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.