Buses in China

Chengdu and JiuZhaiGou are only about 400 km apart. Unfortunately, in China, that translates to a 13 hour bus ride. Now, the ride wouldn't have been so bad if:

 

(a) the lady sitting in front of us hadn't spit on the floor of the bus as soon as we boarded and if she had left her devil child at home

 

(b) we hadn't been sitting in the cramped seats at the back of the bus directly above the hot engine

 

(c) the bus driver had actually managed the pit stops a little better instead of stopping twice within an hour, then not at all for three hours, and then every hour thereafter and

 

(d) there were paved roads.

 

Despite all that we made it safely to JiuZhaiGou and had an amazing two days hiking in the gorgeous Chinese mountains. JiuZhaiGou is the "land of fairy tales", says the visitors map we received, full of lakes, waterfalls, meadows, and forests. The water in the lakes was so clear that you could see all the way to the bottom and so blue that it was as though it had been touched up with some food dye. It honestly was unlike anything I have ever seen before.

 

Unfortunately our hotel was a little bit like our bus experience, no hot water until after 8pm and then limited amounts of it, bugs in the rooms and dirty sheets, extra charges and very mean hotel staff. But we survived and are now thoroughly enjoying our hotel in Chengdu complete with buffet breakfast. Tomorrow we head off on a 20 hour bus ride to LiJiang and then we will spend two days hiking at the Tiger Leaping Gorge. We know we'll hate every moment of the bus ride but unfortunately it is the only option that will provide us enough time to see everything we want to see before leaving for Hong Kong on the 16th. But I honestly feel that the inconvenience in hotels and buses is more than made up by experiencing the beauty of China's nature.