Clairesj's Travel Blog a travel blog by Clairesj

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photos! Skardu, Pakistan Shock horror- i have new photos up! i just put the SD card in a different bag! enjoy! written by  Clairesj on July 26, 2009 from Skardu, Pakistan from the travel blog: Clairesj's Travel Blog Send a Compliment comment on this...

glaciers and apricots Pasu, Pakistan Along drive along the KKH and we arrived at Pasu, a small village surrounded my mountains. we are staying in a campsite with a nice restaurant attached to it, and a friendly owner. Hot Rock previously developed 3 sports routes on a crag nearby the campsite, which is the only developed climbing in the area. they are slab climbs that are plesant. others in the group have now put up 3 more routes, well they all have anchors at least, but the drilling has been taking 45 mins per bolt hole, and after that the battery dies, so it is slow progress. there is also only electricity every other night here so recharging is difficult! a nice 6c has been put up with bouldery moves, which im working. its a shock to be getting pumped again as its been such a long time since i climbed a route! we have received more newbies, hannahs mum (who is officially called 'mum' becasue her name is also Clare!) and her partner Daj are on the trip and Daj is an experienced mountaineer. so a group of us went up to the glacier so he could teach us cravass rescue and the basics. 5 of us then thought we would go higher up the glacier to join a path for a longer way back. it turned into a bit of an epic, taking all day and the glacier got more steep and cravassy! daj got a rope out for me when we had to cross vertical walls, and learning how to front point on crampons, feeling like i was almost ice climbing! it was exciting and scary having big drops below us! then we had to go up a steep scree slope to join a path. the glacier was amazing- it was huge and dramatic- like what you see in national geographic! lots of fun. I think i am jinxed though, as the next trad route i do after Jill fell off- i climb with Hannah and we find a nice easy looking V Diff. Hannah leads and gets over half way up then pulls a block (about 25cm squared ish!) off and takes a fall onto her gear, and this block whistles past me! we were both a little shaky! I seem to be being a bit unlucky at the moment as far as trad goes! its like im being tested. For the rest of the days i am going to do a river walk- crossing a couple of scary looking bridges, some more sport climbing. In 5 days we are going into the next country which i have been warned not to use its name as they control internet and can block webpages if you use specific names! im not sure on the details yet. we also may not be able to access the internet becasue in Kashgar they have cut all internet off to clamp down, and currently have a strong police pressence in the town. it all seems quite strict. we are going to Shiptons arch- which is taller than the empire state building, but is a natural arch. its apparently climbable but is very loose conglomerate rock, and sounds quite sketchy so im not sure how many people will climb it. written by  Clairesj on August 3, 2009 from Pasu, Pakistan from the travel blog: Clairesj's Travel Blog Send a Compliment comment on this...

