishments and airlines that won't DCC me.

I had one situation (my Phase 2 of Lijiang) where somehow the booking wasn't showing up when I arrived at the front desk. Called sinohotel, handed phone to reception, some papers were looked through and shuffled around, and in less than a minute receptionist was grinning again and everything was settled. I've had very good experiences with sinohotel on Chinese hotel properties and service, so they tend to be my "go-to" booking agent of choice for hotels in China rather than ctrip. Ctrip I use as a backup for hotels, and have also very occasionally booked through a more mainstream online service (never Expedia though).

PS: If I was a golfer, I surely would have been out on the links, with that fresh air and fine weather. You will have to have a Jiatong Yunnan Golfing Advanture and then tell us about it. ;)

Awesome trip report, going to chengdu myself soon!

Awesome trip report, going to chengdu myself soon!

Make sure to stay at the IC!

hey jiejie,

thanks for the report - will help a ton in my Yunnan & Sichuan planning. (yep, yep, still thinking about TAR!).

One thing that made me a little nervous was the "troops train" to Lijiang. Had a pleasure to ride an overnight bus from Guilin to Guangzhou and I'm ready to overpay for flight tickets.

safe travels!
mfk

hey jiejie,

thanks for the report - will help a ton in my Yunnan & Sichuan planning. (yep, yep, still thinking about TAR!).

One thing that made me a little nervous was the "troops train" to Lijiang. Had a pleasure to ride an overnight bus from Guilin to Guangzhou and I'm ready to overpay for flight tickets.

safe travels!
mfk

Well, it's 9 hours of claustrophobia though it is handy timing for logistics and especially if needing to save precious daytime for sightseeing. It was certainly the least pleasant of any of my sleeper rides in China in memory. But at the time I went, the flights were just not being discounted at were running 8x the price of the hard sleeper and 5-6x price of soft sleeper. If Dali had been in my plans, I would have just taken the bus, maybe the day train in a seat (the fast bus from Kunming at 4 hours is quicker than the day train at 6 hours, just make sure you find the right long-distance bus station in Kunming). Wait until you get a better overall itinerary and if Dali is included as a stop, the issue will resolve itself. Or go for a soft sleeper if you do the direct overnight train. However you get there, it will be worthwhile once you reach the Lijiang area. The sucky thing about the plane is the Lijiang airport is not close to town, so upon arrival you've got about an extra hour to make the airport-city connection by road and add that to the cost. Train station at edge of town is only about 15 minutes away and bus station is right in town.

Bumping up this "great" thread.

I did finally make it to Yunnan for 4 days, stayed at the Golden Eagle summit hotel in downtown Kunming. Only a 20 rmb taxi ride from the airport. Lots of local food nearby this area of town by this hotel.

Also did day trips to nearby cities of Qujing & Yuxi. The new Kunming international airport hopes to be the china gateway to SE asia & india !. it will open this June, could be interesting on some fare promos..

nice year around weather there, i might go back in August & play some golf when BJ is tooo hot.

Want to add a few notes on Chengdu:

1) Liked the city. Although immense, seemed friendly and easy to get around. Taxis were plentiful and no shenanigans, although one driver waved off my hotel card—either he couldn't read or needed reading glasses. Although I can't speak Chinese I could say the name of the road well enough and then later showed him the map I had all was fine.

2) Jiejie's post about pandas is spot on. Some of the pens were closed, but unfortunately they don't make that clear until you're at the pen. Also, museum is closed now but supposed to reopen in July. Summer may not be the best time to go, as the pandas don't like the heat— they seemed languid even at 9a. Nonetheless, my 8yo daughter was in heaven seeing several dozen pandas. Yes, she heald one for RMB1300 (Er, donation). We stumbled across the holding pen at 10 and there was almost no line. It got long very quickly though, even though each person gets only about 1 min with the panda. I was lucky and got to go in with her to take pictures—usually they let in only the paid person and take pictures for you. At that price, only my daughter gets the experience. We took a taxi there. He offered to wait for RMB80/hr. We declined, correctly predicting we could catch the taxi someone else used to get there when we were ready to leave. That might not work if you stay until 4p, but we were done by Noon.

3). We went next to Wenshu Monastery. Beautiful architecture and very serene. Tickets are only RMB5—a real bargain considering the free incense. Also went to Du Fu's Thatched Cottage, which was also a beautiful park. We would have stayed longer if no child and also weather that was not 85 and equal humidity.

