We started by walking up a path led by our tour guide Jonathan. Immediately we saw large Lord of the Rings-esque mountains, snowcapped and looming. We feared we'd have to cross these mountains which are basically the foothills of the Himalayas. Luckily our plan was to just walk past them, in their shadow. The first day we walked past terraced farms and goats for about 2 hours. It wasn't too tough of a walk. There were a few steep rocky sections that I think the less physically fit among us had trouble with but I was quite comfortable. We eventually reached the Naxi Family Guest house. A beautiful, apparently brand new timber lodge at the foot hills of the gorge. Our view was fantastic. Not a bad place to spend an evening. We ate the usual meal of vague but delicious vegetables, vague but tasty meat and bland broth and leaves which I neither like nor understand. It's basically hot water, with a few spinach leaves, eight to nine noodles and sometimes an egg. There was one standout dish. Bitter Gourd. If you ever have the opportunity to eat Bitter Gourd, don't. It's awful. It's like eating earwax flavored celery. After dinner we put on a few extra layers of clothes, sat around bowls of smoldering coals and learned to play Majiang or Mahjong. It's not as complicated as it looks and a good way to pass time. We were all given a bowl of sunflower seeds which we ate furiously. Why? I don't know, they were neither filling nor tasty but when you're up in the Chinese mountains playing majiang by starlight you just don't say no to anything. Except Bitter Gourd.
After another night on top of an electric blanket we rose to head out to the main part of TLG. A few people had come down with a stomach illness since Shaxi. Aseem had to stay behind and meet us at the next hotel. The first hour of climbing was much more difficult than the previous day. We had been warned. The itinerary did warn of 18 switchbacks of hell. I think there were more like 30 but it was all uphill, direction didn't matter. Me and a few others were getting tired of the walk for ten minutes rest for five routine so we just went on without everyone else. It was hard to get lost on this path. After the hardest part of the climb the trees opened up exposing a great view of the gorge. This was the gorge of gorges. I've never seen such a dramatic changed in altitude. It was like standing on the end of the earth, and the other end had wrapped all the way around but couldn't quite reach. The weather too was odd. It would be sunny, then hail, then rain, then gail force winds, then sun again.
I think this scenic outlook was the highest point in our day. We descended to another guest house to eat lunch. We met some Brits and Argentinians here, they said they were headed where we were heading in a few hours. There was one odd thing about this guest house. In the corner two people practiced Kung Fu. Like real Kung Fu. Morpheus vs Neo, Mr Miyagi, Jackie Chan - Kung Fu. And one of them was a white guy. He was obviously the apprentice.
The rest of the hike was pretty much flat. We just hugged the side of the mountain the whole way. Literally hugged in some parts as we were basically walking a long a cliff. This made me think. How did all these guesthouses get up this high? Answer: Horses. Horses carried every single one of the objects used to build these massive guest houses. Incredible. Soon we came to a huge waterfall cutting it's way across out path, we had no choice but to walk through it. This is apparently where a lot of people die in Tiger Leaping Gorge. Sweet, Jonathan, thanks...
Shortly after the waterfall we descended down to our next hotel, Chateau de Woody. A name I'll never understand. We were served a post hike green tea and ...walnut platter? To open the walnuts we were given rocks....out of the flower garden in the courtyard. This hotel had another great view. I think Troost stayed here in this hotel because he describes the exact view. Looking out the hotel all you see is a Mordor-esque wall of rock.
We went upstairs after showering and resting for dinner. We had another post dinner game night of majiang, poker and craps. We called it a day. Quite a day. It was about 6 hours of hiking, some of which was pretty tough. In my opinion Troost is a pansy. It wasn't that hard of a hike.
The next day, before heading to Zhongdian/ Napa we drove down the namesake rock of Tiger Leaping Gorge. It's a big rock. In the middle of a big river. Not that exciting to be honest. Maybe it was early, or maybe it was the 50 flights of stairs we had to climb down and then back up to see it. I could have done without seeing it close up. I had already seen it from the glorious top of the gorge.
Onto Zhongdian!
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