As each week passes word comes of another self-emulation in Tibetan lands of China. Many are young monks, and more and more are women. The grief they must feel for the slow loss of their culture is unimaginable to me. In our tandem travels across Tibet, we saw the government’s attempts at subjugating the Tibetan culture by smothering their lands with emigrants from the Han majority:
Finally we waved and pushed off, our 26 inch prayer wheels spinning out thousands of goodwill messages up his mountain; but I think we might have missed the point. The farmer and his wife live Shangri-la, not just in it, but they are Shangri-la. They are poor, but well fed, and the circle of their days allows for a break when tired, a visit with passing strangers, the rhythm of weeding, or wall building when they feel like it, and the song of bird and stream as accompaniment to it all.
This is a re-post from about a year ago when we were still on the Tibetan Plateau. We re-post it here for those who might have missed the original. If you wish to read the complete posts of In Search of Shangri-la, click on the link under Adventures at left.
We’ve called this often grueling trip from Chengdu, the Back Road to Shangri-la. A few days ago, we entered the high gate to the garden of Shangri-la. We topped out above 15,000 feet each day, and often stayed there for hours.
We recently had a comment from Losang about my post on Litang. He he has lived in Tibet for eight years and knows all corners. If our posts gave you a taste of Tibet, Losang ‘s site offers a feast. I’ve linked to just his Litang post, but you can follow other links to the rest of his site.
There will be more mountains to come, and some will probably seem harder than this one. Zippy is making strange noises from the drive-train, and we fear we have put him under too much strain this time.
We are sometimes tired, but feeling stronger every day. We’ve reached that magical three-week point in a long challenging bicycle tour, when we are in the zone, when we feel pretty much ready for anything.
people think of the Tibetan people and the Tibetan Plateau as being only within the lines drawn by the Chinese government, the Tibetan Autonomous Region. Both the Plateau and the Tibetan people are spread over several other provinces. The government encourages Hans to move into Tibetan lands with various incentives, and by building new cities deep in formerly exclusive Tibetan lands. But the fingers of Himalayas we crossed to climb the Plateau, and the difficulty in building and maintaining roads, have kept this part of Tibetan land Tibetan.
When we awoke it was still raining, spattering the mud puddles of the courtyard with discouraging regularity. We couldn’t imagine another day of near hypothermia, and more hills and bad roads. But, we didn’t want to stay another day with the road workers, nice as they were, so we packed up our filthy gear and steeled ourselves for the day. By the time we were ready to go, the rain had stopped, and there was even a hint of blue over the first hill. The road workers were spot on with their description of the road ahead, a first on this trip.
We used Bob’s jacket printed with a map of the world on it to try to convey where we were from, where we’d been and where we planned to go. I have no idea if they’d ever seen a map before. It doesn’t really matter to them, their world is an isolated village along a road between two passes and 50 kilometers from the nearest town. It sounds romantic: going to sleep to the sounds of chanting and waking to the sounds of milking. But these women’s lives are a gritty existence that our culture hasn’t known for generations. Hauling wood, water, and food up the ladder to the living space, making butter and curds, grinding grain, hand washing clothes, keeping the fire going, cooking… Mundane, routine, weather-dependent, smoke-filled and layered with years of grime.
We were in the middle to nowhere for three days, climbed more passes than were supposed to be there, were never below about 14,000 feet and bad weather surprised us. The road to Shangri-la is always filled with life and surprise.
Follow the whole story over the next three posts.
we’re eating pork now, or any kind of protein for that matter, and we eat whatever vegetables they bring us. At the grocery stores, we study and poke the packages and hope they’ll sustain us through a night of camping. Yogurt and cookies (a whole roll) is a before bed tradition of carbohydrate loading. …push a pedal stroke for us, we’ll need it; tomorrow; (tonight for you) we climb 7,000 feet to well over 15,000 feet and hope to get down in elevation to find a camping spot low enough to allow for sleep, before dark.
Yesterday we rode Zippy to the highest elevation ever for us. We started at 8,500 feet in Kangding and topped Zheduo Pass at 13,900 feet in 35 kilometers, or 21.7 miles, all under construction/repair. For our Olympic Peninsula friends, that’s like taking the Hurricane Ridge Road, raising the sea level start to 3,000 feet above the Ridge, loading 80 pounds on your tandem before beginning. Oh, I forgot, put 1,000 people and hundreds of trucks and equipment on the now gravel/dirt/broken concrete road.
We are getting into Tibetan prefectures and seeing the dress and features of the minority population. After a 13,000 plus pass tomorrow, they will no longer be the minority. We are already seeing prayer flags flying, and old women turning prayer wheels as they walk, men dressed in huge leather cloaks with cowboy style hats and daggers. Everyone is friendly, and the air is finally clear!
We caught them 1,000 vertical meters later at the entrance to the summit tunnel to great exclamations of pleasure and another round of picture taking, with Zippy at the center. Lucky was busy flirting with one of the girls and got left out of the picture, again!
There were police and army personnel all over the place, protecting the tunnel no doubt, and we had to show our passports to be allowed through. We had heard horror stories about the tunnel, but found it reasonably well lit and smooth. As usual, when you worry, it is always unnecessary.
Life is measured best not by the number of breaths you take, but by the moments that take your breath away..
