Both had a lot of plans for us, only boredom wasn't included. First of all we drove to the West hill. Why should we go the the hotel first for a shower? Not necessary. And the West hill is pretty nice, no stairs, it's definetly not steep and it's a very relaxing walk. That's what our guide told us. The way up hill we found a cable car, from there it went down ;-)
At least the tracks are hand made by one single taoist monk who lived 300 years. If you believe what the chinese believe. The funny thing is, as soon as you ignore the temperature you think, you're in Austria. If there weren't these chinese characters and buildings from time to time.
On the way back in the valley we found a lot of Buddhas. One of the was female - that's new for us. The female Buddhas are needed for the child blessings, we couldn't imagine, why. Also on the way there is the Dragon Gate. As we're in China there is also a story for this one: If a carp from the lake down in the valley manages to jump over the Dragon gate, he becomes a dragon. Well this could be one reason, that the dragons in China are extinct. Or it's the explanation, why there are so less carps in the lake. But for sure it brings some luck in future exams if you touch the gate and if you believe.
Enough sports for the day, back to the hotel, unpack, having a shower, dinner and all those things you do during vacation. But that was our plan, not the plan of our guide. There is a buddhist monastery waiting for us. We arrived there 5 minutes before 6pm, and usually the monastery closes at 6pm. But our guide had enough connections, that we got a special exception.
To give you a short overview of the fauna and flora, we shot some pictures as samples of the variety of the nature here in Yunnan. The last of the pictures is a Ginkgo Tree.
We also revealed the secret of the different colors of the incense sticks. The yellow ones are for prosperity and health, the red ones for money, partnership and love. Why money and love are shared by one color, well, thats maybe a different story.....
Ok,we saw the really nice monastery, it was worth to go there, definetly. But now to the hotel? No way, first of all we're going for Dinner. In a real Yunnan restaurant with the local specialty: Over the bridge noodles. And again the story behind the name: Once upon a time there was this man in the jail (innocent as always). In the ancient time, the family was responsible to bring food for the captive, so his wife brought him everyday a soup with noodles, vegetables, meat and all this stuff. But unfortunately the jail was on an island in the middle of a big lake (no, we don't know, where this lake was and what the name of the lake was, hey, it's a story). There was only one long bridge to reach the jail and the result of the long walk was, that the soup was cold until it reached the poor, innocent man. The solution was pretty easy: the wife transported the soup and the ingredients seperatly. And they lived happily ever after.....
We got as main dish a "over the bridge noodles" and a s starter pig ears and pig tail. Yummie....
More than in Suzhou we had to give the real tourists as model with the local people in the restaurant. Wow, we're stars again ;-)
And then we got hit by the culture of the Bai minority. Life on the stage in the restaurant they performed a show with dance and music. Very traditionell, very nice, very colorful and very noisy.
After the treats, a lot of impressions and adventures we arrived in the middle of the night in the hotel. Groggy as we were we fall into the bed and slept like the groundhogs. If groundhogs are living in these mountains, we don't know, but this is again a total different story......
signs...
...are overall and everywhere. Some make sense, some not,
sometimes just a perfect chinglish.
