The closest thing to civilisation!The nearest city is Hongya. It's a 4hr, rather treacherous, bus ride away and is developing by the second. It's common opinion that this area of Sichuan has a very bright future and they're building frantically just in case this is true! New 'European Villa' complexes are popping up everywhere. The favourite form of transport is the 'sangla,' a type of ricksaw. You are surrounded by them the moment you...

Back to Chengdu

Flower Mountain

I'd visited Chengdu before. My clearest memories were of funeral shops and pollution. I optimistically thought there was probably much more to the city, particuarly as I was to spend the next 3 months of my life based there. However, my memory was not playing tricks on me. Chengdu has won the esteemed title of 'Worse City in China.'

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 &#...