indiana jones, karaoke and dog meat Pasu, Pakistan We had a spontaneous party one night when some of the guys found some Chinese firewater (a spirit), as alcohol is illegal in Pakistan, this seems to be the alcohol that crosses the border. We all went down to BiRT and put some loud music on and danced on the roof! The following day I tried the 6c making some progress- I linked the first 2/3rds in one go- it had great cruxs with wicked moves. I joined Suuz, Danny, Hannahj and Sebastian on a bridge walk- this involved crossing the river on 2 bridges that were Indiana Jones style! They were pretty scary- consisting of steel cables (lots of broken strands) and random planks of wood that weren’t really planks- more strips of wood, often broken and spaced far apart, pushed through the cables. It took over 10 mins to cross too. We managed to turn it into a mini adventure by taking the lower road to the bridge which Khan told us not to take! It was steep with scree heading into the river. But the real reason was the path had collapsed at one point. Dannys idea was to wade into the swampy river to rejoin the path! We ended up in waist deep freezing water but made it to thew bridge. We met a lady from Malaysia who joined us on the walk but decided to turn back at the wading, but met us on the otherside after finding an easy path not far back! In the small village on the otherside of the river wemet a local called Abraham who showed us the was to the next bridge and when we crossed, he offered us tea at his house. (the 2nd bridge was worse and next to it was the remains of the new bridge- blown away in a hurricane!) Abraham was into fine art and we discovered his father used to be a porter back in the 50s and 60s on some expeditions to summit virgin peaks. He went with Brits, Germans and Japanese up 8000m peaks and had letters of recommendation from the teams on his wall. Unfortunately he didn’t speak English but seemed a character! We were given tea and apricots and salt for our tea- apparently a northern Pakistani thing- we presumed it was sugar until Sebastian put a teaspoon full in and found he was drinking sea water! The family were far from offended when we found it funny- they joined in! we hitched a ride with the first car that passed. One last day in Passu and we tried the sports routes again. Then it was goodbye to Paul and off along the KKH towards the border. We got through Pakistan Immigration in the morning and drove the rest of the day through no mans land. We camped overnight in no mans land then drove to the Chinese immigration, passing the official border at 4800m altitude. We were struck immediatel by changes- all the men in army uniform- the smooth tarmac road with lines on it and 2 lanes! And the toilets- a building with 4 holes and small dividers that us girls had to use at the same time. The boys had a guard watching them too! They examined all our luggage- taking everything out all our lockers, then we had to do it all again at the official immigration a few hours drive later in Tashkirgan. Here we had our temperature taken, bags x-rayed and BiRT had to be thoroughly checked so we checked into a hotel- a nice hotel with free shampoo, TV and 2 to a room! We met our first liason officer- we have to have one all the time with us traveling through China to keep an eye on us! His name was Abdul, and was a nice guy and useful when sorting out bills etc! At dinner, the group discovered beer for the equivalent of 30p and it soon turned into a party, where we went to a karaoke bar which looked like someones house and the soundsystem was really bad! We explored the town finding fresh fruit- grapes and apples! And really good ice-cream for 10p. we ended up staying for an extra day as BiRT had to have certain forms to get into the country which didn’t arrive. We walked round the old fort and saw nomads on the grasslands. We were ready to get driving again to Kashgar. also the food- we have a meal called '4 Disc Pure Speculation'. I think the meat in it was exactly that! we havent seen any dogs around and had meat in every meal- including what they call the vegetarian meals! so im fairly sure we have eaten dog or other random animals! written by  Clairesj on August 22, 2009 from Pasu, Pakistan from the travel blog: Clairesj's Travel Blog Send a Compliment comment on this...

