Hua shan is one of the things you have to do in Xi'an. The city's most famous and spectacular scenery. Unfortunately it involves an almost deadly climb. When The Lonely Planet describes something as 'fairly strenuous' and 'bottleneck sections can be dangerous,' one does become slightly dubious as to whether or not it's a good idea to confront the 6km climb and reach the 2160m high peak! However, it was only a matter of time until as 'Overseas Leader' I would have to give it a go! My chance came when a rather unbearable photographer man was sent to visit and take photos by i-to-i. He evidently thought photos of the current i-to-i group climbing one of the world's most impressive mountains would make much more impressive photos than the usual i-to-i volunteer activities of watching DVDs or gulping beer at Music Man!

I kindly volunteered to bring up the rear! I really hoped somebody would give up and need to be taken back to base. With a group of around 20, including a 70yr old man, I thought the chances were quite good. However, everybody made it. An amazing group achievement and I'm sure the immense feeling of achievement will stay with all of us forever. True to its reputation, the climb was ridiculously treacherous and life threatening. We did however take a very clever approach - we did it all at night and in the dark!! I'm sure if I could've seen the sheer drops I was climbing I would never have continued, but when you can only see the next few steps infront illuminated by torchlight, it becomes strangely hypnotic to keep going, on and on and on! Luckily, my legs seemed to magically click into gear and are still attached! Plus the heat is much more bearable at night. As all mountains in China, the route to the peak was a never-ending staircase and of course there was a steady stream of fellow climbers wearing high heels and dresses so that they could look nice in their photos! We made the excursion all the merrier for them with our inexhaustive reperatoire of mountain songs! We did have to pull ourselves up at some points where the path disappeared but again in the dark, we couldn't really recognise the real risk of plummeting to our deaths!

The main reason we chose to do the climb at night was to see the sunrise. Unfortunately, when we triumphantly reached the top and amazingly re-grouped, there was no sunrise in sight, completely hidden by dense clouds. However, at that stage, the sight of familiar faces, our goal, and a bottle of whisky appeared much more magical than any sunrise could ever be!

The descent was much more scary! Simply, because this time we could see where we were walking! Thank goodness the cable cars were working!!