First annoying point is that last night I wrote a huge blog for Tiger Leaping Gorge (TLG form herein) and this morning it somehow deleted itself, very annoying so now I'll try to remember what I wrote! So, first question, why is it not wholly acceptable to wear skippers when trekking? Because I'm sure these swollen maggot shape blisters would not be decorating my heels if I'd been donning some fluffy, padded Marks and Sparks slippers! So first up we were sat ea...

Just a short one from Jingong as we were only there for about 28 hours, even that was too much in my opinion. After our 'almost' bus catastrophe we caught a random motorised trycicle with a bench on the back into town and checked into a nice little hotel for £5. We had some food then armed with map, playing cards, lonely planet and money went on a wander in search of Botanical Gardens, Medicinal Herb Gardens, promenade overlooking the Mekong and Water Splashi...

Lijiang was a nice, although an extremely tourist (95% Chinese tourists) infested place. We stayed in a hostel called Mama's Naxi, Naxi being the name of the largest minority group in Lijiang. 'Mama' was absolutely nuts and screamed in Mandarin at anyone and everyone, but she booked us tickets, organised cheap transport to bus stations and to Tiger Leaping Gorge, cooked good food and even gave us a leaving present (necklace and a banana!!). We spent a day getti...

Okay so here we are in.....hmmmm Shuhe?!?! (pronounced shoe-hey), and erm, not Lijiang! So we get up this morning, go for a casual breakfast in Dali and head back for our minibus to Lijiang, yup, all cool so far. We jump on and there are, just about, two seats left. I opt for the one at the front next to the three huge red sacks each weighing about 20 kilos and each packed to the seams with raw, bleeding meat.....MINGING! There was blood on the floor and every t...

Aaaah Dali, Dali, Dali, Dali......what a beautiful, different, quaint little town in the middle of nowhere. Imagine this: a fairly small walled off town, each side of the wall having a stunning ornate Chinese gate/pagoda in order to enter the 'Old Town'. We were based around the South Gate in a great hostel called Friends Guesthouse where we managed to get an empty 8 bed dorm for just the two of us for ¥20 (about £1.85) each. The weather is spectacular, sunny, ...