Freshened up with baby wipes and a quick wash in the outside basin of the old mans garage/house complex we headed next door to the bus station... By 7am we were on the raggedy bus with yogurt drinks and water. Today the bus journey was heading further north up the Nu Jiang valley.. The scenery is just awe-inspiring.. Its a narrow road hugging the edge of huge mountains with the raging river beside you.. Waterfalls of all sizes connect the river... Brilliant blue water from high up in the hills connects violently with the murkey browness of the Nu Jiang river... In the distance behind the first row of mountains, when the clouds clear, a small sneaky opening emerges allowing you to marvel at the towering jagged peaks behind. Ive never seen anything like this before...

China is eating into it's countryside... Small quiet towns are being monopolized and mountains blasted to make way for super highways... I feel as though we have made it just in time. This stretch of river is not going to be around for very long. They are already trying to pass the construction of 4 hydro electric plants and dams in this part.

Stopping in a busting little town of Fugong for noodles, the dish of Yunnan. "Whao cher su" - vegetarian please :) it's a fettuccini like pasta in a clear broth. On top goes pickled ginger, pickled greens and a little potato. Soy sauce and ABC sauce can be added as well as chili and salt. Pretty damn good. Five minutes to scoff the noodles down, pee in a revolting toilet and just enough time for everyone on the bus to hock up a wad of flem and together form a small river in the ISLE OF THE BUS.

More and more gorgeous scenery pass by and after a few hours we are stopped behind a queue of cars. The engin turns off, the doors open and I can sense everyone taking a deep breath in order to calm themselves to relax. Unsure of the hold up we leave the bus and walk beyond the red and white traffic pole to investigate. Just beyond the bustling village becomes a quite, peaceful road dotted with random wooden shanty houses with new born puppies playing on the roadside next to a gaggle of ducks leading there ducklings astray. Chinese grannies with their brightly coloured traditional clothing stare at our tall stature and odd noses :) A gap appears between the shrubbery and the shanty houses and we find ourselves marveling at the river and the sheer brillance of the surroundings. Sitting there on the edge of the cliff clicking away with the camera... It's one of those silent marvels just sitting and gazing and natures astonishing beauty... Moving onwards down the road we discover the cause of the hold up; A massive landslide combined with dodgy roadworks...

Back to the bus to find out more info on the hold up we find no one actually knows anything (well no one speaks english for starters!), however the idle line of car owners had made themselves comfortable with speakers blaring, staring out their wound down windows at the only 2 foreigners around or simply snoring loudly stretched out, seat back with feet crossed on the stearing wheel... It was evident we could be here a while.

Time to find a toilet... f*** me china you have big shiny buildings in the remotest of places yet your sewerage system in seriously screwed. Braving the stench of the toilet buildings from 100m back, we tiger balmed our top lip in preparation to enter.. Words cannot describe the sheer filth of that place nor will I try to explain it... but please trust me that it was bad. Ive been living in Asia a while now and this was the worst! It was that bad that we evactuated the literal s*** hole to walk around the back of building to the farm of pigs and hens and all their faeses to release ourselves.

Back on the roadside nibbling on sunflower seeds we are soon fed up of the unfriendly, curious stares of the locals and the unrelenting transvestite stalker who keeps harassing us for 1 yuan. We opted to hibernate back on our bus and watch the L-word until the time comes when we hear horns blazing and bus drivers frantically searching for their passengers, pulling them roaring drunk from the local bars. The queue slowly easing we are moving again!!! Nothing like a 5hour standstill to remind us of the importance of patience whilst travelling.

We arrive in gongshan around 8pm (13 hours on the road so far!), stop for a pee, drop passengers off and pick up new ones. 2 being a couple of serious looking road bikers! These 2 tall dudes bounded with long legs onto our bus, pin pointed the only 2 white people, plonked down between us and boomed every travellers favourite answers without a single word but "hello" from us.

Memories: spoken in an mid west American accent "I love LIOoo KUuu.." "oh it's AWESOME yeah!!! Bingzhongluo is my favourite place in CHINa. Oh yeah.. It's soo Awesome haha!"

Oi chill out boys.. Sheeeeesh! By 10pm (13hours travel!) we arrived in Bingzhongluo seeing the famous first bend of the "Nu jiang river" (insert mid west accent!) 3 times, not paying the 100 yuan entrance fee and not escaping the irrating dad and son! Hotel check in was easy scoring us and the lads a 100yuan discount (we are getting good at this bargaining shenanigans!) and went out to find food. Although arriving at night The feeling from Bingzhongluo was just what we have been seeking. Small, cute, relaxed and a little chilly! Excitement and energy flowed through us irrelevant of the immense day of travel. We couldnt wait to explore this place During the day.

