Fullboy - China - Yunnan Province - The Road to Shangri-La

It felt liberating carrying only our small backpacks as we got on the bus for the journey up to Lijiang, located near the foothills of the mighty Himalayas. Our main backpacks were getting heavier and heavier with all of the extra items we were picking up and it was nice to give our weary shoulders and back a rest. The bus journey was smooth and we even had a movie to watch, 'Red Cliff', a Chinese war epic complete with English subtitles! The bus stops along the route were pleasant and we picked up some wonderful dried fruit and nut snacks. We eventually arrived in Lijiang around 11 hours after leaving Kunming, we realised that travelling in China was going to take a long time.

It was night time and we didn't have to look around too long to find a guesthouse. It was a simple room around an old courtyard. Lijiang was a touristy town, popular because of the 'old Lijiang', a town dating back over 800 years and retaining much of its stunning ancient architecture. Intricate waterways sliced their way through the town and it was a pleasure meandering through the old streets and walking over the old bridges. We had a great nights sleep and work early the next day to a pleasantly cool morning due to our altitude of over 3000m. We had a lazy stroll around the old town's streets and found a wonderful little cafe where we had a fantastic breakfast of grilled goat's cheese, thickly cut ham, a potato pancake and toast. Believe it or not, this continental style breakfast was a local dish, 'farmers food' popular with the Naxi People, an ethnic group who inhabit the foothills of the Himalayas.
Lunch was similarly rustic food, a delicious blood sausage kebab, grilled on a stick along with some griddled baby potatoes. After two months of noodle soup in Vietnam, this heavy, hearty food was definitely a welcome change.


Feeling rested, fortified and ready for a challenge, we took a bus to the gateway of the majestic Tiger Leaping Gorge. The weather was cloudy and drizzly and we had been warned of landslides in the area. We'd also heard rumours that the hiking path was officially closed but we weren't going to turn back, not after coming this far. The trek was long, steep, winding and the weather in places was horrible. We were pretty soaked through and our cheap camera we bought in Thailand was definitely feeling the strain. A delicious bag of spicy ginger candy that we bought in Lijiang was our fuel and munching on this gave us the energy we needed to get to the top. Upon reaching the top of the gorge, the clouds parted and tired, soaked and hungry, we managed a smile as we finally saw the rich, blue sky. For most of the trek it seemed we were the only two people on the path, apart from the occasional goat. We walked across the top of the gorge and found an old, traditional house where the owner offered us rooms for the night. We were the only guests and the kind lady who lived there cooked us up a delicious meal of hand-cut ham and onions, fried potatoes and stir fried chicken. Facilities were basic but the views of the snow capped Snow Dragon Mountain and the raging Yangstze River deep in the gorge were breathtaking and it was a meal we'd never forget.






























The next day's weather was perfect and the trek down to the road was obviously far easier than the arduous journey up. Unknowingly however, the most dangerous leg of our journey was now upon us. We got on a minibus to take us along a narrow gorge road to the main road and our path was blocked by a landslide that had occurred the previous evening due to the bad weather. We had to get out of the bus and clamber over the fallen rocks with the raging river roaring far below us. The path we had to navigate was probably around a foot in width and to make matters worse we had to crawl under some rocks whilst Chinese builders were drilling all around us trying to clear the debris! Watching small pebbles giving way under our feet as we navigated the precarious path was one of the most nervewracking moments of our travels thus far and we were grateful to get to the other side of the landslide in one piece. After experiencing this it's easy to see why there are so many building accidents in China, our safety was not once taken into account by the crazy builders who wouldn't stop working whilst we passed. Shaken but in one piece, we got on another bus that took us to the main road.




