Bob and Claire Rogers have moved their Shangri-la, 2009 Asian Adventure blogs to a First to Last blog format. Relive their adventures from Tibetan China through Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia and Thailand.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eM_J55g0Ju4
Happy Christmas from Bangkok
Happy Christmas from Bangkok, from Bob and Claire and Lucky. P-bear, Lai Lai and Foster send their best wishes from Tucson.
We’ll celebrate by crossing the International Date Line on Christmas Day. Does that mean we get Christmas twice?
Happy Christmas
Claire and Bob Rogers
PS. See a video of us having a look-back at our Shangri-la journey from Bangkok, Christmas Eve day.
We were introduced to this plant in Australia in Queensland on out tandem tour there. Claire noticed it here in Laos.
His Shangri-la
His Shangri-la is Lao
We stopped in the middle of a four hour mountain climb south of Luang Prabang, for a cold drink and some shade. A man came out of the house next door, and I glanced his way. Nah. He looked farang (Western) but it couldn’t be, this far out of the city, in a tiny village. Something about the way he moved about the house, helped a small boy with his shoes, said he belonged here, lived here.
I saw the beard, the nose, yup, farang. He turned to us and said, “Hello.” We spoke, he in a vaguely European accent with excellent English. He said he was German, and had traveled by bicycle, for five years, around the world. We shared touring stories, favorite places, bicycles. He said we could never make the climb by the end of the day, and the worse one waiting after that. We hoped he was wrong.
I wanted to know how he ended up in Laos, and how long he had been there. I waited. It would come.
He began his story: He got food poisoning in Laos. After five years of bicycle touring around the world, he was stuck in Luang Prabang. Then he met her, and his life changed forever. They married, have two children, and he has been in Laos for seven years. He manages a pig farm for his father-in-law, and the family spends half the week in Luang Prabang, where their children can get an adequate education, and half on the farm.
I asked him if he would ever go back to Germany, take his family. He smiled, “Never.” He is Lao now, family man, farmer, happy, healthy. He found what many would call his Shangri-la. His is real. A beautiful wife, comfortable home, two much loved children. So, for some seekers, Shangri-la becomes more than fantasy, an ideal, but a day to day life, real.
He traveled alone those five years on his bicycle; we know just how many pedal strokes that is. He was searching for something, Shangri-la maybe. He entered Laos from Yunnan China, mythical location of mythical Shangri-la, as we did. He hadn’t found it there, lovely as it is. Food poisoning brought it to him, it brought him love and purpose.
Where he lives is beautiful, very, very beautiful. The people are poor, but they laugh at, and with, we crazy farangs pedaling through their lives. They bathe by the roadside at a cold water stand pipe, and instead of complaining, laugh. They expect little, and appreciate much. Perhaps our German friend, now Lao, saw that, and the light of his love’s eyes, and knew he was home, in Shangri-la.
We didn’t get his name, but he has this site and we hope he will e-mail us. We will publish his name and correct any miss-perceptions. We’d also like him to know we made it to Kiukacham, just before dark. It was our hardest day in Laos.
Christmas? Now in a Lao Shangri-la
This interesting thing about this is there were twice as many people before I took out the camera to video. Chinese do not like to be photographed as a part of a crowd, and yet they always like to be a part of a crowd. I wonder if it has to do with how much they are under surveillance, or think they are?
Thanks to everyone for the comments, especially after our unplanned detour to the hospital. It’s really nice to feel more connected to a community and we love hearing from you.
Zippy Joined Us
‘I complained because I had no shoes until I met a man who had no feet,’ comes to mind after one of our stays along the backroads of Shangrila. Remember the fun we had with the video detailing the trip across the road, down the stairs and over the bridge to the outhouse? This time we stayed at a “hotel” with no toilet–at all.
The Tibetan women we stayed with earlier were not in business, but this hotel was running an accommodation where the toilet was a five minute walk along the road to where the fence ended and the hillside dropped down through some trees for privacy. One really had to watch one’s step and keep eyes from wandering should another villager be occupying a nearby tree. Even open space here has a purpose. On the bright side, Zippy was able to stay with us for a change, rather than with a baby pig or in the meat locker.
The lone light bulb flickered and faltered in sync with whatever was going on in the family living area next door. We didn’t charge our computer or cameras that night!
Misty Morning in Shangri-la (Claire)
We took the recommendation of Bill Weir and Alice and Andoni, cyclists we’d met way back in Almaty in 2005, and took a back road rather than Highway 214 to Tiger Leaping Gorge. We had at least one climb each day, one day we had three climbs totaling about 18 kilometers. The road is now paved except for washouts and we had very light traffic and beautiful views. Villages along the way were full of hard-working but friendly people eager to say “Hello!”. Coming the backway into Tiger Leaping Gorge was more fun because we didn’t feel so much a part of the tourist hordes. The big rock slide blocked vehicle traffic so we had the gorge to ourselves for most of the morning.
Shangri-la Vista
Clothsline in Shangri-la
Plowing with Oxen
Fall Colors in the Mountains of Shangri-la
Nearing Another Pass With Moss Covered Trees
Travertine Pools of Bai Shui Tai
The main reason we went the longer, back way to Lijiang was that I (Claire) wanted to see the travertine terraces at Bai Shui Tai. Unlike at Havasupai, these terraces are perched on a hillside, rather than in a canyon.
Flower in Shangri-la
Dahlias grow everywhere.
