Tiger Leaping Gorge

The leaping tiger may be a myth but thankfully the rumours we've heard about Tiger Leaping Gorge are all true. The gorge is a couple of hours north of Lijiang in Yunnan. It's one of the deepest in the world, and is about 16kms long. The Chinese visit it in buses, but we headed high above the road on a dirt track where the environment and the villages remain relatively untouched. Up here there are no microphone touting tour guides, no hawkers, no noise and no traffic. Just snowcapped mountains on one side and the odd donkey, villager and guesthouse on the other. We've lingered in the gorge for three nights, although you can do it in one. Call us crazy, but we're in no rush to get back to civilisation. Every morning we've woken up to spectacular views of the mountains, blue sky and sunshine. At night, we've feasted on locally grown vegetables. The trek has taken us around the side of cliffs, up and over mountains, around 30 gruelling uphill bends, through rice paddies, under waterfalls and over piles of rocks left by small avalanches. Bliss.

Gasp! That there'd be blue sky!

Now this is more like it. We survived our 13-hour hard sleeper journey from Chengdu to Panzhihua and are about halfway through an 8-hour bus ride to Lijiang in the Yunnan province.

We've heard good things about this part of China and things are looking promising already. The bus is weaving its way through green valleys that look nothing like the industrial wasteland we've come to expect in China. The sky is a clear blue and the sun is shining.

If we could just get the bus driver to turn off the Chinese music that's blaring out of the TV and get the guy puking in the back to keep it down, we'd be in business.

The hard sleeper may live to fight another day

The earplugs worked a treat so we got a decent kip and we even managed to sort out some porridge for breakfast. No morning goobers came our way from the top bunks, just a bit of vocal throat clearing but we're used to that.

Our friends in soft sleeper on the other hand got a cougher in their 4-berth cabin. Knowing the Chinese don't cover their mouths - even in enclosed spaces - and already infected with the flu, they spent the whole night praying that another Chinese lurgy wasn't headed in their direction.

Anyway, we made it to Chengdu. Tomorrow we're off to see some cuddly pandas (actually we'll probably just take photos of other people cuddling the pandas for a whopping 100 pounds a cuddle). In a couple of days, the migration to the sun will continue. But will we brave the hard sleeper? Stay tuned.

Is this the end of the hard sleeper?

Carl squished into a bunk built for midgets

Maybe it is for us. We vowed that we would downgrade from a soft sleeper cabin to hard sleeper cabin when our journeys became shorter than two nights. So here we are, squished into two middle bunks in a carriage with about another 50 Chinese. No other gringos to be seen. Just us and 50 smelly, spitting, slurping Chinese.

I must admit I'm beginning to think that the 4-berth soft sleeper is worth the extra 5 pounds. But then again 5 pounds is 5 pounds, and at the moment that's the same price as we are paying for a night in a hostel. Plus it's only 16 hours. We've already survived a waiting room that reeked with the stench of a thousand sweaty bodies, a child projectile vomiting in the aisle next to us and the battle for a spot on the luggage rack. Our sleeping bags are protecting us from the dirty bed clothes (they don't change them when one passenger gets off and another gets on) and Carl actually looks kind of comfortable ... for a 6-foot white boy in a bed made for a midget. (He can't stretch his legs out without them hanging across the walkway so his knees may not survive the night.)

My biggest concerns right now are:

• the toilet (never a pleasant experience in China but on Chinese trains they are exceptionally filthy)
• the baby that's screaming it's lungs out in the next carriage
• getting to sleep before the 40-odd men in the carriage, at least half of whom will snore their way happily through the night I'm sure
• not getting spat on when I get out of my bunk in the morning (seriously the Chinese have a major aversion to saliva and will spit anywhere anytime

The earplugs are ready. Next stop: Chengdu

An ambitious little bugger

You've got to give the man credit. Qin Shi Huang, China's first emperor, had a grand plan and he pulled it off. I don't even think George Bush would have the bollocks to build an army of warriors to protect him in the after-life. Little Johnny Howard may have thought about it, but the recent election seems to have put an end to those kind of dreams. Noice one, Aussies, noice one.

The army of terracotta warriors

The lungs take a beating

Carl speeds along Xian's city walls

This morning a bit of exercise sounded like a good idea. We'd bike around Xian's city walls - built in 1370 during the Ming dynasty and still standing today - take in the view and stretch our legs after yesterday's train ride.

The walls are 12m high, up to 18m thick and have a perimeter of about 14kms - the perfect cycling track for a couple of travelers on rusty ol' bikes.

Tonight though, we are wondering if it was really a smart move. We read somewhere that spending a day breathing in the air in China is the equivalent to smoking 70 cigarettes. Call me paranoid, but there was not one spec of blue sky to be seen today and the sun was almost completely obscured by smog. Even our London-ravaged bodies can't withstand the damage we probably did to them today ...

Everest base camp - we cheated!

Tashilhunpo Monastary (Gyantse to Tingri)

Tashilunpo Monastary is the seat of the Panchen Lama, who is second in command to the Dalai Lama (Panchen means 'great scholar').

Before we entered, our guide warned us not to discuss the Dalai Lama with any of the monks. According to our guide, the monks at this monastery will report you to the authorities if they suspect you're sympathetic to the plight of the Dalai Lama and the fight for Tibetan independence. These monks, he claims, receive funding from the Chinese and it's fair to say that the monastery is in much better than nick than most we've seen. A little more probing of our guide and a flick through our trusty lonely planet guide reveals why this monastery is different from the others we've seen.

