Tiger Leaping Gorge

14 June 2014 –

Here I am – reeeeeaching waaaaaaaaaaay back to June for the next several blog posts and photos. And even after all this time I STILL haven't managed to get my photos all in order. However, in the interest of ATTEMPTING to get everyone caught up on our magical summer vacation I'll go ahead and post the photos in whatever order I can conjure up! LOL!

So… let's step back to June 14th, ok? The lovely Stader family was here visiting us and we'd flown to Lijiang for the weekend on Friday. Lijiang being a beautiful city in southern China with an exceptionally charming old town. (The old town looks exactly as how I'd envisioned China looking like before we actually moved to China).

We took a chance and booked a guided hiking three-hour with a Chinese guide for Saturday….here's hoping the rain holds out for us just a little bit longer!

The lady at the hotel took us to the meeting up point for the tour – it looks like it could rain on us today. It's drizzling as we walk to the pick-up spot.

Oh boy. When the lady booked our tour she wasn't kidding when she said this tour was going to be in Chinese. It's a several hour drive out to the gorge and the tour guide is on a bizarre reverberating speaker which loudly broadcasts his droning words all over the tiny tour bus. Really??? It that really necessary??? Can't we just sit in peace and quiet and watch the world go by without all the noise?

Check us out…we took over the back of the bus!:

Looks like we're at a potty stop; or at least we assume that's what this is. We're next to a big, strong current flowing river with several small boats tied up at one spot. Several Chinese people are trying to encourage us to go out on one of those small boats. Ummm…no thanks. It's cold and wet and I'd rather not get colder and wetter. Plus, we've got to get back on the bus. We'll just walk around and watch you guys ride on the river!

Chinese "graffiti" on the bamboo stalks located behind the kids. I wonder what they say…hmmmm:

Back on the bus….it's certainly looking more gorge-like, isn't it??

A stop to check out the views!

Here's our bus with our Chinese tour guide (so you'll remember which bus to get back on for the ride home!):

And now it looks like we're stopping for lunch. I say "looks like" because we can't understand the conversation in Chinese. This place is called Tina's and it looks like it's perched on the side of the gorge.

The lunch consists of many different and VERY delicious Chinese dishes. Inside Tina's there's also an amazing view of the gorge out their windows. Wow! What a neat place!

This looks like a big wicker basket filled with amaranth leaves:

Quick potty stop:

Was that really a toilet????? You sure about that?

Apparently it's time to go on the hike: we heard from one person that this will be a three or maybe four hour hike. The hike starts just up the road from Tina's Guesthouse.

Ready to go?

Where do you suppose this sign leads to?
Oooo….a swing bridge! Are you up for a walk across it?

For a few kuai we paid the entry fee that let us walk across this rickety bridge (that had a dead hog floating under it. Peeeee Yewwwwww!!!)

Trail signage:

Mark, Annika and Lilly checking out the local crystals for sale:

The local crystals (Annika did buy a few):

It's very gorge-like, isn't it?

Emily, Dani and Eric:

And the way out???? Up these VERY steep ladder…hope you're not acrophobic because check us out:

Just remember: DON'T LOOK DOWN!!!

Well, what do you know…we're back at Tina's Guesthouse!

The road…

Looks safe.

Not.

The kids and Eric both saw a car "parked" in the ravine. Not sure I want to know the details on how it got there. Yikes!

Narrow road – mountain on one side and steep cliff on the other side – NO PROBLEM.

Whew! We made it back to Lijiang…now it's time find dinner! We really got lucky today as the rain held off for our entire hike. I'm also grateful that our kids managed the entire hike with minimal whining. ;-) That's always, isn't it?

What's for dinner?

Hmm…I'm thinking Happy Drunk Bar isn't going to suit our needs. 😉Have no fear! We found a hot pot place: