13. 3 Nov - 14 Nov 2011 - Goodbye to China, and the Fast-Lane Home through Thailand and Malaysia. China was definitely the highlight for us this time. We would love to go back and visit some of the bigger cities further east than where we travelled, to get a more complete picture of China today. But we loved the more western provinces we visited, and found it to be an incredibly exciting place to travel. Our very last city was Jinghong. On our first night, we...

12. 4 Oct - 29 Oct 2011 - South through Sichuan and Yunnan Provinces, China. We were wrong to think that we had left Tibet when we entered Sichuan Province. A line on a map means nothing and Western Sichuan seemed more Tibetan than Tibet. Beautiful mountains and rivers, with even more chortens beside the road, and so many prayer flags, much bigger than we had previously seen, and also large rocks along the river made into mani stones with prayers engraved a...

11. 12 Sept to 3 Oct 2011 -Tibet, China. The 5231 metre Tanggula Pass was a fitting welcome into Tibet - high altitude is a constant companion, the Tibetan plateau having an average altitude of 4000 metres. In Kyrgyzstan our Song Kul excursion seemed monstrously high at 3000 metres. With the dizzy heights of many mountain passes in Tibet, and at least five campsites at altitudes of over 4000 metres where it was common to wake up short of breath, 3000 metres...

10. 31 August to 11 Sept 2011 - South through China towards Tibet - Gansu and Qinghai Provinces Traffic jam blues were soon forgotten with the wonderful city of Dunhuang, our major stopover in Gansu Province. It lies in a fertile oasis, a relief from the desert landscape all around. We spent two full days there relaxing in a reasonably priced hotel, and wandering at our leisure throughout the city. A market street selling fresh food and hardware runs para...

9. 11 August to 30 August 2011 - Xinjiang Province, China We crossed into China and left the snow of the Torugart Pass behind us, but it wasn't long before we were at the official border crossing, having passports checked and stamped, vehicle chassis and engine numbers checked, and departure cards issued, and our meat and fruit handed over, not to be taken into China. All this with delays due to a passenger bus arriving at the same time, and every passenger h...