TIGER LEAPING GORGE

We met a Spaniard in Lijiang. He was wearing a conical hat á la southeast Asian rice farmer and had a dread-locked mullet that hung down to his waist. After smoothly tossing all five locks over his shoulder to dangle down his chest, he went on to tell Yago and me that Tiger Leaping Gorge was ‘only OK’ . Only OK? Pardon my Español, but that place was fuckin' awesome! He must have gotten off the bus at Tiger Leaping Gutter. Either that, or he was too busy matting his poop-locks to notice where the hell he was. Hearing such mediocre reviews of a place is good sometimes, it kind of lowers the bar. But even if he’d told us that it was the most beautiful place on earth, I still would’ve been blown away.

The bus ride to Tiger Leaping Gorge was a delightful preview of our adventures to come. Looming over Lijiang to the north is the almighty Jade Dragon Snow Mountain, and in three hours time we’d rounded the snow-capped range to where the Jinsha River becomes pinched between the Jade Dragon and its almost equally impressive neighbor the Haba Snow Mountain. Less than thirty minutes after we’d jumped off the bus we were trekking along the north side of the gorge, high above the river on the slopes of Haba Mountain, with the colossal Jade Dragon staring at us from across the canyon. Even though I’d seen the mountains looming in the distance all morning long, I still looked up and thought, where the hell did these come from? This is when I really came to appreciate China’s geographic diversity. It’s kind of like China’s cuisine, there’s a lot more to it than kung-pao chicken and sweet-n-sour pork. 

We passed through a few villages in areas where the slopes of Haba Mountain became fleetingly more gradual. The earth was baked and dusty, but below each village irrigated terraces of plush green agriculture spilled towards the river. The hike was rigorous for the first three or four hours, but after a grueling vertical section appropriately named the Twenty-Eight Bends, we found ourselves cruising progressively downhill for the rest of the day. By six o’clock we’d reached a small village that marked the midway point on our two-day trek, and before long we’d checked into a guesthouse and had cracked open a couple of beers. The guesthouse was rather empty upon arrival, but over the next few hours more and more hikers rolled in to settle down for the evening. With cold beers in hand we posted up on a balcony overlooking the Jade Dragon, and as the sun sank behind us, we stared out across the gorge and watched the shadow of nightfall slowly overtake the opposing mountainside. People were exhausted after a day of hiking, but the conversation was lively, and when the kitchen opened, everyone headed down into the dining hall for a well-deserved meal. Yago and I found ourselves at a large table with a Belgian guy and a group of four young Chinese people. The food and conversation were equally stimulating, and despite sporadic power outages, the revelries carried on, fueled by candlelight. It was a wonderful way to end the day, and the delightful combination of food, beer, and exhaustion, had everyone stumbling towards bed around ten o’clock.

The sun didn’t peak over the imposing Jade Dragon until around nine o’clock the next morning, and soon after that we were back on the trail with our new friends for another wonderful day of hiking. The pack had grown to nine overnight, and the leisurely trek was full of laughter and conversation. The journey concluded mid-afternoon after a dramatic down-and-up hike to the bottom of the gorge (including a fifty-four rung ladder bolted onto the side of a cliff), and by four o’clock the group had disbanded. Yago and I caught a bus back to Lijiang, and from there he and I parted ways. Not only had my stint with Yago come to an end, but so had my six-week adventure in China, and after an overnight train to Kunming, I boarded a flight out of the country. But not back to the States, not yet!

I had originally planned to teach English in China, but since the job fell through last minute, I ended up doing a little bit of traveling instead. What a privilege! Once I got to China I discovered that finding a teaching job wouldn’t be too hard, so I thought I'd do some exploring and possibly find a cool place to teach for a while. But that’s when my friend Charlie came calling from the jungles Borneo, and said that he could give me some work for the summer. Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia? Why not! So that’s where I’m heading next. I’m looking forward to putting my bag down for a while and getting to know a place. But not before a quick stop in Thailand...