The bus from Yuanyang was another interesting one, we prayed for a coach rather than the previous bumpy minibus and our prayer was answered. After ten minutes of bumping and hurtling down the steep mountainous roads at about 100mph we realised we may have been better seeing what happened without praying! Two girls were sick on the bus (a first from our backpacking experiences unless due to hangovers) one girl was sat next to me so I had seven hours of heated puke infiltrating my nostrils for the journey....nice! We stopped off at a roadside eatery and grabbed a fried chicken leg, sausage and fried potatoe slices dipped in chilli which was pretty good. We arrived pretty knackered and on the outskirts of Kunming so decided to get ripped off for another taxi to Hump Hostel off the main square. It's another goodie, there is a massive terrace overlooking the beautiful square and huge common areas, the dorms have wooden staircases to get to the top bunks which we've never seen before, well cool! We're in a ten bed dorm which is £3 per person but last night was booked out so we had to get a private for £13, it was gorgeous though! Still feeling crappy yesterday evening so we ate in the hostel, fairly average.

The next morning we checked out of our private and into a dorm before breakfast then headed out into the glorious sunshine! We wandered round the square taking some pictures of the beautifully ornate old Chinese archways planted slap bang in the middle of the square. We wandered along to see the East and West pagoda's, East was covered in scaffolding so we headed straight to the West, you used to be able to enter it but not any more unfortunately but it looked fantasic, especially as it's surrounded by brand new sky scrapers. The main roads are great, well the pedestrian versions anyway, they are wide tree lined boulevards with fairy lights and red Chinese lanterns hanging from them. We took a peek in the Yunnan Provincial Museum for an hour or so and learned about the ancient empire that preceeded Yunnan that was called Dian and looked at the various bronze artefacts that have been excavated dating as far back as 400BC. The next stop was Flower and Bird Market street, we didn't find any flowers or birds but there was plenty of random junk for sale, some cool jewellery and trinkets, bags of tea and coffee etc etc. We bought a bag of Chinese cherries from an old street vendor who carried two baskets balanced on a long pole over his shoulders. They were gorgeous, the size of raisins and a mix of sweet and sour but cherry like all the same. We followed the main road round to Green Lake Park which had the stereotypical but very fascinating and entertaining Chinese scene, one elderly man flying an old fashioned kite that was hundreds of metres away from him, a tiny dot up in the sky, a group of four ladies doing some wierd dance and various couples playing the old Chinese game of Mahjong. Another short walk and we reached the Yuantong Temple, another spectacular sight, it was so calming despite being able to see office blocks in the distance. There we loads of people praying and a group of people singing old Chinese songs which added to the armostphere. Around the main section we saw a minature terrapin sooooo cute and so tiny. After an hour we reached the Tian Fu Famous Tea shop and tried some green and some oulong tea and some green tea biscuits mmmmmmm! We then gandered back to the hostel, grabbed a beer an sat on the terrace (conveniently west facing) and watched a stunning sunset.

That evening we went to the much talked about Brothers Jiang restaurant for some famous 'Across-the-Bridge-Noodles' we were given a bowl of white noodles, a plate with pork, chicken, veg, an egg and other random things and a HUGE bowl of steaming soup, you throw all the raw bits in, mix in chilli and vinegar an wait for it to cook.....it was absolutely disgusting, one of the worst things we've eaten EVER. The smell from outside almost put us off going in but we persevered, the soup smelt of pig poo and tasted the same yuck! Dissapointed to say the least, oh well it was only £1 a bowl.

The next morning we went to a place called 'The Loft' which is a Scandinavian art gallery/cafe, we had Swedish meatballs for breakfast, as you do, and checked out the art. The plan after brekky was to head out to Bamboo Temple, 3 buses out of town, however we caught the first bus in the wrong direction to the end of the line and by the time we got back into town we couldn't be bothered to start again, call us lazy if you will. The sunny terrace drew us back to the hostel for sunbathing and reading time. Wish work was like that, can't be bothered? Don't go, simples! Anyway we knew we'd have a full on day with the Stone Forest.

First 'almost' disaster of the trip the other day too, we went to the bank to withdraw a weeks worth of cash, then went fruit and bakery shopping. Returning to the hostel we munched all our snacks then Adds realised s***, we left the bank card in the machine!!! He ran back and I followed with his passport, luckily the machine had swallowed it and after a short process we managed to get it back. Luckily we'd used an ATM in the bank and not one on the street as normal!! Duh!!

We were up pretty early for the Stone Forest, it took us 3 local buses instead of 2 (as we went to far on one) and then a 1.5 hour coach to Shilin. It was a perfect day, blue skies and bright sunshine. We paid the extortionate entrance fees (£35 for two of us) and followed the crowds. Once inside we stood and looked around us, it was packed, and I mean PACKED with Asian tourists. There were queues to take pictures, queues to get through passageways. It was pretty awful. We walked past screaming groups and shouting children then found a little pathway that seemed quieter, we followed the small paths around for about ten minutes. Turns out the tourists either stayed at the beginning or hired a golf buggy to drive round the perimeter of the forest. Yay for us, only 1km in and.......silence! We wandered as far as possible in 3.5 hours and then returned to the entrance due to heat exhaustion and dehydration from being in 28 degree heat for so long. Anyway, the Stone Forest, it's really cool. It's a geologists dream, covering a few hectares of land, the forest is a labrynth made up of millions of grey limestone pillars that have split and eroded from rain and wind, some reach up to 40m in height. There are signs round the paths leading you to 'Man Waiting for Wife', 'Leaning Elephant', 'Sword Stone Pond' etc etc but they still just looked like rocks to me so we opted to walk and see what we found for ourselves. This was a much better idea as we found tiny little pathways leading up and down tiny passageways (Adds got stuck), into caverns and crevices and we made our own shapes and references in the rocks, mainly rude shapes as we are very childish. We also discussed at length, not for the first time, what we would bring for a picnic if we could pick ten items.....yes, losers we are but craving Western food more and more every day. We found a coach going to Kunming and hopped on and were home by 7.30pm, not a ba day. One of the Chinese receptionists from the hostel took us out for tea to a favourite local of hers where we had, two portions of Chow Mein with three BBQ'd side orders of beef and chillies, chicken and green beans, and a litre of beer.....£2.50! Excellent!

It's now Monday and we had an early get up again to get an hour long local bus to the bus station where we caught a five hour bus to our next destination....Dali, aaah can't wait.

Bye for now, the two grubby travellers. We really do stink, we're well overdue a laundry session!!!!!!!

PS Happy Birthday little bro for Sunday, if you're reading this that is?!?! Ha ha xxxxx

Love you all

Xxxxxxxxxxx