the 4th ascent of the worlds biggest rock arch!! Tashkurgan, China As soon as BiRT was free, we drove to Kashgar- that was 8pm so we arrived at 2.45am. everyone sung along to cheesy music sitting on the bouldering mats at the back of BiRT as it got dark. We had a brief stop at Lake Karakul which was near Mustagh Ata (7000m peak that is quite accessible). Again we got a nice hotel and Hannah and I woke up at 12 the next day just in time to catch the end of breakfast- pancakes! We are in Beijing time here which is 2 hours ahead of Pakistan time, so a lot of people use local time, but businesses use Beijing time. It’s a bit strange but means we have light until 10pm. Kashgar is a busy city but has good pavements and is clean but very busy and smoggy. The people here have Turgistan influence so most don’t look typically Chinese. The womens dress is aweful- sequines and frills and bad colours- like children dressing up! We had a brief day to sort ourselves out before getting taxis- modern jeeps- luxury!- to Shiptons Arch. I now officially have the title of 4th ascent of the biggest natural rock arch in the world! It still sounds so cool! So after hearing from Duncan all the details about the climb, as he did it last year (the first ascent was by the National Geographic 10 years before). The arch is made of loose conglomerate rock so its not going to be world class climbing as every step you have to check the pebbles wont break off! Duncan explained his route as ascending a gully solo to a scary traverse with bolts spaced 8-9 metres apart, then a 60m abseil to the beginning of the route- this ment leaving static lines on the ab to jumar back up again to get off the route. After was a 3 pitch climb to the top of about Severe/HS grade. He described the bolts as probably ok- but they are essentially drilled into mud and pebbles! The whole thing sounded scary but I was sort of intrigued! I casually agreed to climb with Graham but depending on what it looked like and how Danny got on on the first day. Team 1 was Danny, Hannah and Seb and Veroni. Graham and I got up with them at 7am when it was still dark (after I slept just in my sleeping bag under the stars!) and set off along the half hour walk to the arch. The surprise at the archwas universal- ‘wow’ was all we could say as we looked up to the top of the arch and down into the depths of the valley. The guys decided to look at a different gully that the National Geographic took and found it cut out the scary traverse and abseil. At that point I decided I was climbing it! The four reached the top at lunchtime- much quicker than expected so we decided to go for the summit that day. Roscoe joined us as a 3 and we started up the gully. I found this really scary as parts were so steep you had to bridge up with a long drop below you, having to trust the pebbles. At the top (about 100m) we had a terrifying traverse of 5 metres or so on loose stone over a massive drop- it felt so exposed! I was glad to reach a bolt and start using ropes! We met the other 4 at their last abseil point considering how to do the traverse pitch, so Graham led the pitch- I bolt in 20m with a second rope that could be fixed both ends and used as a static rope to clip into when abseiling. The great thing about this is I could clip into the rope while climbing and avoid having to worry about the possibility of a 10+ m swing into nowhere and having to jumar up. The next pitch Roscoe led and it had no bolts until the belay, and the last pitch was longer with 3 bolts. The climbing was fine and not as loose as I was expecting. We went up the ridge line so could see miles in both directions with an amazing view on top down into the slot canyon and over the other mountains. The top was about 2m wide, so we enjoyed the view but were quickly ready to start abseiling down which Danny had said was he scariest bit. This was because it was down the ridge so if you slipped you would take a massive swing (possibly cutting the rope on sharp pebbles, worst case scenario) or hang in mid air in the arch and have to jumar up the rope. I didn’t want to test the bolts that well either! Roscoe wanted to go down first, which ment he then held the rope at the next belay to hopefully stop me from swinging if I slipped. We had no trouble though and got down to the top of the gully. As I had found the gully so scary, we used a bolt left by the NG (10 years earlier and no hanger so we tied some tat round it) and used it to ab off- it moved so not ideal! the ab finished just before the worst part of the gully- typical! about 7 hours later we were back on the ground and very pleased/ relieved with ourselves. back to reheat leftover dinner. the rest of the group had moaned so much about going to Shiptons arch becasue there is nothing else to do there- its in the middle of nowhere, that Danny walked all the way back to the road to ring the taxis to pick us up. so at 11.30 that evening we had to quickly pack up and again arrive at Kashgar at 2am. just around the corner is a western restaurant owned by a new zealander and it sells proper cheese burgers- hurrah!! and it has chinese monopoly and pool. weve spent the last couple of days there including a party there which ended in the early morning. the owner produced a spicy vodka shot with a dead scorpian in the bottom- there was no way i was trying it, but a few oif the guys did, eating the scorpian- yuk! we visited the sunday market which was full of all sorts including a lot of fur, w saw a whole tiger fur, and i finally found a musical instrument. we go on to t!bet as soon as our liason officer turns up. written by  Clairesj on August 22, 2009 from Tashkurgan, China from the travel blog: Clairesj's Travel Blog Send a Compliment comment on this...

blogs will come soon!! Lhasa, China just to let you know i have put loads of photos up and i have various blogs to upload, but i wrote them on Suuz's laptop on the journey here and they are on a modern version of word so not compatibule ojn this computer! it would take me ages to write it all out again so i will hopefully save it in a different way then post them up soon. there is a lot to tell- be warned! im off to Yangshuo tomorrow so sohuld have lots of regualr internet access again-yey!! updates to follow.... written by  Clairesj on September 3, 2009 from Lhasa, China from the travel blog: Clairesj's Travel Blog Send a Compliment comment on this...