Carved Headstones
Village in Shangri-la
The expansive valleys on this route were stunning; deep enough that we couldn’t see all the way to the bottom.
Mountains of Shangri-la
Chili Harvest
View from our $4.20 room
Lunch Time in a Shangri-la Field
All Dressed Up
Haba Snow Mountain
Tiger Leaping Gorge
After the rain in Tiger Leaping Gorge
Stupas in China
Another day, another two mountains. When we reached the Yangtze we thought we would be cruising down the river for a few days, but China 214 took a hard left into a narrow gorge where we found yesterday’s accommodations.
China’s mountains cloaked in mist and clouds
We began this morning in the rain. The mountain ahead – a 1,000 meter climb – looked grim, with tatters of gray rain hanging from charcoal clouds. Rain dripped from our parka hoods, spray from trucks and small streams crossing the road had wet us thoroughly. We settled in to listening to Zippy creak and grind in the wet and grit.
We stopped often for moon cakes and Tang, our primary power sources these days, and plodded on at the reasonable pace of 6 to 8kph (about 4 to 5mph) for a couple of hours. The road made a switchback that took us away from the rain and we slowly began to dry. An hour or so later, we topped out for a few kilometers of descent and began another 500m climb, with rain threatening the summit.
Claire:
Our day was made sunnier by the friendly Chinese tourists foisting food on us. At one point, we had to reject a girl who was on her third trip to give us fruit and moon cakes. We were already loaded down with walnuts from this morning.
Chinese Village
We also had a great exchange with some other bike tourists. David and Maria from Bilbao, Spain are going north. I felt bad that they seemed anxious about how high the climbs were and we couldn’t tell them anything encouraging; yes, there would be some very hard all-day climbs ahead. I know exactly how that feels, but during the climb it doesn’t seem so bad after all.
David gave us a map he would no longer need and I gave him my notes transcribed from Mark and Julie McLean’s great website: Mark-Ju.net. Julie’s detailed description through this last segment was spot on.
We are seeing some of the plants we all take for granted as garden plants here in the West, but originated here. It was Joseph Rock’s explorations in these mountains that began the garden boom in England, and subsequently the Western World. An English author read a story in National Geographic, and based his mythical Shangri-la on Joseph Rock’s cultural observations as an aside to his botanical work. So it is in quite a round-about way that the Shangri-la no-tell-motel on the seedy side of town is named “Shangri-la.”
Flower of Shangri-la, one-inch tall
Still Shangri-la?
Is this part of China still Shangri-la? For many of the people content to live the simple life of farm work and devotion to Buddhism, it still must be a peaceful existence. They watch the world pass and wonder at it, but have little desire to follow it to the cities. Of course, some of the young do follow China 214 to the city, and village life no doubt suffers for their loss. The outside world nibbles at the edges of their world, but so far makes seemingly minor inroads. We see a village high on the mountain as we pedal the China 214, and wonder at how they possibly can get up there, how they found a place to put a house – let alone a barn, and those terraced fields. A few hundred meters is a long way when the slope is 45 degrees.
Are they the healthy happy people who live long lives, as described in the novel? Their smiles indicate they are happy. As for their health, they must have strong hearts to navigate the near vertical hillsides all day – every day. Their sanitary systems are nonexistent, but they’ve probably adapted to some degree, and all consumed water is boiled.
Many of them live as my grandfather lived in West Virginia more than 100 years ago. He was still mowing hay by hand when he was 90 years old. He worked with horses, had no electricity, went to the outhouse, ate pork every day, and died peacefully at home at 93.
Shangri-la? Not for us, but considering the challenges of modern life, and that American’s life spans are decreasing for the first time ever, perhaps there are lessons to be learned.
Claire took a nice video of a man dragging logs with a team of oxen that reminded us that we were in a world not wholly made up of diesel belching trucks, wildly driven SUVs, and kilometer long lines of tourist cars.
The National Holiday
We are in the middle of one of two national holidays in China. All Chinese who can afford it, and there are many more than four years ago, want to drive their personal autos to some tourist hot spot. We are entering the area defined by the tourist industry as “Shangri-la,” and it is apparently a prime destination.
We’ve had our picture taken so many times by so many Han Chinese, with their huge Canons and Nikons, that I am considering declaring us an official minority and charging for our images. One time it was a huge tour bus filled with photographers, wearing camera vests and sporting lenses larger than both of our cameras put together.
It gives me a new perspective on photographing people. When I was a photojournalist I often just charged into a group and began knocking off frames at a furious pace, with no consideration of the feelings of the people. I don’t have to do that any more. Now I ask, or am so unobtrusive that I don’t disturb the flow of their lives.
Claire shoots from the back of the tandem, and that seems to disarm people. We also get a kick out of the Chinese amateur photographers, scrambling for the best angle, jabbering away, finally waving and giving a thumbs up; it’s all road entertainment for us.
Shangri-la, The City
After a short descent to a large lake which seems to be a major tourist attraction, judging from the traffic jams, we again rode in the rain into the city of Shangri-la. Claire was surprised at the size of the city, and despaired of finding the guest house we sought. We finally found it, paying eight times what we paid the previous night for the privilege of hearing our neighbors, and choking on their smoke that seeps through the walls. The extra price is for arriving during the national holiday; the Chinese also pay the higher fee.
So far it seems like any other medium sized city, except there are many more hotels (all full). There is a tourist “Old Town” that we must see while we are here.
