冒险娘之旅 Part 5 Dali Cangshan

Cangshan 苍山 is the pride of Dali residents. But they sure did not make it easy for travellers. Unless you are in tour, finding the place to take the cables cars can be a little tricky. The staff claimed that the place was reachable by foot from myhostel but it was not really. I started out happily walking with the map early in the morning one day. In the end, after an hour, I gave up and flagged down a taxi. The driver took me to the Tian Long Ba Bu movie site for the newest cable car to Horse-washing Pond. There I was informed that the cable service would only go up mid-hill since the peak was too slippery and cold. When I asked about the scenery at mid-hill, it don't show exciting. Disappointed I took the taxi to the other cable car point as Gantong temple. On the way, I learned from the driver that the Sanzhong temple's chairlifts were permanently closed to the public.

The experience in the cable car alone really tested my courage. I was not really afraid of height but this being in China where I still did not have trust with its technologies yet. When a strong gale of wind swayed my cable car left and right, I frozed and began to worry if I would drop into the deep valleys and die cold and lonely. It was weird that when one wis alone, one do not scream since there will be no one listening. Luckily great almighty China with its advance cable service did not fail me. I arrived at the top of the mountain, dazed but unhurt. Phew.

My first stop was the Grand Canyon of Cangshan. Problem was the waterfall and river dried up due to the season and there was only cliffs to view but still pretty impressive. I took to the walking trail on the Jade-Cloud Road 玉带路 but realised quickly that the next scenic spot, the seven fairies waterfall, was 4.5km away! That meant a total of 9km if I was to travel back and forth. Since there was nothing much to do on top, I slowly started the journey to see how far I can walked before giving up. At 2.4km I met 2 young ladies.  They were travelling at a pace slower that the rest. We took a rest in a pavilion at the same time. I took out the supposedly fresh strawberries that I bought at the foot of the mountain and realised that they were soak in syrup. Seriously what is wrong with these merchants? Where is the ethics and trust we should have?

Anyway the 2 ladies and I seemed to have built a bond after resting together in the pavilion and started chatting. They are ex secondary classmates travelling during their school vacations. Both of them are currently university undergraduates in year 4. I learned that they will need to do internships for their last year of studies. Both of them are from Anhui and had took a 33 hours long and tiring train ride from Anhui to Kunming. And the reason why they were travelling at such slow pace was because they were still recovering from a 10km cycling from dali to Xizhou the day before. I could only envy such youth and energy. We gave up halfway since we heard that the next spot was dried up too.

The return trip was fun since both of them were humorous and we shared stories of our travel so far. In the cable car, we met 3 middle aged men and we chatted with them as well. Something I would not had done if I was alone. Once we were down, we were offered 25rmb for a tax ride down. But the 2 ladies insisted they will not pay more than 20rmb. To and fro they haggled the price with the driver. I just stood watching. In the end we failed and decided to walk the 4.5km downhill to catch a public bus. Actually I could have just offered to pay for the ride but why should I dampen the efforts of these 2 young spirited ladies?  They were travelling within their means and refused to bow down to a capitalist. It was pretty easy walk downhill actually and we encouraged each other all the way down.  We took a public bus back to Dali Gucheng and had dinner together.

After exchanging contacts, I bid them goodbye as we were all tired and in need of rest. Again I met friendly Chineses and spend a enjoyable afternoon with them. Definitely impressed with the young generation of China with their energy and thirst for knowledge.









Scammed! Sweetened Strawberries