MHV 3

Wow! Lots to report since my last update... The rain finally let up a little, allowing me to spend more time outside, although I still had to wait for the crags to dry before going climbing. I spent some time hanging out at the Lizard Lounge last week, bouldering and meeting people. It is such a cool hang-out for climbers with a very laid back vibe. There are two other Americans in town, both traveling solo and looking for climbing partners, and we've been leaving messages for each other at LL trying to meet up. Hopefully, we can start climbing together regularly.

Well, I have sort of lost track of time here in China (somewhat intentionally, I suppose...it is summer), and it's difficult to recall everything that's happened in the last week or so. Last Wednesday, I finally got around to hoofing it up Yue Liang Shan (Moon Hill), the namesake of my village. It's only about a half hour hike-up, but the views from the summit are outstanding. I also checked out the climbing routes underneath the arch - let's just say that I'm not quite ready to get inverted on a 5.13c route. On the summit, I also met a British guy with whom I had a great conversation during the descent. After leaving the Royal Marines, this guy had decided to travel the world for a while. After spending 9 months traveling all over South America, he had come to China. Next, he would head for Mongolia, then Russia, then Eastern Europe. After that, he planned to walk home to England from Estonia. He refuses to use travel guides and is not concerned about what he'll do when he returns home (after his money runs out). Before departing, this guy told me that I have a very interesting life, but I'm pretty sure he's got me beat... I think that one of the most rewarding aspects of solo travel is the opportunity to meet and have enlightening conversations with fascinating people from all over the world, and I love hearing about ways that other people attempt to live life to the fullest. On Thursday, I embarked on an epic hike up a karst peak called Gao Ao (basically "very tall"), which had not been climbed in almost 10 years and had never been scaled by a foreigner. The "trail" was completly overgrown, with vegation rising well above my head and so thick that I could proceed only inch-by-inch. Despite what most people would deem as impassable conditions and the incredible heat, I eventually reached the summit and was rewarded with outstanding views. Of course, I was also rewared with a pretty nasty rash all over both arms, and the itching is driving me absolutely crazy. The next day was an exhausting one as well, as I woke up early and headed into town to meet the climbing guides I had reserved at China Climb. We headed out to an awesome crag called Baby Frog, where we climbed all day, again, in incredible heat. The views at the base of the 400 foot cliffs, which required a decent hike just to access, were amazing, although those from high on the rock were even better. I really enjoyed the day of climbing because, for once, I was receiving expert, formal instruction rather than just being belayed by someone. My Australian and Chinese guides worked with me on the ins and outs of lead climbing, and I now feel much more knowledgeable and safer. I led a 5.7 and a 5.9 and managed to muscle my way up (with the help of a top rope) a 30 meter 5.10b to finish the day. By the end of the last climb, I was very dehydrated (despite having drunk several liters of water) and overheated, so, after descending, I found refuge from the sun with my water bottle and a banana in a nearby cave, with cool air flowing through and a jaw-dropping view at my feet. Back in town that evening, I got to know my guides better over a meal of jiaozi (dumplings) at a local restaurant and then headed home for some much needed sleep.