drive days and 5400m Lhasa, China Ali, 23rd I updated all my blog yesterday then came to a different internet cafe today and found that blogabond is blocked. dave couldnt get onto his blog either so i presume its the government controlling it. very annoying! so i am writing this in my email to transfer when i can. at least email is still accessible. we are now onto our 6th drive day in a row which is hard work! it has been early starts and driving all day until dinner and sometimes beyond. the scenery changed quickly and dramatically into high altitude mountainous desert. its quite stunning, with sand for miles, then colourful mountains and the odd lake in the distance all around us. we come across small villages with restaurants for lunch and dinner, big distances apart. i finally got a shower this morning, which was something after 5 days without sitting in the truck getting covered in sand and dust! we have now been upto 5400m twice in a day and havent been below 4300 for the last few days. so not surprisingly most of the group have been getting altitude sickness symptoms, including me- head ache, tiredness, feeling energyless and sick. hannah has it quite bad and feels really dizzy and not with it. it is a bit scary because usually you could just go back down the mountain and be ok again, but we cant go down! we are driving to mount Kailash today so going back up to 5000m and camping at this height. i am a bit nervous about it, and potentially want to do the 3 day trek around mount Kailash which clenses all your sins aparently and gets upto 5600m so it will prob be quite hard to breath!! i think i will be relieved to get down to normal air! we have been camping by the side of the road, which is actually not allowed by the police for tourists to stop there, so we have been pretenting BiRT has broken down to do this, and we stayed in a little house that had lots of beds crowded into one room- but it was warm! the temperature has got freezing. mostly we sit in BiRT in our down jackets and sleeping bags just to keep warm. when we stop for breakfast- which is porridge made on a small portable stove, it has been particularly bad- when i washed my plate and left it for 5 mins- the remaining water had frozen! it cooled my porridge down a bit! We found an unknown crag on the way yesterday, so stopped and had the afternoon exploring. i did a nice easy 2 pitch climb with Jill that had the potential to do at least 5 further pitches to reach the top if we had more time. i gear was run out though! we then drove onto Ali that evening and were planning to have a vote whether to miss a trek to have more days at the crag, but then found out we couldnt go back there because there is a check point inbetween Ali and the crag, so we could not explain why we were changing our schedule to the guards, as they are sooooo strict here! so it is onwards with our original plan. we are also not allowed to split from the group, so that limits us all to doing exactly what is on the schedule. after Kailash is 4 driving days then Mount Everest basecamp trek, then onto Lhasa. So far, i dont feel like we are in T!bet, but i think perhaps tomorrow when i see monks and prayer flags, etc. then it will be how i imagined it here. written by  Clairesj on September 3, 2009 from Lhasa, China from the travel blog: Clairesj's Travel Blog Send a Compliment comment on this...

tattoos and limestone karsts Yangshuo, China im afraid that my Mount Kailash blog will have to come in a couple of weeks, because as usual i forgot to sort it out before i left, and i left my notebook with it in on BiRT! Lhasa was a lovely city, very relaxed and nicely touristy. more to come in the other blog. i got a tattoo while i was in Lhasa. some of the other guys wanted to get one, and having wanted one for a long time, i thought i would go with them to get ideas, but not to get one! the tattoo artist didnt seem amazing so i left it and went off shopping to the barhkor. at 7 in the evening, i bumped into Hannah's mum who told me she had found a really nice tattoo parlor where Danny was getting a tattoo done at that minute. so i went along to talk to the girl for ideas of a design, and she was an amazing artist who ended up spending over 2 hours designing me a tattoo based on chinese art that all related to nature, and she altered it so it had mountains in. i was very fussy but she was also a perfectionist! i was so pleased with it that i had to get it done! its on my leg, just above my ankle. ill put up a photo of it soon. what a great souvineer from T!bet! I am now in Yangshuo after buying a flight from Lhasa, first to chonqing (not sure if spelling is right), then another flight to Guillin, then a bus to the centre of the town and a further bus to Yangshuo! the trip went quite smoothly- we almost missed our second flight becasue the first was delayed and we had to recheck our luggage in. we just managed to in time, then the second flight was a bit delayed! i have gone ahead of the truck and will join them later, either in Chengdu, or just wait until they reach Yangshuo in just over 2 weeks time. Veronica, Jill, Sebastian and Gareth came with me. we got a shock when we arrived in Yangshuo- expecting a nice relaxed touristy town, we found a big busy city full of Chinese tourists and crowds. but we searched out the couple of climbing centres that exist right in the middle of the caos! 'Ch!naclimb' is a centre that organises sessions for groups all over Ch!na, and there is a restaurant that is climber freindly called 'Karst Cafe' and also a really small climbing shop called 'Spiderman Climbing'. we found the guys at Ch!naclimb could give us some advice on places to climb and how to get to the crags. we are staying in a youth hostel which is actually pretty nice, even though its on a street with lots of shops full of girls- a bit bizarre! the limestone karsts are amazing. its about a 15 min taxi ride to the crags, where you are surrounded by karsts as far as you can see, (which isnt really that far becasue of the humid haze!). most are covered with trees and greenery, but some have huge rock faces exposed. this means all the climbing is overhanging becasue it is the areas that cant grow trees that are exposed! so far i have found the climbing hard- i am really out of shape, physically and mentally, and it doesnt help that thuggy overhanging climbing is not really my style! im ashamed to say i have been getting pumped on 5's and failing on 6b's. im hoping my strength and confidence will make a fast reappearance as it is very frustrating at the moment. as i potentially have 5 weeks here, im sure its just a matter of time! the rock is generally very sharp and mottled, some areas have tufas (i tried my first tufa climb today- very strange! and this huge tufa sounded hollow inside!), and some areas are getting polished, especially footholds. but the routes so far have been really nice, with good variety. we have already checked out 5 crags, as it works well to go to one which is in the shade in the morning, then as the sun comes round, move to a different one in the shade in the afternoon. its imposible to climb in the sun as it is so hot and SO humid, that drinking enough water in the shade is almost impossible! a couple of days ago, it was Sebe's birthday so we went out for a western meal at Karst cafe and had awesome pizza and lasagne. we are now back to cheap chinese noodles and rice and veg, which we have found extra cheap at a restaurant nearby. Zamora, Shaggy and Ed got the train to Yangshuo which took about 3 days, so they should be arriving tonight. written by  Clairesj on September 6, 2009 from Yangshuo, China from the travel blog: Clairesj's Travel Blog Send a Compliment comment on this...