Iris in Shangri-la, China
We’re off on a back road trip to Tiger Leaping Gorge. Claire says more mountains are ahead of us – and no doubt some spectacular scenery.
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You might wonder why we don’t find better accommodations? The next Bingwan was 84 kilometers, and 1500 meters up the road, a hard all day ride. Sometimes the basics seem awfully nice after a long hard day, with another one waiting.
October 3
Shangri-la is changing as we drop in elevation. The yaks are gone, replaced by mixed breed cows, sheep, goats and donkeys. The high meadows, empty of human habitation, other than seasonal tents, with sparkling air and clear water, have been replaced with terraced fields of crops, villages with substantial houses, roofs filled with drying corn and racks with hay. The people remain friendly and vocal as we pass, our unusual mode of transportation a novelty still.
But there is a change. The prayer flags, stupas and monasteries are fewer, the flags more likely to be tattered and faded, and the architecture increasingly Han and not Tibetan. There have been a few instances of architecture new to us, indicating we are entering an area of more diverse ethnicity. Groups of women walk in brightly decorated dresses and several varieties of head dress.
Today was a nearly perfect cycling day: the road was smooth, and mostly downhill, with just enough cooling upstream breeze. We had a few hills, but none were long. There were friendly people, cute donkeys and goats, spectacular gorge scenery, and all our official interactions at check stations were pleasant. I’m beginning to think we just got a couple of bad eggs, on edge because of the 60th anniversary of Communist China’s founding. The army was even guarding a bridge, complete with sand bagged bunkers, though they seemed relaxed, perhaps because the day, October 1, has come and gone without incident, as far as we know. Unescorted foreigners are still blocked from the Tibetan Autonomous Region, though that was supposed to be lifted this week.
October 2, Derong, Sichuan, China: A Thorn Tree Grows in Shangri-laBob:
We left Xiang Cheng, for another long day of climbing, our last over 4,000 meters. The road had a reasonable grade (we could maintain 7kph (about 4.5mph) and the surface was good bitumen. The views back down the valley to the monastery were spectacular and the few small farms blended organically into the vertical mountains.
Tibetan valley with houses
At one curve in the road, a woman looked up from weeding her small orchard, and let out with an extended soliloquy on our presence, accompanied by a large smile. Her husband, walking in the road, waved us down, and eagerly suggested, in pantomime, the we join him for a rest under a shade tree. He too beamed with joy at the possibility of enjoying our company. We had a difficult (more than we knew) day ahead of us, and I pointed at my wrist and shook my head in denial. He persisted, and we went back and forth, all with smiles.
Finally we waved and pushed off, our 26 inch prayer wheels spinning out thousands of goodwill messages up his mountain; but I think we might have missed the point. The farmer and his wife live Shangri-la, not just in it, but they are Shangri-la. They are poor, but well fed, and the circle of their days allows for a break when tired, a visit with passing strangers, the rhythm of weeding, or wall building when they feel like it, and the song of bird and stream as accompaniment to it all.
We, on the other hand, have brought our schedule laden philosophy with us. We are here to SEE Shangri-la, not be it or live it. We have conquered her mountains, seen those living Shangri-la, but have not made the truth-based myth our own. Oh, we have absorbed much more than those black SUVs that pass us by the scores each day, carrying Chinese to possess for a holiday, their most exotic locations. At least we have the memory in our legs and lungs of the place; we have the images of the genuine smiles from the minorities directed to us as somehow kindred spirits. But will we bring it home with us?
Farm in China along river
Now for that thorn tree: As you will read in Claire’s note, there are many police in Shangri-la. As we have descended the Himalayas, the number of police posts on the roads has grown with one about every 50 kilometers. As we came up the eastern side of the range’s fingers, there were few posts, and they always waved us past, usually with a smile. Here it is different. We are still in Tibetan minority area, and very close to the border with the Tibetan Autonomous Region, where we assume they are expecting trouble. We were not able to go into the TAR as independent travelers, only as part of an organized group with a minder/guide. About a week ago, even that privilege was revoked for foreigners.
Police post in China
To me it seems at least a few of the police on this side have taken a negative tone with laowai (foreigners). Not all by any means, most perform your passport check professionally and even smile. But, after a beautiful descent of our last 4,000 meter peak, we came to a village where we understood there was accommodation. At the police stop, in the center of the village, one young man strutted back and forth of Zippy, regaling the growing crowd of mostly Tibetans with his apparently negative opinion of us. He particularly seemed to dislike the Tibetan prayer flag we had attached to the handlebar bag, and indicated his disgust with a sneer and a dismissive flip of the flag. He also told us the accommodation was no longer available, and through a translator, that we get a family to put us up, an unlikely possibility after word spread about his dislike of us. The locals fear the police. They don’t seem to be there to solve crimes, but to watch over the non-Han population, and make sure they have little contact with foreigners.
Claire Rogers and Lucky in tent
Tent camouflaged with branches
Valley and river in China
Claire getting water from a seep in China
Tibetan couple
Monks on a motorcycle
At this point we knew we would have to guerilla camp, and bought two chicken legs at a store, and got some stir-fried egg and tomato, a huge bowl of rice, and all our water bottles filled with boiling water. While we were eating, an old Tibetan man fingering his beads, came over, touched our prayer flag, nodded his head and smiled. There is a split here and it revolved along religious/ethnic lines. Only one side wears uniforms. This could get us thrown out. Yesterday, I had to help a policeman go through all the pictures on the camera Claire uses to shoot from the back of Zippy. He was a pleasant young man, just doing his job, but to an American, it was difficult to endure. Few countries have a First Amendment. Treasure yours.