On Friday, I, not surprisingly, slept quite late, and I then spent the rest of the day resting and doing laundry. I did make three new friends - an American guy and girl and a Japanese girl - all of them 2 years out of college. They are very, very experienced world travelers and are spending some time in China this summer before heading to law school at Stanford and Northwestern. The American guy actually landed a really cool job out of school as a foreign policy advisor for a senator. Anyway, I arranged on Saturday to meet them the following morning and join them for a trip to northern Guangxi province. Through a combination of buses and taxis, we ended up in the village of Ping'an by Sunday afternoon. Ping'an is located about 4 hours north of Yangshuo, high on a mountain ridge overlooking the spectacular Longji ("Dragon's Backbone") Rice Terraces. The rice terraces are built into the side of these incredible mountains so that they form a natural staircase for several thousand vertical feet and wind gracefully along the contours of the land for miles and miles. They also include an extensive irrigation network and represent an agricultural and engineering masterpiece. Additionally, scattered throughout the terraces are many ancient tombs, whose hieroglyphics I had quite a time trying to decipher. We stayed in a great little hostel, made entirely of wood, that is perched precariously on the side of the mountain, thousands of feet above the valley floor. I'm pretty sure you can't find a room with this kind of view, for approximately $2.50, anywhere else in the world. With clouds sweeping through the valley and the locals working well into the evening on the terraces, we enjoyed a great dinner (including a game of "guess how many chicken heads are in the soup"...although I, for one, prefer to eat the chicken foot) and a few games of cards. We split up the next morning, as they were headed for Sanjian, and I was doing a long hike as the first part of my trip back to Yangshuo. Despite torrential rain and, at times, low visibility, I set out for the distant mountain village of Dazhai, located almost a day away by foot (the only method of travel, anyway). Let's just say that I'm glad I know Chinese; otherwise, I'd probably still be lying on a rice terrace in the middle of nowhere. After a few hours of crossing mountain passes, following tiny paths along the terraces, and fording small rivers, I arrived in the tiny village of Zhongliu. Both Zhongliu and Dazhai, like Ping'an, are perched high on the side of a mountain - with most of the buildings being supported by stilts that rest on the hillside below - so navigating through them is very confusing. I eventually stumbled upon some sort of store, where I bought some peanuts and managed to get some vague directions to Dazhai. The locals were really excited to see me and wanted me to stay for lunch, but I knew it was going to be very difficult to make it back to Guilin by 8:00 PM, in time for the last bus to Yangshuo, so I had to decline. I set out again in the torrential rain (by this point, I was beyond soaked) in another seemingly random direction, trusting that the locals understood what I was asking when I requested directions in Chinese. Along the way, the rain diminished slightly, and I was treated to absolutely incredible vistas. At times I felt as if I were in a Pacific Northwest forest; other times, the scenery more closely resembled the highlands of Scotland. With each crossing of a mountain pass, a new view of rice terraces would unfold, stretching all the way to the enormous mountains in the distance. Sometimes, staring at the long, curving, parallel contours of the distant terraces would make me dizzy, as if I were looking at some kind of optical illusion. Raging rivers were always visible at the bottom of the valley, their thundering roar often just barely distinguishable, and small waterfalls dotted the hillside. This was truly some of the most outstanding hiking I've ever done, and I'm sure other backpackers would give it rave reviews as well. Eventually, I reached Dazhai, although this village, too, was perched high on the ridge. I hadn't really thought about how I was going to exit the mountains - I had just been told that I could get a bus in Dazhai - but I decided that since roads were not possible in such topography, and since buses require roads, I should probably head down. So, I followed some random path down the mountain side, crossed a few rivers, attempted to convince the villagers in Dazhai that I only wanted a bus, not food, and to my wonder and astonishment, ended up at what appeared to be a bus station. Twenty minutes later, I was on a bus bound for the city of Longsheng. The driver had attempted to explain to me something about getting off the bus and walking, but I didn't really understand until a few minutes later. Despite being high in these gorgeous mountains, I had forgotten that I would have to exit through an incredible gorge, with the only road being cut directly into the cliff. I also forgot that I had heard something about landslides being a problem in the area. Anyway, I started getting a little nervous as the bus began skidding around corners, with the cliff on one side and a sheer drop of several hundred feet to a raging river on the other side. That was just the beginning... Abruptly, we came to a stop and everyone started getting off the bus; this is when I noticed that the road was covered with an enormous landslide, spilling over into the gorge. This gorge was absolutely spectacular (more reminiscent of Costa Rica than anything else), and as I was busy admiring what had to have been a 500 foot waterfall, I failed to realize that anyone with some common sense might speculate that an area having just experienced a massive landslide might experience another. As I was walking slowly across the slide, my back to the hillside, people started yelling a bunch of Chinese I didn't understand. Fortunately, everything clicked pretty fast, and I turned immediately and sprinted out of the way of some falling boulders. It wasn't really that close of a call, but it did make me just a little more alert. During the rest of our ride out of the gorge (on a 3 bus shuttle), waterfalls cascaded down the cliff to our left and ran under the tires, small rocks slid down the mountainside, and enormous waterfalls became visible at each bend in the road (indeed, this area possesses some insane, mostly undiscovered potential for Class V-VI whitewater paddling). By this point, I decided there wasn't much I could do to make the journey any safer and worrying certainly wouldn't help, so I started taking pictures and ooh-ing and ahh-ing with the Chinese people each time we skirted the edge of the cliff. This was certainly adventure at its finest. Some time later, we arrived in the city of Longsheng. I was very lucky to be able to literally hop onto a bus for Guilin just as it was pulling away. Of course, my only thought was that I had misunderstood the Chinese and was headed either back to the gorge or to some distant city in the wrong direction (I'm not sure which would have been worse). Nevertheless, we were indeed headed for Guilin, where we arrived at exactly 7:58 PM. I made a mad dash for the ticket counter, sprinted to the day's last bus to Yangshuo (again, worrying that I was heading back to Longsheng or something)...and made it. An hour and twenty minutes later, I was back in Yangshuo, where I grabbed some dinner in town (which I ended up trying to eat while carrying on a long conversation in Chinese with my nineteen-year-old waitress, who decided to join me for dinner...There, now you all have something to gossip about!) and then hired a guy on a motorbike to drive me down the potholed road, in the dark, to Moon Hill Village (a journey which was probably more dangerous than my bus trip through the gorge). Yuan's father was still awake, and, after telling him "hen lei le" ("I'm really tired") and making a bee-line for my bedroom, I collapsed on my bed.

As you might guess, today was another rest-day, and I didn't do anything exciting. The computers are extremely slow today, for some reason, and I've had to answer a number of concerned emails regarding my well-being in regards to the flooding in southern China that has been all over the news. So, at the moment, I'm a little tired of being in front of the computer. If you are one of the authors of these emails, don't despair!! I'm quite safe - and indeed dry, at the moment - and do not intend to be washed away in a flash flood. I'm enjoying my adventure even more so than I had hoped, and things couldn't be better. Until next time, take care, and - whatever you do - don't take the bus!