bolt clipping and slack lining Yangshuo, China not much to update apart from more climbing, and a rest day today after only 2 days of climbing, but finger tips have lost a lot of skin and muscles are hurting! we are planning to put a slack line up in the park, then go and get a chinese massage (im a bit scared of what it will be like!). the heat and humidity is still incessant, but i think i am beginning to get used to it a bit. i have done a few more leads on 5s but im hoping to get leading more, even if im falling off the routes, as im finding it so frustrating not leading or having the confidence too. we found some crimpy routes yesterday (rather than thuggy overhanging routes) and i worked my way up a 6c which wasnt too bad, but still feels a long way off until i could climb it in one- especially when all the routes here are 25m +! Jills birthday was a couple of days ago and we went back to the Karst cafe for pizza and cake! we also went to the river in between climbing, where traditional hot rock style- the hot rockers got into trouble! the others (i wasnt swimming becasue of my tattoo) found an abandoned bamboo raft and pushed it down the river over a small waterfall- apparently this was not allowed and the security guard told them off and told us all to stay where we were. so we made a quick exit and hid in a cafe incase he had called the police! luckily nothing more happened! so we went to the next crag!! there are still plenty of crags to explore, and most of them only go into the shade in the afternoon, so we may start going climbing just in the afternoon for most days, im not sure yet. and there is great debate whether climbing 2 days on, 1 day off or 3 days on, or 4+ days on is best! im aiming at 3 days on, 1 day off mainly becasue i dont like staying in the city all day which is what you end up doing on rest days! written by  Clairesj on September 11, 2009 from Yangshuo, China from the travel blog: Clairesj's Travel Blog Send a Compliment comment on this...