We left the village for a 12 kilometer climb to an uncertain camping spot. The mountain sides are so steep, below the Plateau, that we had to camp on a power line road, in full sight of the main road. We used a few limbs to break up the contour of the tent, made sure headlights wouldn’t hit us directly, and we don’t think we were seen. Claire had a couple of disturbing dreams, but we both slept well.
There were two more encounters with the police, including a mostly pleasant one here in Derong. We hope this eases us; even though we are getting accustomed to the delays, they are not the delays we would choose.
Stupa in far SW China
Tibetan women carrying stacks of hay
Fall colors in China
Looking back down a Chinese Valley
Woman filling sacks in SW China
The (renamed) town of Shangri-la (here it is pronounced Shan Ge Li La) is two days away. Stay tuned.
Claire:
We watched the National Day festivities on television last night. The hyperactive, color coordinated crowds rallied for the cameras and the massive, meticulously staged production was visible only to Party members with box seats and everyone in television-land. Our celebration of the day consisted of us wishing the police well on China Day, three different times. The roadside checkpoints only grew tiresome because our day wore on longer as we waited for our passports to be returned. One lone police man called us in to somewhere, browsed through the photos on one camera (he didn’t know about the other one), then after some tense effort to communicate, made it clear we were to check in at Derong, 40 kilometers down the road. At one checkpoint, the police seemed to laugh at us for interrupting their card game.
The festivities here in town consisted of ten minutes of fireworks a few meters in front of our hotel, but I think we were the only ones watching.
We’re enjoying the light traffic and rural roads of this steep mountain country, knowing that we’ll soon come back down to more densely populated areas. Here, the land is simply too vertical to support a large population and any relatively flat space is occupied or in use for growing food. The thin, clear air has been good for our lungs and the stiff climbs certainly good for our legs.
We’ve called this often grueling trip from Chengdu, the Back Road to Shangri-la. A few days ago, we entered the high gate to the garden of Shangri-la. We topped out above 15,000 feet each day, and often stayed there for hours. We meandered the Tibetan Plateau, in company with yaks and Tibetans, surrounded by a landscape stippled with stupas, prayer flags, tiny wildflowers and singing mountain streams. Meadows of jade steepened up to fresh snow covered peaks, at least some days backed by a cobalt sky and cotton clouds.
At least one day was miserable with rain and we cut our day short, rain soaked and freezing, at an unheated roadhouse infested with Mahjongg playing and yelling, day off revelers. But those are not the things we will remember. We will remember the smiling Tibetan greetings of “tashi dele” from every roadside yak camp or a passing motorcycle, laden with bags of grain, and sometimes the whole family.
We will remember the hours long climb each day, each switchback revealing new wonders of high meadows and lines of blinding peaks. Then we begin the long descent through rock walled paddocks, friendly villages, and herds of yaks and deep gorges of evergreens, autumn coloring trees and roaring streams.
Do the people here live to very old ages? Are they always healthy and happy as the Shangri-la myth tells? No, they are mortals, increasingly invaded by the outside world, nudged into ways foreign to their culture and religion. But from the smiles on their faces as we pass, an exceedingly strange apparition from afar, the hearty waves and open-faced surprise, I know they are a happy people. We were told by one man that they don’t even think about the weather, no matter how bad, and it can be very bad! That tells me the Buddhist philosophy is real and alive in their lives. We’re not there yet, especially when it comes to weather!
So Shangri-la is in some measure real, at least here in the high meadows. There is much more to discover, much more to come.
Tibetan plateau
Claire getting a hug
Lucky made it! I guess we can take credit for 16,000 ft. since we’re all on the same team.
We’ve been in the high meadows of the Tibetan Plateau, most days over 15,000 feet for hours; we have found the back garden gate of Shangri-la. Look for a longer post soon with lots of pictures.
Claire:
Poor Bob had to pedal by himself halfway to Sangdui because I was too busy kicking myself up the mountain. Can anyone tell me why one remembers something left behind only after you’re well beyond going back to retrieve it? My security blanket is gone, and it’s all my fault.
At the breakfast table, in the roadhouse where we spent the night, I left my packet of maps, phrases and our chopsticks. It was an envelope I clutched tightly anytime we were off the bike. Now, it was 30 kilometers back and 1000 feet down. We weren’t going back for it. So we’re without a good map until at least Shangri-la (Note: Bob was smart enough to photograph the road atlas pages, so we do have a backup). The phrases? I’ve mostly got down the basics enough to get us a room or a meal without my cheat sheets. And the chopsticks? Well, this is China.
Bob:
There will be more mountains to come, and some will probably seem harder than this one. Zippy is making strange noises from the drive-train, and we fear we have put him under too much strain this time.
We are sometimes tired, but feeling stronger every day. We’ve reached that magical three-week point in a long challenging bicycle tour, when we are in the zone, when we feel pretty much ready for anything.
The next post is one you won’t want to miss: we now know we have entered the high back garden gate of Shangri-la. The success was hard won, but all the more rewarding for the suffering.