We were waiting for a bus to take us up to Shangri-La and an enterprising individual who saw us waiting offered to give us a lift, for a price. We managed to find a couple of others to join us in his little minibus and we set off. Not long into the journey, his minibus broke down!! It didn't take our driver long to fix the problem and before we knew it we were on the road again. The journey was very scenic and we passed wonderful meadows of wildflowers with immense snowcapped mountains dotting the landscape. The temperature was noticeably cooler and the air fresh. Shangri-La was a quiet town and we found a great guesthouse with the best hot shower I think we'd ever had. After our soaking on the Tiger Leaping Gorge, it was just the place we needed to get our head down for a few days before we made the journey back to Kunming. The bed had thick, warm blankets and we had a wonderful nights sleep.

























The next day we had a walk around the town and had a great breakfast of assorted meats and veggie kebabs with delicious flatbreads. The weather, at around 3000m high, was cold enough to warrant jackets and the hearty food was warming and comforting.









































Shangri-La is located where Tibet, Yunnan Province and Sichuan Province meet and is settled by Tibetan people. The cuisine is heavy, Tibetan fare and we had several great meals. Our favourites were the Tibetan stuffed breads, similar to an English pastie, filled with minced meat and onion. Also, the barley salad was fantastic, like a heavier version of the Arabic Taboulleh. Another great snack was the dried yak meat and there were countless shops selling this local delicacy. It is very similar to beef jerky and came in many different varieties. Our favourites were the original and the Sichuan pepper coated types. We also tried the yak yoghurt drink which, made from yak milk, was thick, delicious and very tasty.






















Our trip to the large Tibetan Buddhist monastery, Songzanlin, was a very peaceful way to end our expedition into the mountains and our bus journey back was memorable as we sat next to some old, local Naxi ladies who were dressed in their colourful, traditional garments. They were sniffing something off their hand, and, noting my curiosity, offered me a go. One of the ladies put some dusty looking substance on my hand and encouraged me to sniff. When in Rome I thought..... SNIFF!! It immediately made me cough and splutter, then my eyes started watering. The rest of the packed bus all turned around and found it immensely funny and before we knew it, everyone was roaring with laughter, including Melissa! Don't think I'll be trying that again in a hurry!

Fullboy - Cambodia - Ban Lung - Chewing Dust

It was a dry, dusty day as we crossed the border into Cambodia. We found a minibus to take us to the small town of Stung Treng where we would get onwards transport into a remote north eastern town called Ban Lung. We arrived at Stung Treng and waited in a small cafe for a number of hours for our next bus. I had a little walk around looking for anything of interest but to be honest, it was a fairly dull town and the most exciting thing I stumbled upon was an old lady frying up banana fritters. There were two types, one was the sweet variety and the other more savoury, similar to a plantain. They were a good, cheap snack to prepare us for the horror of a bus journey ahead.



















The bus arrived, there were no seats and nowhere to store our backpacks. We had to climb over piles of pineapples at the front of the bus and push our way through the aisle. Our bags had to go on the floor and we sat on little mini stools in the aisle. We were feeling very sweaty but just relieved to be sitting down and finally, the bus set off. More discomfort was around the corner as the bus travelled along dusty roads, so dusty that the inside of the bus was enveloped in a hazy, grainy cloud. People had their handkerchiefs over their face as the choking dust swirled around and there was an awful lot of coughing!! As the bus arrived in Ban Lung we were absolutely caked in dust, our clothes a mucky brown colour. We were mobbed as we got off the bus by touts desperate for us to go to their hotel, they must not get many foreigners in this neck of the woods. We chose a hotel and got a lift there on the back of a bike. The hotel restaurant menu was dull, my meal of minced pork and aubergine probably the most exciting thing I could see and to be fair, it was pretty good, the aubergine had a nice smoky taste and paired well with the meat. After a very long, refreshing shower, we called it a night.


















