Dali

Located on the Western shore of Lake Er Hai, Dali is a major Chinese tourist attraction - tempting those looking for the quaint old town, local Bai culture, and outdoor activities around the lake and Cangshan Mountain Range. The 'old town' is a collection of shops, travel agencies, restaurants, and hostels within an ancient imperial wall. Many of the attractions have been recently manufactured to draw more crowds and money. The large lake, looming 4000 meter peak, and abundant pine trees make it feel a lot like Central Oregon and Washington.

The farm land that we saw on the way to Dali was much different than the expansive crops of pineapple, bananas, coconut, and sugar cane that we saw on the way to Kunming. Instead, the farms were much smaller and diverse, as if they were used to feed a family rather than sold to a market. Villages were simple clusters of twenty or thirty houses until we reached Dali. Water buffalo were also much more prevalent. To give you an idea of the significance of water buffalo in the Yunnan, watch this video sent to me by Chellis. If you're interested, there's also a website here. To those of you who cry easily I recommend getting your tissues ready.

Unfortunately I came down with something that my body felt necessary to purge out both ends, so Nicole spent the morning reading while I wasted away in a coma. By the afternoon I had recovered so we set out to hike up the mountain nearby. On our way up we met Irene, on vacation from the Guogdong Province. She spoke perfect English and asked if she could hike with us. It was a tough hike considering we haven't seen many mountains in the past few months. The trail passed through several graveyards overlooking the city and distant lake - common in China for graves to have beautiful views. Passing overhead was a chair lift swiftly carrying the less inclined to the temple that we were slugging our way towards. A loudspeaker obnoxiusly repeated advertisements and Berlin's Take My Breath Away. Fairly accurate since we had to take breaks to catch our breath every ten or fifteen minutes.Finally made it to the temple, about half way up the mountain, after a couple hours and strolled around the grounds for a bit and taking in the scenery. A stone path carried on along the side of the mountain for another eleven kilometers, but we only ventured three or four - worried that some storm clouds blowing in might let loose. The sun was setting and we had our fill of exercises on the way up so opted for the chair lift on the way down. It was a fun ride with great views of the city with the lake as a backdrop.This morning we took a bus from Dali to Lijiang, about 150 kilometers North. Lijiang is popular for the same reasons as Dali, though it is also commonly used as a staging area for moving on to Tibet, via Zhongdian(more famously known as Shangri-La), and Tiger Leaping Gorge. Naxi is the dominant culture here and people dressed in the traditional clothing are everywhere. Traditional songs are performed occasionally in the town squares. Like Dali, Lijiang has an old town of cobble stoned streets lined with small shops selling jadeite, local clothing, tea, and other souvenirs. As we were wandering through the tight maze of alleys we stumbled on to Sinfang Sqaure, a relatively open space. A large red inflated tube arced across the square with "Eastern Oregon University Choir" printed in white block letters. I had to read it twice to make sure I wasn't crazy, but sure enough it was true. A handful of twenty or so college students in uniformed polo shirts were milling about the square having just finished a performance!The trips to Tibet are tempting, but a it's out of our price range and too time consuming. Instead, we head North to Tiger Leaping Gorge - touted as the longest, deepest, and narrowest gorge in the world - tommorrow morning. We're really looking forward to hiking for a couple days and seeing some of the Himalayan 'foothills'.