It will be posted soon with lots of photos.
The Himalayan foothills are turning vertical and Zippy’s long wheelbase and weight is making it difficult to hold a straight line, especially when a bus screams at us with its ear splitting high pitched horn, and the captain reacts toward the 100 ft. drop off into the river! So far so good, and the old reflexes will soon come back. The first weeks are the hardest, and these mountains are really really hard. We might have kept these mountains for the end of the trip when we are fit, but then the passes are snowed in; there is a typhoon approaching the coast, and we might get it even now. Hope not.
We have taken a day off at 8.000 ft. to acclimatize, catch up on getting some protein in; you have no idea how hard it is to get good quality protein in the small villages, and our bodies are craving it. Last night we bought a can of some kind of strange fish with a very strong flavor, and some black beans mixed in; wonderful. We have boiled eggs for morning and a bunch of greasy (tasty) pastries for the climb.
We are getting into Tibetan prefectures and seeing the dress and features of the minority population. After a 13,000 plus pass tomorrow, they will no longer be the minority. We are already seeing prayer flags flying, and old women turning prayer wheels as they walk, men dressed in huge leather cloaks with cowboy style hats and daggers. Everyone is friendly, and the air is finally clear!
Here are a few photos from the last couple of days:
Lucky Studies His First Prayer Flags
Corn Husking Party
Market Day
Our Constant Companions
A Few Minutes We Were Pedaling Up That Switchback
View From Our Binguan
Buddhist Rock Paintings
Food
Picking Tea in Sichuan
We have been interested in the Horse Tea Route, Tea and Horse Route, and other translations, of an ancient trade route that rivals the Silk Road in importance for China and Asia. We first heard about it from a friend, Cindy, and wondered if our route would take us near the ancient route. It must have been a slow brutal traverse of the Himalayas, from what we endured, in the foothills today on the “modern” route.
Horse, Symbol of Ancient Tea Horse Route, and Tanker Truck, Symbol of the Modern Route
As we were leaving Ya An today, we saw some beautiful, larger than life, bronze statues of horses and men carrying heavy burdens. A sign nearby indicated that it was a memorial to the ancient route that took tea to SE Asia, India and Lhasa, in exchange for trade goods, and horses from Tibet. We are roughly following the southern route that was supposed to go to Yunnan (Shangri-la) and into present day Laos. We hope to find out more as we get deeper into the mountains. If we are lucky, maybe we will see a bit of the original.
For now, the modern route is challenge enough, with landslides, constant mud and water on the road, trucks, buses and all manner of smaller vehicles competing for a narrow deteriorating road surface, often with precipitous drops into a burnt sienna river raging with rapids. The captain’s shoulders are tired and the stoker’s nerves are frazzled.
So many things go on during our days of pedaling that we thought it would be good to post a video of what we see in an average day so far. This is combined from three days, with lots left out!
httpv://youtu.be/b1s03widPPo
Goat on the way to market.
Lucky says he is not ready to comment on this bicycle touring thing, or China. His white is turning gray like us, and everything else here, and the rough roads are taking a toll. He’ll reserve comment until the mountains, soon. I hope the beauty of the high country wins him over, and ends his silence. Claire and I have done this a few times, but it’s all new to Lucky.
The locals in Ya’an make steep uphill signs, raise their eyebrows and exclaim when we tell them where we are going. One man, in elaborate pantomime, told me we should take a bus.
It’s all a bit unnerving, especially the idea of the four kilometer tunnel somewhere ahead, and the rain last night didn’t help. Ah the pleasures of the unknown. It always works out, somehow.
Bob:
September 8, 2009
Day One: Left Chengdu to parts unknown. Encountered difficulty: finding the right post office, getting our bank card to work, finding our way out of town. Visited a nice big plaza and took pix of Chairman Mao statue. Traffic eased as we got out of town, but were almost hit by a car coming onto the street from a side street. We both stopped in time. Then it got really, really hot and the humidity was killing me. We stopped twice and I chugged sodas; the sugar and caffeine kept me going for another half hour each time. Finally found a binguan after asking at least five times. Air conditioning! But nothing else works very well. Finally got hot water after dinner which was an epic. All we could find were streets filled with hot pot restaurants and they couldn’t really accommodate us for under 100yuan, and a lot of confusion. We weren’t that hungry.
Near a street market, we stopped for a meal of baozi, and met a nice family group and a regular customer. Lots of language issues, but lots of fun communication and laughter. The regular customer bought our dinner! We presented the family with business cards. Stopped for pastries to eat on the way back to the binguan. One was filled with sweetened squash! Wonderful.
September 9
Day Two: Went back to the same place for breakfast: two tea eggs, three jiaozi, two bowls of rice soup, and pickled vegetables: 5y or 70 cents for a great breakfast for two. Claire was made happy the one person who didn’t get a business card last night, and they all got to wonder at Zippy!
On the way out of town, one missed turn cost us about 3k, not too bad for getting out of a medium sized city.
We stopped at 39K. The heat/humidity index has to be over 100 because we are exhausted early; we have four months (or more) ahead of us, and some 12-15,000-foot mountain passes not many days away, so we need to ease into this thing! We should be getting into some cooler temperatures soon; today our closed plastic bags collapsed some, so we gained some elevation, but it’s still hot and humid, though the pollution is easing.
