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Nihow,
I have been in China a little over 2 weeks now and i have to say it is shaping up to be one of the best countries ive been to so far on this trip and before (countryside, cities, rivers, transport and food all amazing and relatively cheap)!!
Last time i left you i was on my way to Macau to make my fortune in the casinos, and while i didn't set any records i did come away roughly 16 quid up after 2 days of gambling so can't grumble, add that to the tenner i won at the races in Hong Kong and i made a tidy little sum. Got to see a bit of the city of Macau going up this huge tower for views across the country and city and went to a few old churchs and buildings from the portuguese era, but it was all about the casinos in this place. I read that it turns over more money than Las Vegas which is easy to believe with bus loads coming from China and Hong Kong where casinos are illegal. In my 2 days i managed to go to about 20 casinos including the Venetian, Sands, Hard Rock, MGM Grand, Grand Lisboa, city of dreams and a few others. Me money was predominently made on blackjack where somehow i reckon i won about 80% of the hands!! Would have come away alot healthier if it weren't for my roulette craving which cost me a fair bit of me winnings, damn and blast.
I then crossed into China and again immediately things change, with less english spoken and a different ambience. Got the bus to a city called Guangzhou (Canton in the west). Nice place on the pearl river delta where i spent a couple of days. Went to a mausaleum and a few parks and generally strolled about city and along river watching people watching me and eating cantonese food, yummy. Fantastic metro there which is brand new as they are hosting the Asian games(like olympics) next year.
On from Guangzhou i got sleeper bus( the bus had about 20 bunk beds in it!!) to Yangshou. I spent 2 days cycling thru gorgeous countryside, like the picture above, in scenery like nothing i've ever seen before. There were thousands of karst peaks strutting up everywhere abruptly, hard to describe but just incredible and like i say like nowhere i have ever been can i compare it with. Must have a cycled a good 30 miles each day, so on the 3rd day feeling sligthly saddle sore and to protect my vital assets i thought i'd do a walk along the river. Got a bus to a place called Yangdi and somehow managed to find my way 24km(15m) down the river to Xingping. Wow what a hike, fricking incredible scenery like the 2 days prior. The countryside around Yangshou really is out of this world!!
From Yangshou it was onto a small country town called Fenghuang via a few transit towns. This was a beautiful little town set along another river with old wooden buildings and covered bridges crossing every now and again. It was beseiged with chinese tour groups which kind of added a bit to the fun of the place. Here i discovered chinese street food. You can have 3 gorgeous meals a day for about a quid from one of the many stalls that line up along the street offering gorgeous food with differing varieties of rice, noodles and potatoes as well as whatever kind of beastie on stick you want. Restaurants in China are kind of funny, to keep meat fresh they just keep it alive until it gets ordered!! Then they batter it to death in front of you and serve it up, nice!! The town came to life at night with buskers everywhere singing quite eardrum friendly chinese pop and everything was illuminated. I spent a good hour watching chinese aerobics on the hill-top to an assortment of aqua, vengaboys, Peter Andre, europop, and trance music which was quite fun, bearing in mind those from an older generation were practising Tai-chi about 20m further down the mountain all elegant and graceful to traditional chinese folk songs!!
Then it was back into the countryside to a national park entitled Zhangjiejie. I met an Australian artist called Pete on the bus and after a few minibuses to the random wrong villages we ended up at our destination and scored ourself this huge hotel suite with 2 huge beds sofas 2 TVs tables and a lush bathroom. He spoke a bit of the local lingo so i let him sort everything out which was a bonus. Spent a couple of days there walking round more gorgeous scenery, more karst peaks and rivers and general forests and mountains and having someone to chat to in the evening and eat with which was nice. There were also many chinese tour groups here but they seem to like crowds as you can walk of for about 5 minutes in one direction and all of a sudden you are on your own in the middle of nowhere, quite cool for China. The local delicacy in the restaurants here was giant frogs and i mean giant. Every restaurant along with the usual fish, turtles, chickens, crabs and snakes displayed in water tanks outside the front door had these frogs (they may have been toads) that were as big as ones hand!! Didn't try any tho can't say how they tasted!!
Well Pete was to be the last westerner i saw for the next 5 days, which was kinda cool, as i journeyed up to Yichang a town on the Yangste river and the jumping on point for my Yangste river cruise. Spent a couple of days in Yichang a town according to my guidebook had not a single sight, but i thought it was a real nice little city ("little" meaning it only has 3.99 million inhabitants!!) Walked about thru parks and along river eating more street food and watching the chinese at there finest. This was also the place where i guy on his scooter was driving down the pavement, as they do, spotted me before a girl ran out of a shop in his path which he saw at the last moment and he skidded across the wet floor. Kind of funny(he weren't hurt) should have been watching the road(sorry pavement) and not me!! Then i went for breakfast and got approached by a lady in her late 40's/early 50's who kept saying "To my home, To my home" and i was like oh your going home, nice for you, have fun. Then she said we make love, we make love. Bearing in mind her age and the fact that she had i'd say about 4-5 yellow teeth remaining it wasn't a very tempting offer and i said thanks for the offer but no thanks. Usually in China, i have been approached by pimps with business cards showing rather pretty young(ish) girls, so if this is the face behind the picture i think i'll give it a miss!!
Managed to book a Yangste river cruise in Yichang sailing upstream to Chongquing. Woman in office didn't speak a word of english so don't know how we managed it but
i ended up here in Chingquing so jobs a good un. Was the only westerner on a chinese cruise ship which brought many curios stares. Booked a third class cabin, but they put me in 2nd class which was nice tho had to share with 3 chinese men in their pants most of the time!! Whenever i was in my room people would just open the door have a look then either leave the door ajar or go of and someone else would come and have a look. Was kind of offputting at first but got used to it and could read my book oblivious to the staing eyes. Somehow i managed to find a quiet spot on the boat (everyone had paid to be VIP's enabling access to the top deck, i refused and found a perfect spot at the back on deck 2). Went thru these amazing gorges on the first day in stunning weather, before having a mistier 2nd and 3rd day but trhe scenery was less special there so weren't too bothered. Did a few excursions off the boat where i found myself part of the dreaded Chinese tour group, didn't know wtf was going on half the time but somehow managed to follow the tour leader with her umbrella and were in fact pretty good little excursions. Also passed the 3 gorges dam which is the largest in the world and sceintists and ecologists are a bit wary of saying it will affect quite a bit (heard it is going to change the tilt of the earth when all the water is relocated!!). It is also flooding up to 2 million homes and you can see lots of deserted houses along the river and lots more apartment blocks being built higher up to re-house these people. At various intervals there are these markers that show how high 175metres is, which is how high they expect the water levels to reach, and there are/were quite a few things below this level.
Arrived in Chongquing yesterday morning where i saw a group of westerners(boo hoo) elderly Germans waiting to go on their cruise!! This is a pretty cool city, which some say is the biggest city in the world which depends on where you draw the boundaries i guess, wikipedia disagrees so i'll go with that. Its in the middle/west of China and the state is throwing billions of dollars at it trying to get this region up to date with the economies of cities on the east coast, so there are skyscrapers everywhere and you can feel the money in the city. Went to an urban planning museum yesterday which shows all the projects they have in store to reach there goal by 2020. Had the best Kebab ever last night en all.
Anyway i'm hungry now so gotta go
Tommy
(ps its my birthday on saturday so presents can be mailed to 45 Bagshoui village, Emei shan, Chengdu, Sichuan, China, 657392) (only joking - don't really send anything there)
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