Blogs from Emei Shan, Sichuan, China, Asia - page 2

The holy mountain of Emei Shan is a sacred site, and has been for the last two thousand years, of the Buddhist people. Though it was originally a Taoist retreat in the sixth century a famous Buddhist pilgrim, who was accompanied by a six tusked elephant, visited the mountain where after all the Taoist temples were converted to Buddhism. Today it is also a very popular tourist destination as the mountain is situated in a very picturesque area. For many years the mountain has been a magnet for western tourists, and more recently young Chinese backpackers, who choose to take the long and very difficult trek to the summit. And it is a gruelling trek - the long route up sixty kilometres of steps whilst the short route is a mere forty kilometres of steps! Emei ... read more

Well, no great trip is without its problems. Hopefully I got them all out of the way early and the rest will be smooth sailing. There was some heavy rain in Kunming the day I left which translates to heavy traffic. Despite leaving an hour early (usually a 20 minute ride) I missed my train... I had to go to the ticket office and switch the ticket. They put me on a later train but instead of a bed I had to take a "hard seat" YIKES! Firstly it is (obviously) not very comfortable. secondly it was 15 hours. Lastly, imagine the calibre of people that take the bottom class seats on an overnight train in west China. Disgusting! A child pooped on the floor, trash everywhere, crowded, noisy, hot, and everything. Now, it wasn't all ... read more

Well it took a record breaking 1 day and with another page taken up in the passport I have an extra 30 days in China, however I will not be using all of them and this country is just too big for just a 30 stay visa. For a person who hates form filling and tries to avoid it at all costs it was pretty straight forward, shame that can't be said for finding the building that I needed to go to. I vow now to burn Lonely Planet at the first opportunity. The address it gave and which I first went to had been closed down for some time, the men in a hut promptly gave me a card and told me to go to another government building, on arriving there and another hut and ... read more

This weekend, on Saturday at 9:30 in the morning, our usual PLU mishmash group got on a bus to Leshan and E'mei Shan. First we visited the Leshan Buddha. It was a lot more crowded and touristy than I remembered. After we took pictures of Buddha's head, we had to wait in line for a long time. The whole while I kept hearing "laowai, laowai, waiguoren..." and cameras snapping. (foreigner, foreigner) We pushed and shoved our way to the railing to take pictures all the way down. Then, when we got to the bottom, we had to climb back up. But we didn't have to wait in line for that. And it wasn't as tall as I remembered either. We walked around the temple at the top, recently remodeled. The next day they were choosing a ... read more

Sun 31 / 10 E'mai Shun To day was to be one of the highlights of the tour with a day trip to UNESCO World Cultural and Natural Heritage area of E'mai Mountain to view the Golden Summit It was a relaxing 06:30 wake-up call with no requirement to 'Pack and go' for a hotel change as it was a simple day tour starting at 08:30to and back to this Hua Sheng Hotel. With the weathe some what chilly it was time for layers upon layers It was a short hop to the entrance to the entrance to the park then a change to Park buses for the 2 hr drive up the very steep and winding road to the base of the walking path with a heavy overcast fog that restricted visibility to the yellow ... read more