We would have done another 20 k, but are pretty sure the next binguan is 78k more. We’ll save that for tomorrow. We averaged less than 20k/hr even though there was much less stopping for traffic obstructions than yesterday. Today was riding near the edge of a 2m concrete drop/off into trees or an irrigation (empty) ditch. My shoulders and back are tired wrestling a fully loaded long wheelbase tandem. I’ll work into it.
I packed extra hex wrenches because I wasn’t sure I had all the sizes necessary to fit every hex bolt on the bike. Turns out I had, and I had probably 200g of excess baggage. We looked for a bike mechanic all morning and found one fixing an old bike for a waiting woman. I offered them to him, “I don’t want, do you want?” in Chinese (Wo bu yao, ni yao, ma). Claire knew how to say that! She keeps amazing me, and I keep using pantomime. At first he asked me how much I wanted, “Duo shao qian” (more money, less money literally). I told him I didn’t want any money, “Wo bu yao.” He looked a little confused at first, then happy. Those tools would have cost him quite a few bicycle repairs.
That little interchange, like many others we have on these trips, helps remind us how fortunate we were to have been born in a wealthy country. A small gift, like the reading glasses I gave the Uyghur man in far western China, or those hex wrenches, makes us realize how much we take for granted the little things that most people lack.
Claire:
Today, it only took asking once for a binguan – it was right across the intersection. Bob impressed the whole front office of the hotel when a woman dropped her scooter coming down off some steps and he was able to fix something that broke. I could tell they were also in awe as he muscled the fully loaded Zippy up the same steps.
I’m learning that, in this language, context is everything. So many syllables sound so similar, (and with four tones, my chances of getting the pronunciation wrong is 4:1) that mumbling single words doesn‘t seem to work. If instead, I can prattle off a full line of words, people seem to get the gist. I’m also trying to memorize just the sounds of the last few syllables of the questions people might be asking us. Otherwise, I just get a deer-in-the-headlights look on my face.
Saw three dead pigs today – two in the river and one in the irrigation ditch. I didn’t think pigs had the chance to die a natural death here.
Bob: After five days of building up Zippy, visiting pandas, exploring Chengdu, we are leaving. Claire has been organizing route maps from the China road atlas Peter Snow – Cao bikechina.com gave us. Peter has China bicycle touring company, but he bought us tea at a lovely tea house along the river, and shared information about our route. If you want to travel China with a guide, Peter is the man to contact.
We have enjoyed everything about Chengdu, except the poor air quality. Buildings across a single street have a blue/gray tint from the air. We will be glad to begin climbing the mountains, even if the stories we have been told about altitude sickness, harrowing long days for cyclists. There won’t be much air, but it will be clean at least! It will take us a couple of days to get across the valley and above the pollution basin. Then we will be in the mountains 10-15,000 feet for two or three weeks. We have already decided that we will need to extend our visas for China to leave time for altitude acclimatization and the usual, everything-takes-twice-as-long-in-China.
Lunch: Jiaozi, chilli sauce and spiced vinegar, with cold pejo (my spelling of how to pronounce beer).
Claire: I’m trying to eat more adventurously on this trip and so far, the spicy Sichuan food is very tolerable. Good thing Bob has had me in training for the last few weeks. (I’m beginning to absorb just how Sichuan food burns twice.) Tonight, we had mapo doufu, a regional tofu dish that is very spicy. We also actually did get green beans this time: wonderful crispy fried and salty. I’m sure our restaurant hosts thought we were out of our gourd for not wanting rice, but it was already more than we could eat and we hate wasting food, after all, there are starving children in America.
Those of you who know us and how we try to eat so healthy at home should know that our anti-inflammatory diet stayed stateside. We’re back on the see-food diet: we see food, we eat it.
I should mention here that Sim’s Cozy Guesthouse is very warm and hospitable. We got to meet Sim finally tonight and he was able to give us some good information, being a cycle tourist himself. He even gave Bob some Chinese herbal medicine for a rumbling gut. The amenities are great here and we fully appreciate that this may be the only place we’ll stay in that has in-room Wi-Fi.
Lucky: Leaving finally! I’m ready to rock and roll!
Claire says please disregard any swear words from the stoker. Bob says, with the right attitude, you can make anything fun.
Bob: We’ve arrived in Chengdu, China.
Despite jet lag we got Zippy put together with a couple of problems that were solved with a little patience and some muscle. Lucky was particularly helpful, supervising and giving encouragement. We went riding around town today, and it is crazier than Beijing, more like Baku, Azerbaijan. We attract quite a bit of attention on the tandem, something they appear to have never seen.
We were starving on arrival and went wandering for food around our backpacker hotel, which serves mainly Western food to the less adventurous youth. We saw a hutong (alley) and it reminded us that the best food we found in Beijing was in hutongs. We saw an inviting pile of vegetables and were drawn by a cute girl working the street in front of her family’s three table fandian. We pointed at some noodles and green beans. They brought us paper cups of boiling water, for sterilization, and I ordered a beer for us. Both no name dishes were wonderfully spiced (dried juniper berries in the green bean dish) and the heavily hopped Chinese beer was just as good, and cold, as I remembered it. Total cost for dinner and beer, $2.19
From Claire: I’m hoping our taxi ride from the airport was the most adventure we’ll have on this trip. Sure, Bob was having fun in the front seat–he had a seat belt. Zippy and I clung together for dear life in the back seat of the van. For the driver to have hit a bicyclist on our way from the airport would have been very bad karma all around.
