How can a bridge be interesting you may ask, but this special Bridge has quite some background:

People in Guilin always had the need to cross the river to get from one side (city center, palace) to the other (Seven Star park, etc) and vice versa.

Pretty early they started building a pontoon bridge, a construct made of boats, jointed by ropes and bamboo mats laid over them (Photo on the right). This bridge had the disadvantage that it had to be disassembled every time a number of boats wanted to pass the bridge.

In 1939 the people of Guilin build a more modern, steel framed bridge named after the Generalissimo Chiang Kai-sheck. This bridge, while much more stable than the old one survived only until 1944 when it was bombed by the Japanese.

After that, the Guilinese returned to their old pontoon bridge, but kept the same name as before.

In 1951, with the Generalissimo falling out of favour in China, a new concrete bridge was constructed and named “Liberation Bridge” the bridge lasted until 2001 when it was removed to make way for a new bridge that could handle the increasing amount of traffic.

Though they were told before that winter of Guilin is much more colder than Guangzhou, but Candy got cold immediately when she stepped out of the train. The air was freezing! “I wish I could get the first flight back to my warm Guangzhou!” She murmured to herself all the time till she arrived the hotel room. It was a simple bed-n-breakfast style family-runned motel, nothing could be campired to my sweet flat in Guangzhou! She could not sleep at the first night in Guilin, and she could help bursting into tears after two-hour telephone call to her boyfriend…

The first thing Candy did on the next morning was: ask her boyfriend to mail three big packages of little warm-up bags, the sort of thing he used when he used to watch football games outdoor, he would put it on his knees. Candy was told never put it directly on her skin…it would burn my fat? hope so…

Now the girls felt a littble bit warming up…but still need their boys to show up at weekend…for Christmas! For New Year!

We arrived at the Feilai Temple on 18h30, the location of our hotel - Shenshan hotel was perfect to see the Meili Snow Mountain, the Mount Kawakarpo is just outside the window!  The weather was so good today, no cloud, blue sky…if there would be a cloud capping on the summit tomorrow morning, it would be better…

The time for sunrise is 8am, people blocked the best shooting place from 7am, chatting in the cold wind, if I could find a cup of hot chocolate drink anywhere…

People are everywhere in and around the church, some are cleaning the windows, floor, chairs, etc, some are practising their songs and dances which will be performed on the Christmas day and Christmas eve. 

No matter during the day or at night, people are gathering around the Church, some comes after a full day of work, they are so pround that you could a part of the team to celebrate Lord’s birthday, in the coldest season in Guilin…

The ceremony in the church will be the top event on Christmas eve, and many people will celebrate at their homes, the most happy time of the year is coming…

The 1st day trekking in Tiger Leaping Gorge
2 hours driving in the moring Lijiang/Qiaotou, our trekking started from 10h50, a Chinese followed us with his horse, and we tried to explain that we did not need any help. Without saying anything, he smiled all the time. OK, we might need a horse in case of emergency…he might be of help.

Had our lunch at a local Naxi Family, the name is NAXIYAGE, a place with simple facility of food and bunk beds. We were told that we only finished one sixth of the whole distance, the 28 trends was waiting for us…It is 14h00 when we started our walk after lunch, we put all of our luggage on the horse, the cost is RMB 300 from NAXIYAGE to Halfway Guest House…

The 28 bends was not so difficult! (with the help of the horse carring our luggages)…On the mountain top, we saw the Jade Dragon Snow Mountain, and the Tiger Leaping Gorge! There are 6 more hours to go!

The Halfway Guest House is a bed-and-breakfast place, no internet access, no TV, no telephone, the bathroom smells bad. I read articles on the Internet before, and knew that people used to share public bathroom 1 year ago, unsure if they are halfway through renovations or not, the place needs a bloody good clean. Anyway, it is the only choice tonight, I should not complain, at least we had private bathroom tonight, and hot food.

After a OK breakfast we continued on our way. This day’s journey was much easier than the day before. Breathing became slightly easier as you made your way downwards. We stopped at Tina’s for lunch. We had met people coming from the opposite direction that had complained that the staff at Tina’s where not a happy bunch at all. We had also read this somewhere online, thus our decision was made: we would prefer to stay at Chateau de woody tonight.