• Throughout Tibetan history, Panchen Lamas have been 'frequent rivals to the central authority of Lhasa and are often used as pawns in Chinese designs on the high plateau'.
• The 9th Panchen Lama tried to use the Chinese to gain greater influence in Tibet after a disagreement with the Dalai Lama. When the 9th Panchen Lama passed away, Tibetan delegates in Beijing were forced to endorse the Chinese choice for the 10th Panchen Lama (over two Tibetan candidates).
• For a while, the 10th Panchen Lama was regarded suspiciously by the Tibetan people. But his is a classic story of 'bad boy made good'. After the 1959 Lhasa uprising, he refused Chinese Government demands to denounce the Dalai Lama and called for independence. Chinese responded in time-honoured fashion and threw him in jail for 14 years. He was released in 1978 and was much quieter in his opposition (surprise, surprise) but still used whatever influence he had to press for the preservation of Tibetan culture. Just before he returned to Tibet to die in 1989, he argued at a high level meeting in Beijing that the Chinese occupation of Tibet had brought nothing but misery and hardship to the Tibetan people. Many Tibetans argue that he was murdered.
• In May 1985, the Dalai Lama identified the predecessor of the 10th Panchen Lama - a six-year-old boy from Amdo. Within a month, the boy went missing and remains under house arrest at an undisclosed location in China to this day.
• The senior lamas at Tashilunpo monastery were forced to pick an alternative, Chinese-approved boy to take on the role of 11th Panchen Lama. They picked the son of a communist party member.
• According to lonely planet, 'Beijing's interest is not only to control the education of Tibet's number two spiritual leader but also to influence the boy who could later be influential in identifying the reincarnation of the Dalai Lama'.

Interesting.

Journey to western tibet (Lhasa to Gyantse)

Best not to exert yourself too much at this altitude. We've just reached the top of Kambla-La, the first mountain pass on our journey to Everest Base Camp, and at 4799m above sea level it's pretty darn high.

The pass overlooks Yamdrok-Tso, one of Tibet's holiest lakes. It's watched over by a female god (a good sign in itself!) and is definitely the place to be if you're a fish. Apparently, the fish in the lake are also considered holy and can't be caught or eaten. Unfortunately, the Chinese don't share the Tibetan reverence for the area though. They're building a tourist boat for the lake and are planning damns, hydroelectric plants and god knows what else.

The route we're taking into western Tibet is the same one the dalai lama travelled when he fled Tibet in 1959. It's also the route taken by hundreds of Tibetans forced to flee the country, including our guide. At the age of 11, he walked for a month from Tingri (a little further west) to Dharamasala where he was free to study Tibetan, English and computing. He returned as a guide four years ago.

Tibet, the roof of the world

A little Tibetan boy from a village in Western Tibet

The face of a Tibetan is unmistakable. Deep brown weathered skin, dark eyes, and always smiling. Always.

We've spent two days exploring Lhasa, Tibet's capital and the spiritual home of Tibetan Buddhism (yep, they let us in and didn't check for permits - phew), and we're starting to wonder if the locals are permanently giddy from the altitude, particularly when you begin to get an understanding of what they have been subjected to over the years.

We're not experts, but here's the facts as far as we see them:

• Since 1950, when 30,000 Chinese troops attacked Tibet from six different directions crushing an ill-prepared and doomed Tibetan army, the Chinese 'liberation' of the Tibetans has led to more than 1.2 million deaths.
• El Salvador was the only member of the UN to sponsor a motion to condemn the Chinese aggression. Britain and India (so called 'friends' of Tibet) actually managed to convince the UN not to debate the issue for fear of Chinese disapproval.
• The Dalai Lama has always advocated peaceful negotiations - even in the face of fierce aggression and deception.
• When the Chinese Government took control of the high passes of Tibet and India in 1959, the Tibetan Government was abolished and Tibetan society was re-ordered in accordance with Marxist principles - monasteries were destroyed, monks were forced to disrobe and marry, and Tibetan farmers were forced to abandon barley crops in favour of rice (which doesn't grow at high altitudes) causing widespread starvation.
• During the cultural revolution almost every religious monument in Tibet was destroyed and arrests, torture, deforestation, and labour camps became a way of life.
• These days the Tibetan people enjoy only limited religious freedoms. The Dalai Lama remains unwelcome in his own country, there are strict quotas on resident monks and nuns, and the Chinese continue to use tactics of violence and intimidation.

A buddhist prayer site on the yellow river in western Tibet

This only scratches the surface, but it's hard not to be impressed by the spirit of the Tibetan people and the strength of their beliefs. It's impossible to walk into the centre of town and not get swept along by the hundreds of pilgrims walking the Barkour circuit.

Pilgrims walking the Barkour circuit

The circuit is the most famous Lhasa pilgrimage. The walk begins and ends in Barkhour Square and takes you around the Jokhang Temple, the most revered religious structure in Tibet, and is dotted with prayer wheels, chapels, souvenir stands and giant incense burners. These days, the Barkhour Square is paved and open, giving the Chinese a clear view of the locals. (In older photos, it was filled with shrubs and plants.) But remains the focus of protest and violence between the Tibetans and the Chinese.

There are at least five clockwise routes around the city's religious sights. On each one, you'll find the tourists vastly outnumbered by pilgrims spinning prayer wheels and stopping to pray on the pavement, or monks chanting mantras. It's an amazing sight and a real treat.

Check out some of our photos