It is odd how the very distinct smells (all except one) are somehow comforting because now they’re familiar from our first trip. Mostly food, but also some incense and lots of other unknowns. And my ears perk up to the language, trying to pick out recognizable words. Already, I’ve found there is an accent to deal with, so that’s why, once again I’m not picking up much of what people are saying. I feel a lot more relaxed this time, we got a good night’s sleep last night and Zippy is back in one piece.
Bob: While Claire was in a grocery today, reacquainting herself with the joys of shopping when none of the packaging is readable, I stayed with Zippy and had a conversation with a Chinese man. He was middle aged, a bit soft looking, in white t-shirt, black shorts, black socks and black shoes. He asked for a light for his cigarette. I think he was testing me, because he immediately produced a lighter when I indicated I didn’t smoke. Odd to shrug my shoulders in apology for not smoking! Then he asked my age. I knew because it happened so often on our Silk Road Crossing in China. We each drew out our ages on a bench, and used finger counting. He was 53, and showed shock that I am 65. Then he wanted to see how hard my legs are, a reaction to Zippy as usual, and even went so far as to make me flex my arms for him, and he slowly traced my large veins down my biceps and forearm. I suspect he doesn’t have such good circulation. He complained about the pollution (bad) in Chengdu, between deep draws on his cigarette. He was just curious about me, and not shy about it; Chinese seem to be so shy that they pretend not to see you, or get very personal. All this was sign language, helped along by Claire when she arrived.
Then we had an exciting ride back to the bingwan. Now it’s time for dinner. What unknown dish will we have tonight? I’m ready for that cold pejo!
Zippy shrink wrapped and ready for China. The wheels are in two other boxes, along with tools and sharp objects, a third bag will carry tent and sleeping bag for the high mountains. We’ll carry cameras and the computer in …
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The British author James Hilton published a small novel in 1933. He was no doubt shocked at the widespread repute the location of his fictional sacred Utopian kingdom would achieve, and the misuse that would subsequently occur. spaceman slot
Las Vegas to Shanghai, luxury hotels, and the no-tell motel in the seedy underbelly of thousands of towns, have expropriated his fiction. Shangri-la is the idea of a magical place where people live long happy lives in perfect bliss. All of these places, even the most plush, fall short of the dream.
Whole countries have laid claim to the title, and all but one are fabrications. James Hilton’s Shangri-La is not in Bhutan, Nepal, or Myanmar, but in China; in Yunnan province of the Tibetan cultural region of the eastern most ranges of the Himalayas. Here the great rivers of Southeast Asia begin with trickles, explode into violent torrent, gather into the mighty forces of nature to embrace one of the most dense populations on Earth, and to eventually braid out across huge fertile deltas from Shanghai to Myanmar. judi bola
Misty Morning in Shangri-la (Claire)
Amazingly, Hilton was not a traveler. He got his inspiration from the National Geographic which published the explorations of the botanist, philologist, Joseph F. Rock, who spent years in northern Yunnan. The collection of plants was Rock’s primary mission, but he also documented the local Tibetan cultures. Rock’s plant collections are said to have sparked the, now ubiquitous, exotic garden craze in the United Kingdom and beyond. Hilton grazed from this material the fictional beautiful and perfect place. slot deposit qris
Shangri-la, and surrounding mountains, hold most of the minorities of China, and are one of the last holdouts from complete domination by the Han majority.
The unique southerly curve of the Himalayan range at the east end, allows the valleys to funnel warm wet monsoon clouds to extremely high elevations. This makes for a fecundity of plant and animal life found nowhere else in the great stretch of the Himalayan range all the way to Central Asia.
Claire and I crossed the Tien Shan mountains of far western China on our Silk Road Crossing. They are the western ending of the Himalayan range in Central Asia. This trip we hope to cross the far eastern part of the Himalayan range, in our search for the real Shagri-la.
What will we find? Well, as with the Silk Road, fantasy and reality are not the same, but in Asia, reality is always fascinating and alive, always challenging and rewarding. bonus new member
From Yunnan we plan to ride into Laos, then Vietnam, where Claire was born, Cambodia and end our journey in Thailand, after about four months.
We hope you will come along with us, here on our New Bohemians site as we begin in Chengdu, Sichuan, where the great earthquake devastated the region and killed thousands. From what we know of will and energy of the Chinese, the people are recovering. We hope so. We’ll visit some pandas of course, along with our Lucky, and then attempt the mountains, monsoon snows, and vagaries of Chinese Communist bureaucracy allowing us to make the trip. Wish us well and then bookmark and follow us on our unusual, and no doubt enlightening, quest documented on this site.
We leave September 1 for Chengdu, Sichuan, China to begin a tandem bicycle tour of SW China and SE Asia. We begin in Chengdu, Sichuan, where the earthquakes killed thousands last year. We will visit some pandas and probably visit our first important Buddha statue before heading into high country where the Himalayas transition from the Tibetan plateau, giving birth to all the great rivers of SE Asia. After a long crossing into Yunnan, we will drop into the sub tropics of Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia and end probably in Bangkok, one of our favorite cities.
Bob and Claire told me my life with them would be adventurous. The next day they began to show me how to ride a bicycle. Something about China and bicycles seems to go get them all excited, and it looks like I might be a part of what they have planned.
