Day 1 HK to Ringha

Based on a desire to visit Tiger Leaping Gorge and walk the path there, in late 2015 Sarah decided to book us a walking holiday in China in April/May 2016. Little did we know at the time of booking that it would interrupt our NZ house renovation project (we left it not  finished) and therefore was a cause of stress itself, with the little time available to pack and organise, before we had to leave for the holiday. But hey ho! We set off from HK airport early on 23 April expecting a full day of travel and sitting around in KUNMING airport. We headed to DIQINGXIANGELILA, otherwise known as Shangri-La (the place not the hotel chain) and had booked into the Banyan Tree Ringha. The idea was a few days of RnR and a spot of acclimatisation at 3300m above sea level. We would then be joined by our Mandarin speaking HK friends Joey and Deluth Kwok, trek unguided in Tiger Leaping Gorge (2 days) then relax again in Lijiang taking in lots of cultural site seeing on the way.

We had a few laughs and a lot of interesting experiences on DAY 1.

Kunming is in Yunnan province (SW of China) not that we saw much of it as we spent 6 hours in the airport. There are 45 million people in Yunnan, so it is bigger than Australian (c.24m) and NZ population (c.5m) combined. 

Not many signs are in English and where they are, the translations are interesting. 

We enjoyed the secret tips  

and decided not to break any toilet rules. 

Why would you want to do this?

Maybe there is a better translation out there?

Neither of us speak much Mandarin beyond (Ni hao) but we muddled through to lunch. 

Usually we rely on pictures and pointing to choose what we want, but we had much fun in finding food that looked appetising (local delicacies) until we read the description in English. 

No 38, 68 & 118 for us please.

At Diqing airport, everyone walked slowly through the baggage control (acclimatising to the change in altitude) except Sarah who strolled off at speed to the local taxis only to discover no one read English/ had no idea of what or where the Banyan Tree hotel was located. Even the information desk and police did not speak any English, but only when Sarah swore (loudly) we spotted someone in the crowd who understood. 5 minutes later we were speeding off in the back of a mini cab jalopy off to Ringha having called the hotel to double check; it was c. 40 minutes away in the autonomous region of TIBET!  

We arrived in the pitch black pouring rain to discover we had booked into a fabulous authentic Tibetan farmhouse converted into a 2 bed villa. 

 Dark wood and thick carpets and curtains and one enormous bed in the middle of the room.

Dressing up for dinner involved donning a large padded coat (it is so cold outside).

Despite the attractions of ginger tea, we opted for Black YAK beer. 

Not yet had the courage to drink YAK butter tea. Yunnan food is a little bit spicy and accompanied by rice or noodles but very tasty.