No pictures ,No truth.

No pictures ,No truth.

Oops, I've been caught out. I made this whole trip up. :rolleyes:

Oops, I've been caught out. I made this whole trip up. :rolleyes:

Your "fictional" travels were really spot-on accurate IME.

Oops, I've been caught out. I made this whole trip up. :rolleyes:

I find a difference between Chinese forum and American's . There are a lots of Pictures in Chinese travel forum with short description ,but here are hardly find any tiny pic . I like reading travel notes and like appreciating the pics even more, A pic can tell us further things than text , 对不？(right?)

I find a difference between Chinese forum and American's . There are a lots of Pictures in Chinese travel forum with short description ,but here are hardly find any tiny pic . I like reading travel notes and like appreciating the pics even more, A pic can tell us further things than text , 对不？(right?)

1) English is a much more wonderful language for expressing thoughts and narrative than Chinese--it simply has a richer vocabulary and imagery. Pictures are nice, but text is still good.
2) In case you haven't noticed, this forum generally doesn't allow pictures to be posted directly. And I agree with this. Photos take up a lot of space and also loading time. This is a TRAVEL FORUM meaning people are on the road a lot, and don't have time to wait for photos to load. FWIW, I despise Chinese forums simply because they are junked up graphically and a chaotic mess. Unfortunately for you, if you want to play on Flyertalk, you have to play by the rules of the club, not the ones you prefer or may be used to.

Accusing people of lying is not very cool, and I don't appreciate it. I hope you were trying to be funny and it just didn't come across well. Be mindful of this if you continue to post.

Photos: I have opened a Flickr account but have not yet had the time or energy to figure out how to post a selection of photos--when that happens, I will place a link on this thread to the Flickr, so those who wish to look may do so, and those who aren't interested will not have their Flyertalk time and screen space wasted. Likely it will not happen first for this particular trip, but for the Silk Road trip narrative that I am composing now, which will be a separate thread.

Accusing people of lying is not very cool, and I don't appreciate it. I hope you were trying to be funny and it just didn't come across well. Be mindful of this if you continue to post.

Let me defend jiejie - amount of details incl practical advice I got from her (on Xichuan, Yunan and Xizang) is almost impossible to catch w/o actually being there and experiencing it.
So yes, mind your comments unless you've been there same time and she wasn't there :)

let's focus back on a beauty of Middle Kingdom!
mfk

I am so sorry with my reckless words and apologize to you for it seriously. I want to express my thoughts politeness ,but my poor English skill can't work well on it. “no pics no truth”( 无图无真相) is common sentence as an idiom in Chinese travel forum ,it means that we are eager for some wonderful pics sharing by the host on road. this's all .　Sorry again. If only you understand it.

I have learned so much things from your notes.as return ,another common sentence we usually used be here sent to you.
“What do I look up to you is just like the surging river, in an unbroken line, and like the the Yellow River flood get out of hand. ”
It means that I am very very very very very worship you who are talented.
I hope it will not cause misunderstanding us each other again.

o.

Accusing people of lying is not very cool, and I don't appreciate it. I hope you were trying to be funny and it just didn't come across well. Be mindful of this if you continue to post.

2) In case you haven't noticed, this forum generally doesn't allow pictures to be posted directly. And I agree with this. Photos take up a lot of space and also loading time. This is a TRAVEL FORUM meaning people are on the road a lot, and don't have time to wait for photos to load.

Perhaps posters who wish to do so could be encouraged to start separate travel photo threads, which could be avoided by those who don't want to consume the bandwidth.

I am so sorry with my reckless words and apologize to you for it seriously. I want to express my thoughts politeness ,but my poor English skill can't work well on it. “no pics no truth”( 无图无真相) is common sentence as an idiom in Chinese travel forum ,it means that we are eager for some wonderful pics sharing by the host on road. this's all .　Sorry again. If only you understand it.

I have learned so much things from your notes.as return ,another common sentence we usually used be here sent to you.
“What do I look up to you is just like the surging river, in an unbroken line, and like the the Yellow River flood get out of hand. ”
It means that I am very very very very very worship you who are talented.
I hope it will not cause misunderstanding us each other again.

Apology accepted--I had a feeling something was just "lost in translation." Let us all move on now and focus on providing good information and descriptions of travels in China.

