The end of the road- crazy, imperial Beijing

I

Writing this as we sit in the departure lounge at Beijing airport. Like the rest of the city, the airport is super sized and very modern, but weird eg there are no bars!

Saw this today 

And these over the past few days 

And this

Perhaps gives you a taste of the contrasts here between old and new. Anyway it's been a great place to visit and a marvellous end to our trip! See you all spoon Mm&D

We climb the wall 😎

One of the highlights of the trip - hiking along a section of the Great Wall! Weather was a little unkind, very misty, but did not spoil the sense of grandeur such a massive undertaking generated - pity the poor workers though! After this we move to Beijing  - our final destination

Hanging monastery and Yungang caves

Running out of superlatives fast, having visited the hanging monastery - how did they do this?

 Followed by the wonderful cave carvings near Datong - awesome. Had to have a lie down to recover 

These are just a couple of the Buddhas in the caves, they were quite strict about no photoes

To balance all this high culture we threw in another session of KTV in one if the tackiest places yet, made Vegas look restrained 😆 this is the entrance hall!

Pingyan and Wutai Shan and a cave village

Yet another old walled city full of lovely temples and quite well preserved civic buildings - the old bank was quite funny. Maggie bought some Chinese outfits . This is one if them!

The on to Wutai Shan- another gorgeous mountain setting for a whole raft of Buddhist temples still actively used - lots if saffron cloaked monks and people prostrating themselves. En 

route 

here we also had one night in a village where the houses are cut into the mountain side - lets just say it was an experience sleeping four to a bed in a cave - Maggie quite enjoyed it I think 😳😳

Xian - city of treasure

This is a really great place to visit, starting with the surprise of a proper  quality hotel for once - although I have to say the general standard of the hotels is much higher than ten years ago when  I was last here - although many still seem to function as brothels as well - the oldest profession still thrives it seems😒

The main highlight is of course the Terracotta Army, which is really fantastic but this city is full of ancient treasures reflecting its long and important past  - a few snaps attached from the really good city museum. The food is also wonderful, with a rich mix of Chinese and Middle East traditions - all spiced up with plenty of chillies of course - if you do not like your grub hot, hot hot then stay away!

Taoist temple heaven

Wudang Shan, yet another fabulous mountain range covered in Taoist temples, home of Tai Chi and apparently where leaping tiger sleeping dragon was filmed.

Pandas, karaoke, opera and scary carvings

Now in Chengdu, home of the Pandas! They are very cuddly and photogenic, it's just a pity they seem to have no natural habitat left. They live in a huge modern city, full of neon, and a very flash metro system. We also spent a night at the Chinese opera which was a weird mix of high and low culture - from virtuoso recitals to shadow puppets. On an even more low cultural level we also had a group outing to KTV - our own karaoke booth  - Maggie and I wowed the audience with a pretty cool rendering of American Pie!

En route we visited the rock carvings at Dazu - very beautiful and scary images. Enjoy!

Mountains, monks and mad monkeys

On the last few days we have really had a sense of how huge China is, having driven along a spectacular road  through mountains, amazing bridges over giant gorges and countless rivers to get us to the holiest Buddhist site in China  - Emei Shan. This is a mountain covered in temples amid  lush rain forest - beautiful!

The mountain also  hosts some very aggressive monkeys, which we had to fight off with our umbrella - quite scary . The hotel had the added bonus of s hot pool spa, where Maggie continued her recuperation. It's a tough life. 

Tiger Leaping Gorge

Last major site for us in Yunnan before we head to Schezuan - I hiked bit a and Maggie took a bus, her leg is slowly healing we think. Sorry for rather feeble pictures, my technology does not do this justice.

Lijiang

Spending a few days here in what was billed as one if the most picturesque Chinese towns - well maybe it was before being rebuilt after the big earthquake a few years back. It is now just a fake tourist destination full of tourist tat - shame. Anyway it is a good place to base yourself for the Tiger Leaping Gorge which we hike tomorrow.

The joys of overlanding

Just a quick note from Dali to explain attached pic - en route today we suffered a massive blowout, thankfully whilst parked (don't ask me - something to do with a detached brake pad bolt) so had to temporarily abandon the truck, jomp on in some mini vans and await the repaired Archie. He made it a couple of hours later, so we can go on regardless 

Buddhists and blind masseuse

IGiven Maggie's limited mobility, yesterday was spent (slowly) mooching around Kunming - which is a very pleasant, bustling city of around 6 million people. We visited an arts centre /  gallery, a large Buddhist temple, then had a very nice lunch, a rest then a really great Chinese meal - we have a local guide for all of this part of the trip and she helps us order the best dishes. On the way back to our hotel Maggie had a very challenging  i.e tough massage from a blind masseuse on the street - I think she enjoyed it even though she was wincing and jumping and cried out in pain at one point!

China and nearly bust

Sorry for delay in posting but have just arrived in Kunming, a city of about 6 million and this is the first Internet connection we have had.

This is our fifth night and should have been only our second hotel after three nights camping - but we had to check into a hotel last night as Maggie fell over chasing an errant toilet roll (these things are like gold dust) and badly strained / pulled her hamstring. Luckily there is a doctor on the truck and bed rest he advised should sort it out- let's hope he is is right as we still have a long way to go. The pic below was taken today so she is still looking pretty good!

The camping we did manage was great, as we have to shop and cook as well - the local markets are just amazing, full of everything you could imagine, animal vegetable or mineral! I introduced a few more folk to the delights of porridge too. We camped one night on a banana plantation in the middle of nowhere and the other night inside a closed down steel works - the night we missed was probably the best sight - the car park of the rather nice hotel we were in, at the Stone Forest in Shilin in Yunnan. Such fun!

We have two nights before setting off again towards Dali