Our trip to CHina is drawing to an end and I think I am ready to go home.
had a wonderful time and many great memories and experiences and met a lot of interesting people (not that I understood most of them though)
yesterday was probably our least auspicious day.
we got up early and the mist was still heavy where we were up in the mountains. The paths were narrow with a steep drop on one side, and every thing was damp. We had to pass a donkey on the path and as I went past him my foot just slipped off the path and I dropped about 1.5m giving me a huge bruise on my upper thigh. Not a great way to start out 8km hike across the mountains. I limped back to the hotel worse for wear, and had 2hard boiled eggs for breakfast as the menu there was very limited. We packed our backpack and arranged for it to be taken down to our driver, then headed off in the mist.
our English speaking guide, mai, was great and we had a some good chats with me limping along behind, but because of the mist we never saw anything of the famous terraces that day. Fortunately we had seen some the night before, and the view from our window was fantastic.
mae guided us from Dazhai to pingan about a 4 hour walk. Despite the weather and my leg, it was an enjoyable walk.
when we got to the carpark, the driver had not collected our bags. He dropped us off at the bottom of the mountain while he drove back to get our bags. After an hour and a half waiting we were getting concerned but he finally turned up after about two hours and we started with the rally driving again.
when we got to our hotel in guiilin air just crashed (into bed) as the dreadd stomach bug was coming back for a third visit.
then this morning we flew to Shenzhen. Contrary to expectations, the flight actually left early and we arrived ahead of schedule. At the airport I felt like a coffee until I saw they were $12 each. So I had an orange juice instead - probably better for me.
We went out to the shops this afternoon and out of interest were looking at mobile phones. The main shops had them at australian prices, though the little stores Just behind them had them at half price. Not sure if they were seconds or what. They had stacks of unlabelled phone batteries and were putting Samsung stickers on them as we watched. Made us think the phones might be dodgy too.
anyway, shopping is not really my thing at the best of times.
our hotel tonight is a two roomed suite in central Shenzhen. We ate at their restaurant tonight, but because of language issues ended up with a plate of pork and. A plate of fish. Both very tasty but no vegetables or anything else to go with them. I managed to order rice as an afterthought. We went to the supermarket afterwards and bought some mandarins.
well, that about wraps it up for china.
thank you for joining me on this trip. I have had a wonderful time and seen some very interesting places. It has all gone smoothly apart from yesterday's problems, and I am very fortunate to have had sue do all the planning and directions. She has also been prepared to carry backpacks, ride motor scooters, travel in the peak hour subway, and generally put up with me, so i consider myself a very lucky man.