Hungry as ever we spot a cute BBQ man with kebabs of all sorts. Tofu and thinly sliced potato was our choice and with a 80cent beer we settled in on a low plastic table and chair and munched on the incredible food. Spicy but firm tofu and spicy soft potato. Yum! Just what the doctor ordered!

With 4 sticks of tofu in our bellies it was bed time. Bu jiang hotel bed were mega comfortable. Hot shower, clean sheets, a kettle and a water dispenser! Perfect!

Waking up feeling fresh we pull the curtains of or hostel to find clouds at eye level skirting the base of enormous green moutain peaks. Below rice terraces train off into the valley below. Crispt air inspired us to don the converse and get outta there to find a 'pointy place' for tomato and eggs with rice for breakfast at less than $1.50aud each and start exploring the town.

Full up from a great meal we walked along the one road heading outside the town. Less than 10mins walk we made it to the 'actual' first bend of the nu jiang river! Now this is the spot where the photo was taken which had been shown to us by a Chinese girl in Tengchong. This one photo had made us change our route and take a weeks detour... Haha. So as you can imagine our expectations were pretty high.. Well you will be happy to know it was pretty spectacular. A huge kink in the river which bends back on itself nearly forming an island. An ancient bridge connects the head on the bend to the other side of the river allowing access for the local villagers to come and go as they please from their quaint village upon the sloping hills of the bend.

After many snaps we walked on heading in the direction of gongshan... Wondering along the paved road gazing out towards the limestone cliffs, waterfalls and mountains, time passed and the mileage signs on the roadside crept up and before we knew it our water bottles were empty and 14km had passed. Turning back it seemed pointless to walk a path already travelled, so with hands out we slowed down a blue noisy diesel truck and hitched our way back! Back in bingzhongluo, walking back to our hostel we looked up to discover SNOW coverered PEAKS!! The clouds had cleared during the late afternoon and allowed the glistening white snow to shine through! Ahhhh!!! Our first sight of snow! Whoop whoop!

NW: we later found out that these snowy peaks were over 5000m high! Oh and bingzhongluo sits at 1800m..

In the evening we visited Alou's guesthouse (the Tibetan guide mentioned in LP and all over the net). We enquired about trekking to deqin from here... He spoke little English but we managed to find out that a trip was leaving in 2 days and there was Owen this Welsh dude going on the trip already. Owen spoke pretty good Chinese and helped us out with prices and other questions we had! It was something becks and I really wanted to do... And the price was great... For 3 days trek, 3 nights accom, food for 3.5 days, guides and a porter for one bag, it worked out to be 1150 yuan between us... Just under $100aud each!!! Book us in PaaLeeaseee!

Up early the following day, a hardy breakfast from a 'pointer', it was down to peter's shop to hire some moutain bikes, grab a map and get off the beaten track (not that we were not already!)... Winding down the road with fresh morning air in our faces, the rice terraces surrounding us zip by and soon we are along the edge of the river. Our plan today was to cycle the 27km to the Tibet border!

We were Actually on the 'road to Tibet'!!! What a feeling! The scenery was once again stunning, the villagers were one again cute and soon enough the smooth road turned into bumpy, rocky gravel! Its a tough ride! Hills galore ready to burn your quads, flooded bits of road to test your bike skills and 2 road blocks to test your commitment! The ever increasing serenity of the 'road to Tibet egged us on and on. Our commitment was unfaltering (well maybe a little shaky at points when the legs would not get you up the hills!). We carried our bikes over the first road block - a landslide and continued on until the next road block - road works, where the men were working below a ginormous waterfall. Climbing over, leaving our bikes behind we set out on foot... Just over 3km later we had made it!!! The only knowledge we had made it was a sign with the English script "foreigners forbid"!! Of course we did step on tibetian soil!! Becks even took a sneaky rock just to solidify the fact we actually WENT to TIBET! Unreal!

NW: bloody tough day. We heard off a few people that they stayed a night in a small guesthouse up near the border.. It's a big day! We are pretty fit girls and we found it tough.. Eat a big breakfast!

Knackered we arrive back to our hostel but not before a huge feast of fried eggs, sliced potato, greens and rice!!!

What a day! Brilliant!!!!

Tomorrow we leave for Dimaluo a small town only accessible via foot 8km from the red bridge (20km by bus from bingzhongluo)..

Adventures begin!!