Raoul's China Saloon (V5.0) Beta

The Bar Room => The Saloon Photo Album => Topic started by: Maifeilan on November 29, 2012, 08:11:07 AM

Title: mid August in the Guizhou mountains
Post by: Maifeilan on November 29, 2012, 08:11:07 AM

... I landed back in CQ on the 15th ... my ganma (godmother) and I were on a mission for an off campus apartment which was accomplished within 20 hours of landing o_O ... I recall two weeks of stressbag before leaving TO on account of having no clue about how bloody easy this would be with the help of my CQ mama and a chance encounter with a couple of girls from my school who had studied with a couple of my brit. council colleagues two years previous ... I landed, went to mama & baba's, ate and drank and was put to bed ... got up the next morning in 40+ steaming degrees ... and a very few hours later it was done.  Mama said, "It's stinking hot. Call your boss and make sure it's okay to go back to Guizhou with me and hang out with grandma..." ... so I did and it was.

(http://i1149.photobucket.com/albums/o590/wooo_O/the-view-from-the-road---guizhou.jpg)

... we were lodged in the top left ...

(http://i1149.photobucket.com/albums/o590/wooo_O/best-guizhou-sunrise.jpg)

jet lag sunrises are glorious when you have naught to do but marvel ...

(http://i1149.photobucket.com/albums/o590/wooo_O/guizhou-sunrise.jpg)

(http://i1149.photobucket.com/albums/o590/wooo_O/cows---guizhou.jpg)

... one morning on an early hunt for Chinese medicine in the form of a flowering thing, we stumbled upon a random herd of cows ... cowbell in abundance :)

(http://i1149.photobucket.com/albums/o590/wooo_O/the-morning-swimmers.jpg)

I joined the morning swimmers ... an instant habit took hold: breakfast, tea & tobacco, then a half hour walk uphill for a swim ...

(http://i1149.photobucket.com/albums/o590/wooo_O/our-young-friend-wang-tou.jpg)

... no sooner did the habit set, one morning, straggling behind with my camera, I saw a smaller branch of what I'd taken for the usual swimming crew veer off and descend into the green ... towards a farm house and right past a friendly boy whose father offered us walking sticks from a heap of bamboo ...

(http://i1149.photobucket.com/albums/o590/wooo_O/hunting-the-elusive-tian-ji-huang.jpg)

they were hunting the hard to spot tian ji huang ... a flowering thing destined to be steeped for tea that I was soon being taught to pick out of a green August riot of tree and brush and wild everywhere ... I was awful and blind about it at first, but I eventually got better at it or else we'd stumbled on a fat patch or two - either way I saved gatherer-face and picked my mama quite a dense fistful of the stuff ;) ...

(http://i1149.photobucket.com/albums/o590/wooo_O/home-for-lunch.jpg)

(http://i1149.photobucket.com/albums/o590/wooo_O/happy-hunters.jpg)

... and then we went back for a victory lunch of all good things and many cold beer.

I can't wait to get back to Guizhou when the heat is on.

 bfbfbfbfbf









Title: Re: mid August in the Guizhou mountains
Post by: Granny Mae on November 29, 2012, 11:18:01 AM
Thanks for taking me on that journey Maifeilan! bfbfbfbfbf
Title: Re: mid August in the Guizhou mountains
Post by: Monkey King on November 29, 2012, 03:18:06 PM
Great pictures, that part of China is just so ridiculously lush and green in the summer.  Must make plans to escape at least part of this grim Eastern seaboard winter...
Title: Re: mid August in the Guizhou mountains
Post by: fullricebowl on November 29, 2012, 04:01:59 PM
Where in Guizhou were you? Your photos really remind me of the trip I took to a village near the Sichuan border last summer. The umbrellas and swimming rings especially :). Up in the mountains I found it much more comfortable than the weather in Shanghai!
Title: Re: mid August in the Guizhou mountains
Post by: Maifeilan on November 29, 2012, 04:39:22 PM
We were very near 习水 - xi shui ... now it seems to me that designate belongs to a larger collection of stuff down the mountain a bit since up where we were there were just hostels along the highway and farms in between ... I don't think we were too far from the Sichuan border at all.  I suspect we were in the same neck o' the woods in fact :)

It was cooler, wasn't it?  It was bloody amazing.  I bet it's absolutely beautiful up there right about now too ...
Title: Re: mid August in the Guizhou mountains
Post by: Maifeilan on November 29, 2012, 04:45:45 PM
Anybody know what this is...? I saw lots up there and I thought it must be some kind of cone flower ... so pretty and so tall!

(http://i1149.photobucket.com/albums/o590/wooo_O/cone-flower-of-some-kind.jpg)
Title: Re: mid August in the Guizhou mountains
Post by: fullricebowl on November 29, 2012, 05:26:43 PM
Very cool. We made a day trip over toward the Sichuan border but were staying a little closer to Zunyi. I think the area is just gorgeous; just wish a little more of their tax went into road maintence!
Title: Re: mid August in the Guizhou mountains
Post by: Raoul F. Duke on November 29, 2012, 06:39:14 PM
Thanks for posting these gorgeous photos! bjbjbjbjbj
Title: Re: mid August in the Guizhou mountains
Post by: Maifeilan on November 29, 2012, 08:13:23 PM
My pleasure, and I'm glad you enjoyed them :) ... it was quite relaxing to sit and look at them awhile last night and relive a lazy week in the mountains ... things got pretty damn busy pretty fast when I came down and back to the city, and it hasn't let up since ...  kkkkkkkkkk ...