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Published: December 12th 2012
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WE did two days’ trip to watch Yunnan Golden Monkey from Lijiang city to combine visiting Liming which is part of Laojun Mountain National Park.
I heard a lot about the Yunnan Golden Monkey from people who work in national park or nature reserve area, but I haven’t chance to see in person in mountains. So I was looking forward this trip to Baimang Snow Mountain Nature Reserve Area. I contacted with the person who work in Nature Reserve Area to ask when is the best time to see the Yunnan Golden Monkey, they told us it’s better to watch them in the morning. We decided to visit Shigu town(the First Bend of Yangt-Ze River) and Liming Danxia Landscape first. From Lijiang we drive about 1.5hours come to Shigu Town(the First Bend of YangtZe River), Shigu is a small old town but very important place during ancient time, before the government of Naxi people came to Lijiang, they used living here. During 1936, the troop of Long March used getting help from the local people used boats to cross the Yangt-Ze River, also during Yuan dynasty, The Mongalia troop(Kublai Khan) southward fought with Dali kingdom, they though this area. The
First Bend of Yangt-Ze River is the most famous, because the bend, it created a lot of culture and nature diversity in China. It is called the mother river of China. Even now, there are many local people(different ethnic minorities)live in this area and enjoy their daily life. The crops(rice, corn, wheat…) are all very good because the warm climate.
After that, we leave for Liming Danxia landform area. The shape and color of mountains here is so wonderful. They are very different from any other mountains in most of Yunnan Province, the color is red, the shape of mountain looks like someone made carve to decoration. There is one looks like sleepy Buddha, one looks like Mongolian yurt, one looks like two lover stay together… There are several rivers with clean running water between different mountains. It is very nice place for hiking or walking around to explore this spectacular landscapes. Inside of this area are Lisu minority, they are still keep their traditional dress, language, daily lifestyle. They are farms and grazing farms too. Because the condition of this landform, there is very little farmland for people to plant potatoes, snow beans, tobacco,
turnips… so they also try to have many lifestocks: goats, sheep…because the timetable, we only did about three hours hiking into the mountain, then back to Liming town to have simple lunch.
Time always goes fast, it is time to leave for our next stop where we stay one night to watch the Yunnan Golden Monkey. Following the Yangt-Ze river we droved about 3hours to get the lodge where we stay for night. It was dark when we get there, we saw nothing besides many stars shining in the sky. The host of lodge held the flashlight led us to rooms where we would stay. I felt very tired to get to room from our car stop. The rooms are fantastic with clean, comfortable blankets, even TV, electricity blankets and wonderful bathroom with shower and toilet. It was long day, in order to get early to watch the Yunnan Golden Monkey, we went to sleep.
I got up early and looked out of windows, I saw blue sky, big mountain in front of me with foggy and some wood buildings. When I came out, looks this is inside of villages,
under of where we stay, there are about 10 houses with smoke floating around. Even sometimes I can very good smell. Behind of their houses, there are fruits and vegetable garden with fruits and green vegetables. The lodge where we stayed looks very simple, one wood construction building is one guest room. They told me they are kind of Lisu minority traditional houses, almost ten years ago. Hongkong Association for Expedition in order to help the Lisu people to keep their traditional culture also for them to get some income, they collected all the wasted wood and tools to rebuilt the houses to host some guests. Now the Association left and let the community to owned this lodge, one young Lisu lady cooked very delicious breakfast for us. Then we drove about 30minutes to the entrance of the place for watching monkey, on the way we pass by Lisu villages and got off from car walked another 20minutes to place where Yunnan Golden Monkey would come down for breakfast. We saw there was a man held a bag with a lot of tree beard(kind of moss) and divided to different small groups, there were many monkeys running around him and
tried to get some food, after getting some food, they ran away and hided some places to enjoy eating. I heard they live inside of the forests, only breakfast time they come out to eat, otherwise they just find food by themselves and live in mountains.
There are only about 2,000 Yunnan Golden Monkeys in the wild, distributed in Sichuan, Guizhou and Yunnan Province. Because Habitat loss — including deforestation and the removal of dead trees — and illegal hunting have strained a species already struggling to survive in isolated and fragmented populations. Discovered by scientists in the 1890s, then lost and thought to be extinct until 1962, these monkeys are a continuing mystery. Scientists are just starting to
understand the monkey's biology and behavior. Yunnan golden monkeys:
1)Make their home at altitudes higher than any other primate except humans.
2)Live and travel in communities made up of small family groups consisting of one male, several females and their children.
3) Spend most of their lives in trees, eating only plants — primarily lichens found on trees. Although sometimes they can also come down to search for food on the ground, including plant tubes underground.
4)Have a wandering lifestyle. A troop may cover
a few kilometers in one day and have an immense home range of roughly 20 square miles in extreme rugged terrain.
5)Give birth about once every two or three years.
Recognizing the need for drastic action to protect the
Yunnan golden monkey, the TNC and Chinese partners launched a program to protect this legendary species and save the best primary forests in an area of the Three Parallel Rivers, the famous world heritage site, that's sandwiched between
The Yangtze River and The Mekong River.
That morning only about 20people came there to watch the Yunnan Golden Monkeys and took some pictures. all the people were very quiet and enjoyed watching how the monkey enjoy the breakfast. Looked even the monkeys didn’t care the people who were watching them. We spent about 2hours there and drove toward to Lijiang allow the Yangt-Ze River.
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