The next morning we set off in search of some breakfast and were finding it difficult to find anywhere that looked clean enough to eat. We're not overly fussy but there appeared to be a distinct lack of care for the surroundings of the restaurants in this town, last nights chicken bones and dirty tissues littered all over the floors. We thought we'd try the market and I'll be honest, it was the most shockingly dirty place we'd seen on our travels. Flies were literally encrusted onto the meat and fish on display, not just hovering around but nesting in numbers so large you couldn't even see the food! Rubbish tips were piled high next to the stalls and it smelt like... piles of rubbish. Now I know I'm on a mission to sample the local foods of Asia and the markets are usually always the place you get the best stuff, but there have to be exceptions. We couldn't bring ourselves to be in the market for much longer and made a hasty exit, retreating to a guesthouse restaurant we spotted earlier and having a forgettable breakfast. We don't mind eating in simple, even scruffy surroundings, but you have to draw the line somewhere and although the food always comes first, we cannot enjoy it whilst surrounded by filth.

We hired some bicycles and went for a cycle to Yeak Laom, a volcanic crater lake to have a nice swim. After cycling in the near 40 degree heat, we were red faced and sweaty and definitely needed some refreshment!! The lake was blissful and we enjoyed the cool, fresh water in the heat of the day. Cold beers followed shortly afterwards and we ordered some food to go with them. The menus looked a bit more exciting and I ordered some dried squid (a Korean fave) and dried eel to accompany the beer. Both were delicious and partnered by a fantastic salt and pepper mix with fresh lime wedges. We squeezed the lime juice into the salt to create a wonderful salty, zesty dip for the dried fish. Yummy! The other two dishes were pretty good too, a spicy shredded mango salad topped with baby shrimp and a chilli chicken with peanuts. The problem was that we'd ordered enough food for around six people and after eating way too much, we had to cycle back to our hotel, uphill!! It wasn't a pleasant ride in the searing heat with bellies like lead and we were grateful to get back to our hotels without throwing up the contents of the gargantuan lunch.





























Trekking through the dilapidated forests of Ban Lung was not all that much fun and what we learnt most was that the region seemed to have a serious deforestation problem. We passed many uprooted trees and heard the violent sound of chainsaws, never too far away. We walked past many cashew nut trees, a major source of income in this area, and sampled the actual cashew fruit which in appearance slightly resembled a bell pepper. The fruit had a peculiar, nutty, creamy taste and left a really dry feeling in the mouth, it wasn't that nice. One fruit yields just one cashew nut and it explains the relatively high cost of the finished product. We tried a few of the nuts picked from the fruit and toasted over a naked flame, you can't really get them much fresher. The highlight of the walk however was sampling some of the local jackfruit firewater which tasted pleasant and blew your head off at the same time. There were two other jars of homebrew which I tried but I couldn't tell you what was in them, only that they too were lethally strong and not too bad tasting.



























Slightly disappointed with the walk we returned to our guesthouse and tried out the restaurant next door as I'd promised the lady we'd eat there. The food was being cooked at the front of the restaurant and I chose at random, pointing to what was on display. We ended up with an interesting selection of coconut and jackfruit ricecakes, steamed fish in a banana leaf, bbq'd whole baby bird, grilled stuffed frog and a stinky soy bean paste again cooked in a banana leaf. We really enjoyed the variety of taste and unusual foods, the frog was particularly juicy and delicious, stuffed with chopped up noodles, nuts, lemongrass and minced frog meat. The fish was intensely flavoursome, again using lemongrass, lime leaf and chilli. There was definitely a hint of coconut in there too and the fish itself had a soft, subtle flavour. The rice cakes were tasty and filling and the bird was meaty if a little dry. The bean paste was definitely the strongest and most unusual tasting of the dishes, a little too tasty, in fact Melissa found it unpalatable and likened its aroma to that of stinky feet. I tried my best to finish it off because I don't like leaving food on the table but it was just far too rich. Overall, definitely our best meal in Cambodia so far. Our time was up and it was back on the long, dusty road to a small town called Kratie, famous for its freshwater river dolphins, for sightseeing, not eating!!