Chateau de woody
Chateau de woody (Shanbailian in Chinese) is about 20 minutes walking from Tina’s if you choose the lower path. Usually people will go down the gorge to the Jinsha river, and climb up the cliff again. We chose another path, followed the Zhang Family Path down the moutain, walked along the bank of Jinsha river for 2 and half hours, heading to Chateau de woody. You could see signs of Shanbailian at almost every crossroad of trails, the owner tried to lead you at every turn.

Chateau de Woody’s is the first hotel one encounters when approaching Tiger Leaping Gorge from the east, either you take bus Lijiang-Daju or Zhongdian-Baishuitai-Haba-Walnut Grove.

The family who runs Woody’s was just so nice. The shop owner is Mr. Mu, a Han who married a Naxi wife, he has a 22-seat coach, also a good driver who takes passers to Lijiang, zhongdian, deqin, Mount Kawakarpo…XiaoMu, their 21 year old son is a good chef, The food was fantastic and he made the best Naxi Sandwich we had the entire time we were in Yunnan. XiaoMu was just beautiful and cooked us a huge meal of everything fresh and green.

There are three level rooms in the single story building on the Gorge side of the road. They are dark with simple furniture and simple bedding. After being shown the standard rooms, we stayed in the deluxe rooms, which are in the newest building – the two story challet on the Gorge side of the road. The bathrooms are in typical Chinese fashion, the shower is in the middle of the bath area and gets the entire room wet. And since the floor was a bit uneven, there was shallow puddle-ing in spots.

In nice weather dinners are served in a courtyard below the deluxe rooms that has a splendid view of the mountains surrounding Tiger Leaping Gorge.

There was no Internet at Woody’s guest house and none in the surrounding area.

Glad to find the Prague Cafe is the same as 5 years ago!  Light music, quite atmosphere, books here and there…free internet acess, great book collection, board games, watching people outside on the riverside flagging through french windows.

Prague is a warm place in Lijiang. You can have a slice of tasty cheese cake and a cup of fresh Yunnan coffee, watching people outside on the riverside flagging through french windows. or bury yourself in the sofa upstairs, reading a book…They also have great pizza and brownies! The food is good and fairly reasonably priced.

Address: 80, Mishi Xiang, Xinyi Jie, Lijiang, China
Contact: +86 (0888) 512 3757

Thank God, there is still a place like the Prague Cafe in fast processing Lijiang…

2009 is the year of ox, we were all tissing Zoe’s love affair in the coming year….Lijiang is a place of many romantic stories happening daily…

The ideal partner for the ox person is truthful and gentle but knows how to cajole and tease her. Of course there may be times when the ox person misinterprets light-hearted remarks or fails to see the humour in a situation, but at the same time close people will find that he/she is able to throw off her worries and begin to enjoy herself. The ideal partner for the ox person must also have the enthusiasm to introduce her to new interests but at the same time will not take risks that threaten the ox’s security. The ox person can take as a matter of course her partner’s weaknesses, and when there are emotional upheavals the ox will consider whether the blame lies with her; on the other hand such people do find it hard to forgive if they have been deceived.

Many games have been played and lots of fun! Till the BBQ stand owner was so tired and we had to leave….count many many stars in the sky that could not been seen in the concret jungle…We loved Lijiang.

Buying from the food chart from local farmer, I only spent 3 yuan for my breakfast!  He gave me two dumplings and a cup of bean milk from his bike, told me that his business was not good in winter time.  Well, highly recommend everyone to buy foods from locals, rather than buying from those bloody shop owners around the square streets, many of them are not Naxis, selling things from foods to tourist souvenirs which are so semilar that you can buy from any Chinese cities.

Dongba Paper Workshop
I walked around the Eastern Street again and again, but could not find a place named as KeGongFang.  It has been mentioned in many travel books, a workyard where traditional way of paper making can be found…Asked some shop owners, but they have never heard of it…from their accent I knew they were all from other parts of China, rent a place and had their own business here, no idea of this type of old workyard.  An old lady selling fried fish on the roadside told me that KeGongFang was not existed any more, the old house has been renovated into shops and restaurants…I was so disappointed. 

The story is like this: there are ten Dongba Paper Shops in old town of Lijiang, selling good quality rice papers, and the papers all come from a major workyard in Yongcun village nearby, but there is a workshop on Xinyi Street, a presentation of the traditional procedure of Dongba Paper making is available.  Better than nothing!   I followed the instructin, turned east into a narrow lane, tried to find the local faces for road direction in more detail, and eventually I was there.