Ya’an was one of the first rural cities we stayed in after leaving Chengdu on our tandem to ride across Tibetan Sichuan. Luchan, a harder hit town is just to the north. The cities on a fertile rising plain that soon gives way to steep foothills leading to the Tibetan Plateau.

It is was an important supply point on the Tea and Horse Route, just before the brutal climbs into Tibet.

Tea fields on the Tea and Horse Road near Ya’an

The news is spotty, but it doesn’t look as if the quake is as bad as the large quake a year before we left. It is along the same quake fault line as the quake that killed 90,000 five years ago.

To learn how to travel the Tea and Horse Road, go to our In Search of Shangri-La: https://newbohemians.net/our-adventures/in-search-of-shangri-la