25/2/07 - 27/2/07: Being Lazy

I've been totally lazy over the last 3 days, just chilling and living on the cheap accomodation (15rmb per day) and cheap but excellent food at Mama Naxi's guesthouse. The breakfasts are a choice of fried eggs and tomato on a 'Baba' which is a Naxi pancake or banana pancakes while dinners are an all-you-can-eat affair with Mama just continually rolling out the dishes until everyone is full. The hostel guests sit around 4 tables in the courtyard for dinner at 6pm and usually there are about 7-8 people sitting around each table with 7-8 courses being served - it's 10rmb per person while breakfast is 3rmb. All in all its 28rmb just to 'exist' each day. I think the best thing about Lijiang is the Tiger Leaping Gorge and since I've did the trek I've just been wanting to move on to Sichuan especially Chengdu but I've had to wait for my Tibet travelling buddies to come back from Lake Lugu - they're: Phil from Wigan, and Hugo from the Netherlands hence my extended stay in Lijiang.

25th - Went to Black Dragon Pool with Santiago, Sezgi and Stefan to fulfil Santiago's dream of seeing it because it's one of the 'must see' pictures in the front of the lonely planet.

26th- Didn't do jack - wondered around Lijiang, bought tickets to go to Panzhihua which is the halfway point on the railway line between Kunming and Chengdu and used the net for ages as well as getting a much needed foot massage cos they still hurt from Tiger Leaping.

27th- Went for a longish bikeride with David to Baisha which is a village north of Lijiang and then to look for Puji temple but we couldn't find it cos it was too far up a mountain and biking up mountains is way harder than going up on foot - at least I got off my backside and did something (exercise) today.

I've been in Lijiang since 22/2/07 and it's been far too long in what is basically a tourist town - there's not much to do after you've seen the sites and I'm going to try to avoid touristy places like Lijiang and Yangshuo for the rest of my trip - looking forward to Chengdu. Here's some night scenes in Lijiang: