A trip to Yunnan, China.

[Bamboo Grove]

Lijiang day 1

In the morning after finally learning my lessons, I took a taxi to the bus station, had some breakfast near the station and waited for my bus. Taking the bus proved to be a good choice as I arrived in Lijiang about three hours before my train would have left Dali.

Took a taxi to the hotel, checked in and went for a walk. Lijiang’s old town was even better than Dali’s, again very commercial but that didn’t bother me. Luckily nowadays the smart phones have map apps, it would have been very easy to get lost there with all the narrow, winding streets. It was enjoyable to walk around. After a few hours walk, I ate some dumplings and went back to the hotel. In the evening I went for another walk to see what the place looked like in the evening and it was just as charming, if not even more so.

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Lijiang had been an important place in the ancient tea route and there were many statues reminding about this.

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The only problem were the roads, they were tough to walk and very uneven so you had to keep on watching your steps.

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Just outside the Ancient Town there was also a statue that is not so common any more.

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[Nereus]

Lijiang day 1

Incredible history there! Might expect to see Marco Polo step around the next corner!
Wikipedia has a very well documented article worth looking at.

I do not see any power cables draped around like is found in Thailand. Do those old buildings have electric power?
What about the language? The original people evidently have their own unique dialect, so is Mandarin spoken there?

[Bamboo Grove]

The Naxi people have their own language but Mandarin was common everywhere. I thought the Yunnanese people spoke very clear Mandarin, to me, along with Taiwanese this is the easiest to understand. Of course both Dali and Lijiang had people who had moved from elsewhere to open up business in these places and they spoke their own accents. They had electricity but I don't know where the power lines were, not that I was particularly looking for them.

[buksida]

This place looks very photogenic, I don't see many people there though, in Japan or Korea it would be rammed with selfie-snapping tourists ... or are you doing what I do and taking photos without the crowds in them!?

[Bamboo Grove]

Some streets were very crowded but I try to avoid taking photos there and then. I try to find more peaceful spots. Sometimes, though, if you want to emphasize the crowds, it's a different thing. I have to admit though, that the area is quite well spread-out so it didn't feel too crowded. Plus it wasn't the holiday season for Chinese.

[Ginjaninja]

I visited Lijiang several years ago. Thoroughly recommend it for a visit.
Do not, however, make the mistake I did of travelling there during the spring festival!!

[Bamboo Grove]

Any travel in China during their big holidays is best to be avoided. This Chinese New Year I have a week off and I'm planning to stay in Macau. Maybe just a couple of short visits across the border to Zhuhai and/or Shenzhen after the first three days of the festival are over.

[Bamboo Grove]

Lijiang day 2

On the second day in Lijiang I had a plan to go to Black Dragon Pool Park, I had read the scenery would be great with the Jade Dragon Snow Mountain at the background. I had decided to find a bus that would go there and this time I was lucky as I found the bus stop fairly easily and not far from my hotel. This was the highlight of my trip. Such a beautiful scenery I've only seen once in my travels in China.

I arrived at the park and noticed that there was no entrance fee, maybe because of the low season. Anyway, the only entrance fee I paid during my trip was to the Cangshan- mountain in Dali and even there I got a discount price being over 60-years old. No talk about any double or triple pricing China had in the 80’s. Then it was; Mainland Chinese paid the lowest price, oversees Chinese a bit higher and ”Foreign Guests” the highest. After a short walk, I came to the place which was very photogenic. You could see a Chinese pavilion and the Jade Dragon Snow Mountain behind. It was truly wonderful.

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There was also a small museum at the temple and they had some Chinese calligraphy and Chinese paintings there. I like to latter a lot and I'm always happy to have a look at them.

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I walked around the park and every time I could see the mountain, I just had to sit down and take a few more photos. The highest peak seen in the photos is at 5,596 meters above the sea level. The only other place I have seen such a wonderful scenery was back in 1988 at the Tianchi lake in Xinjiang’s Tian Shan mountains. Sorry about the dirty photo of the Tianchi in Tianshan mountains. It's from summer of 1988 and has been travelling a lot before a made it into a digital form. Probably my daughters played with it when they were small (that's right, blame the kids )

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After some hours in the park I walked back to my hotel through the Ancient Town and after a rest returned to the town for supper.

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[Ginjaninja]

On the second day in Lijiang I had a plan to go to Black Dragon Pool Park, I had read the scenery would be great with the Jade Dragon Snow Mountain at the background. I had decided to find a bus that would go there and this time I was lucky as I found the bus stop fairly easily and not far from my hotel. This was the highlight of my trip. Such a beautiful scenery I've only seen once in my travels in China.

I did the bus/cable-car tour up the Jade Snow mountain. The highest you can go on the tourist trail is 4680m!! I had never been at that kind of altitude before and was quite an experience once your body become acclimatised. You had to stop and rest after every level of steps or you'd pass-out.

[Bamboo Grove]

Ginjaninja wrote:

I did the bus/cable-car tour up the Jade Snow mountain. The highest you can go on the tourist trail is 4680m!! I had never been at that kind of altitude before and was quite an experience once your body become acclimatised. You had to stop and rest after every level of steps or you'd pass-out.

I considered that, particularly as I couldn't go to the Tiger Leaping gorge on my last day in Lijiang but as it was late December, I didn't want to freeze.

[Bamboo Grove]

Lijiang day 3

I had booked a ticket to a trip to Tiger Leaping Gorge some two hours away by bus but in the evening before, the hotel informed me that it was cancelled because there had been a landslide in the area and the roads were closed. So I just had a lazy day with some leisurely walks in the old town during the day and the evening and the rest of the time I spent in my hotel room. Lijiang is mostly likely the most picturesque place I have visited in China. Full moon time was a bonus to compensate for the disappointment of not seeing the gorge.

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One photo with lots of people, this was a square, which had many restaurants with singers.

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[buksida]

Reminds me a little of Hoi An in Vietnam. Shame tourist visas for China are such a ballache.

[Bamboo Grove]

There are some similarities to Hoi An but Lijiang's Ancient City is much bigger. If I remember correctly Hoi An has quite limited space for the old buildings? Mainly near the bridge.

[buksida]

Yep, its a very compact place, at least it was when I was last there ten years ago.

[Bamboo Grove]

Shame tourist visas for China are such a ballache.

With the Macau Blue Card, it's fairly easy. A colleague of mine just went to apply for it yesterday. A lots of paper, yes but he will get it in four days, as I did, too.