See, we said China was big - 5 weeks in total to cover a small portion of it! We eventually arrived in Lijiang to find we had no accommodation. So, while Steve sorted that one out we decided to go for dinner by the river in the old town, what a beautiful place; it was exactly what you think of when you watch those old Chinese movies except you had a choice of Chinese, Japanese, Western or Korean food.
We'd heard a rumour that there was an English bar in town so we decided to hunt it down - lo and behold there was one run by a yorkshireman who married a local girl and never left. We spent far too much time there swapping stories, playing pool and drinking English ales.
We did get some culture, it wasn't all about the beer - a night in the old town watching lanterns float down the river, Karaoke competitions with the locals and great street food. Christine took part in a fancy dress party dressing up as Vicky Pollard and doing a very good job of it - You can take the girl out of the North East but you can't take the North East out of the girl!
After a few days here we headed further south to Dali which was similar to Lijiang but much more relaxed - Dope was openly sold and smoked giving the place the feel of Amsterdam. Not much culture here, just relaxing and unwinding after long drive days. Little did we know what we would get on the trip to the Laos border. Heavy rains had washed away huge sections of road meaning that a 2 day journey took four instead with us having to dig the truck out on more than one occasion - try digging a 22 ton truck out of the mud at 6am in the rain and you'll appreciate the office job!
Not only were the roads dodgy, but so was our compulsory "guide" - 20k from the border he told us we didn't have the correct paperwork and it wouldn't be available for four days. We ended up staying in a one horse town called Mengla waiting for the papers, as we had all but exhausted our Chinese money in anticipation of leaving we were not amused to find that the ATM didn't work and we had to wait until office hours to get cash. There were high points though, we went to a traditional tea house and were served a selection of teas in the traditional way by our hostess who waited on us hand and foot in our private room - much like a Geisha. Everyone else went on the beer and confirmed that Chinese nightclubs are nothing to write home about. Oh, there were loads of brothels as well - a very confused little town that we were happy to see the back of.
And on we go - Laos, yay!
We'd heard a rumour that there was an English bar in town so we decided to hunt it down - lo and behold there was one run by a yorkshireman who married a local girl and never left. We spent far too much time there swapping stories, playing pool and drinking English ales.
We did get some culture, it wasn't all about the beer - a night in the old town watching lanterns float down the river, Karaoke competitions with the locals and great street food. Christine took part in a fancy dress party dressing up as Vicky Pollard and doing a very good job of it - You can take the girl out of the North East but you can't take the North East out of the girl!
After a few days here we headed further south to Dali which was similar to Lijiang but much more relaxed - Dope was openly sold and smoked giving the place the feel of Amsterdam. Not much culture here, just relaxing and unwinding after long drive days. Little did we know what we would get on the trip to the Laos border. Heavy rains had washed away huge sections of road meaning that a 2 day journey took four instead with us having to dig the truck out on more than one occasion - try digging a 22 ton truck out of the mud at 6am in the rain and you'll appreciate the office job!
Not only were the roads dodgy, but so was our compulsory "guide" - 20k from the border he told us we didn't have the correct paperwork and it wouldn't be available for four days. We ended up staying in a one horse town called Mengla waiting for the papers, as we had all but exhausted our Chinese money in anticipation of leaving we were not amused to find that the ATM didn't work and we had to wait until office hours to get cash. There were high points though, we went to a traditional tea house and were served a selection of teas in the traditional way by our hostess who waited on us hand and foot in our private room - much like a Geisha. Everyone else went on the beer and confirmed that Chinese nightclubs are nothing to write home about. Oh, there were loads of brothels as well - a very confused little town that we were happy to see the back of.
And on we go - Laos, yay!
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