is that a bird, a plane? no its BiRT in Yangshuo!! Yangshuo, China yes, thats what i thought when we were sitting in the bus after a good day climbing and 2 climbers get on at the next stop. The guy, called Eban, asks us if we are from Hot Rock, and we reply that yes we are. Oh i met the Hot Rockers when they were here last year, he says, and i saw your truck go past earlier heading to the same bush camp. We looked at him questioningly, becasue no, Hot Rock couldnt possibly be here- they are miles away in Siguniang Shan climbing big walls for 8 days. But Eban is sure he saw BiRT, big red truck with a bouldering wall on the back. well you cant argue with that! so then we started to think, well they had 6 days driving to the climbing then about 3 to Chengdu, so if they missed the climbing and drove straight here, then it has been 10 days since we left them, perhaps it is possible.... when we got back we met Shaggy and Ed who had a rest day and they confirmed our suspicions. they had seen some other Hot Rockers in town. The reason was that Siguniang Shan required a permit that had to be paid 2 months in advance, and in typical Hot Rock style, this had been overlooked, so the consensus on the truck was to just drive strasight to Yangshuo. i didnt envy their 10 days straight of driving, but perhaps i wouldnt have spent the extra money on a flight here just to arrive 10 days early. there were a lot of people not happy with Hot Rock yet again. there are too many unhappy customers at the moment and quite a lot of moaning about Hot Rock amoungst us. im hoping that this half of the trip, as it has all been done before, will be better organised and leave all of us still on the truck pleased with the outcome of the trip. the one story the guys on the truck did have from their drive was going to watch a sky burial. i think it is such a unique, once-in-a-lifetime thing to see that im quite gelous i missed it, but having said that, im not sure i could have watched! so a sky burial is the most popular burial in Tibet, where a body is brought to a holy area and a skilled man makes cuts in the body. the vultures then fly in and eat the body, leaving sinue and bones. the man then grinds the bone with sugar and something else so they are more appitising and the birds come back to eat this. nothing then remains. it sounds quite grusome, but apparently the family of the old woman whose burial it was, were very relaxed, chatting and smoking, rather than the grief you would expect. earleir, they had had 300 monks chant prayers for the old woman and that is when her soul left her body, so they then looked at her body as just esentially meat- it was no longer her. apparently, the quicker the body is eaten by the vultures, the better life the woman had had on earth. the guys saw everything, from the woman being caried from the car boot naked and rapped in plastic, to being cut up, and the vultures. the other hot rockers camped for the first couple of nights- when it was raining- we didnt envy them! but when a couple of them thought it was worth paying extra to stay in our hostel, everyone moved here. so we are together as a group again, but still climbing as the 2 groups we became. its a slightly strange feeling of us and them, but as the newbies arrive in 5 days, and a coulpe of people leave, im sure everything will change and we will become a group again. Jill left yesterday to Chengdu, then home, so we went and had a nice meal of burgers and chips in one of the western restaurants- it was really good, and banana cake with chocolate syrup and ice cream for desert. i thought i was spending way too much compared to normal, then thought about the fact i had had a 2 course meal and drink for 4 pound 50! im going to have such a shock with English prices when i go home! the weather has cooled a little, with rain over the last few days and finally the fog/mist/smog (dont really know what it is) has cleared and you can see beyond the first couple of karsts. the landscape looks much more beautiful now, with the lush green vibrant against the blue sky. i hope it continues like this. i may bike upto Moon Hill, which is a karst that has a perfect hole forming an arch. its a tourist attraction but there is also hard climbing on it, and you can walk easily to the top, getting a great view of the area. Maria has joined our group climbing recently, and she is an Argentinan who is staying in Yangshuo for a coulpe of months, and has got a job at an English school for 2 hours a day, which gives her free accomodation and food. rest day today, as i did 2 routes yesterday and was exhausted! even climbing 2 days on, one day off seems to be too much at the moment! written by  Clairesj on September 17, 2009 from Yangshuo, China from the travel blog: Clairesj's Travel Blog Send a Compliment comment on this...

Gong Bao Chicken or Sweet and Sour Pork? place your orders! Yangshuo, China I think im beginning to make small gains in my climbing- i led 3 routes yesterday, and one was a 6a that i did by hanging on a few bolts and at one point i climbed up until i could just reach the bolt, but the the last one was below my feet and i was in an unbalanced position to place the quickdraw and clip, so i backed down to the bolt. after doing this about 5 times, i eventually clipped the bolt! i have found some routes quite run out- 5s often have 3 metres or more between bolts so it doesnt make it easy to get confidence! i took 2 days off in a row a few days ago now, and enjoyed sitting in a restaurant that was on the river, watching the bamboo rafts go past in the comfort of air conditioning, drinking a big pot of ginger and mint tea and reading my book! i realised i couldnt remember the last time i was on my own, so a break from the group was nice. i also went on a chinese cooking course. this was brilliant! there was a group of 8 of us, people from England, Switzerland and Finland, all in their 20s. we had to decide on 3 dishes to make as a group- after resorting to writting our decision down on paper after discusions didnt get anywhere- we decided on sweet and sour pork, Gong Bao Chicken and Braised aubergine with garlic and chili paste. we stood 4 facing 4 with a gas burner and wok infront of us each, various sauces and spices on the table, and our raw ingredients. it was just how i imagined a cookery course would be like! this set up was on the roof of the hotel so we got a great view while we cooked. we donned an apron and chef hat and set to work. cutting all the ingredients involved a huge knife (the square one, like a butcher uses- not sure its name!). we cooked the first 2 meals using a very hot wok, then went down stairs to the restaurant to eat our food, before returning to cook the remaining dish and then eating that too! all the dishes came out really well, apart from my aubergine had too much soy sauce in it so was a bit too salty. i have the recipes so will test them out if i can remember how to cook them in 4 months time when i return to England! i now have the chopsticks so no excuse! we had a goodbye party for Dave who has now left, and Hannah is leaving tomorrow so we will have a party tonight. the newbies arrive tomorrow afternoon which is quite exciting! written by  Clairesj on September 21, 2009 from Yangshuo, China from the travel blog: Clairesj's Travel Blog Send a Compliment comment on this...

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The Arc of Asia 2009-2010. Bring on the climbing!