Perhaps posters who wish to do so could be encouraged to start separate travel photo threads, which could be avoided by those who don't want to consume the bandwidth.

Possibly a good idea, if FT infrastructure is up for it. However, many people who post photos have other circles of internet buddies besides FT'ers, and therefore it generally makes more sense to find a photo-sharing site and putting things there in one place, then linking back to FT and the various other sites. Instead of trying to post photos repetitively on each specific forum one hangs out in.

While pictures are great, most everything here on FT has been text and has worked rather well.

^^Excellent adventure!

Nice trip report, jiejie!

Nice trip report, jiejie!

Agreed! I'm awaiting her Silk Road report, as well.

Bumping this up because its a) great and b) have a question (a more selfish reason! :D).

I'm planning a 10-12 day Yunnan trip over easter and am trying to map it out. Thinking Yuanyang (staying at one of the villages), Dali and Lijiang (figure that's all I have time for, if that) - though I had originally wanted to do Lugu Lake and Xishaungbanna, too.

Rather than roundtripping through Kunming, is there any way to get to to Dali from Yuanyang (aside from private car hire?)? I've looked online a fair bit and have tried to look it up on thorntree, but with no results (unless I'm looking in the wrong places...) Ideas?

Bumping this up because its a) great and b) have a question (a more selfish reason! :D).

I'm planning a 10-12 day Yunnan trip over easter and am trying to map it out. Thinking Yuanyang (staying at one of the villages), Dali and Lijiang (figure that's all I have time for, if that) - though I had originally wanted to do Lugu Lake and Xishaungbanna, too.

Rather than roundtripping through Kunming, is there any way to get to to Dali from Yuanyang (aside from private car hire?)? I've looked online a fair bit and have tried to look it up on thorntree, but with no results (unless I'm looking in the wrong places...) Ideas?

Short answer is no, at least not in your time frame. The long answer is yes but you have to hopscotch a bunch of local chicken buses, which don't run for optimum connections, so you'd end up taking about 2+ days to do this with at least one overnight in a place you'd rather not be. Scrap this idea.

On a more general note, there is no way you will get to all these places in 10 or even 12 days. If Yuanyang is the priority, count on Day 1 for your arrival in KMG, Day 4 at earliest but more likely Day 5 to get back to KMG. Overnight train arriving Lijiang Day 6 for full day, also Day 7, road to Dali on Day 8 about 3 hours, rest of day 8 and day 9 Dali. Return to KMG Day 10. With 2 extra days, add another to Lijiang + either Shaxi or Dali. Notice No Lugu Lake. Yuanyang, Lijiang, Lugu Lake doable with no Dali. Even if flying Lijiang-Kunming for the return.

If Xishuangbanna is the priority, you can go from Yuanyang to Jinghong in about 1.5 days with overnight around Simao or Pu'er or somewhere in there, without dealing with Kunming. Then fly back JHG-KMG if you have 10 days. With 12 days, you could fly JHG-DLU (Dali) and spend a couple of days, then back to KMG. But no time for Lijiang in that case. JHG-DLU may be a bit pricey. Road between the two takes too long--there was huge construction on that route a couple of years ago (definitely a must-avoid) but not sure of status now.

Yunnan is frustrating in this respect, lots of great places but troublesome infrastructure and public buses are cheap but convoluted. On the flip side, this lack of infrastructure is what has kept many of these areas relatively untouristed and therefore most interesting. Unfortunately, fast eroding with development and mass Chinese domestic tourism. See it quickly before it vanishes forever.

Yeah I had pretty much figured to scrap Xishuangbanna and Lugu Lake.

If 12 days, it sounds like I can do Yuanyang, Dali and Lijiang... just have to figure out where to stay in the former...

Thanks! :)

I'm planning a 10-12 day Yunnan trip over easter and am trying to map it out. Thinking Yuanyang (staying at one of the villages), Dali and Lijiang (figure that's all I have time for, if that) - though I had originally wanted to do Lugu Lake and Xishaungbanna, too.

Rather than roundtripping through Kunming, is there any way to get to to Dali from Yuanyang (aside from private car hire?)? I've looked online a fair bit and have tried to look it up on thorntree, but with no results (unless I'm looking in the wrong places...) Ideas?

Re Dali and Lijiang, info found in this link below might be helpful, starting from Post #11:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trip-reports/1387080-100-days-500-photos-my-oneworld-done3-adventures.html

Thanks! You have some stunning photos too!