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26th May Friday Paul - The morning and afternoon was a little bit hazy. Hazy in the sense that I can't really remember what we did. Had breakfast and sat in a cafe all afternoon watching "Hero" on DVD is about the best I can do. Emailed our friends Andy and Anna who are supposed to be in Yangshuo this week and generally lazed about drinking milkshakes and reading. A very "Chinese" day.
In the evening we ended up in "Bar 98", a little bar beside a river with a pool table and playing reasonably decent music (well except for Jet). Friday night so obviously all the local expats were out in force and a chirpy Australian bloke managed to convince us to play in a pool tournament.
Laura - The first round of knock out pool went brilliantly - in that I beat Paul! He was so upset about me beating him that he insisted we stayed for the second round so he could redeem himself. He ended up coming second and got a free beer for his efforts. Bless. More entertaining though was an overheard conversation between a group of expat australians who clearly thought they
were 'enlightened' by Asia or something. They were having a heated dicussion on the merits of private education, eastern culture, and drug taking. In an argument over why drugs were 'cool' one of them came out with the classic line "No way mate, speed is more of an emotional experince than a tactile, physical one". Ok....
We stumbled back to the hostel at around 2 in the morning and found that it was all locked up. Oh dear. Ten minutes of loud knocking later and we managed to wake up the cleaner who let us in. I was so relieved!
Paul - An excuse for my poor performance in the first round was that I was more interested in the hilarious conversation going on around us. Honestly! Lost to a strange Australian guy in the second round, but he clearly played pool everyday so I felt pretty good.
27th May Saturday Laura - We got up at midday and seeing that it wasn't raining we rented some bikes. We had a quick look at a map but soon realised that it was pretty impossible to follow so we just headed in a random
direction. We cycled into some amazing scenery - surrounded by green peaks and rivers - and saw lots of rural villages, where the houses were just shells without windows and doors, and kids played on the street (and in the drains!) with their wolf-like dogs. We passed lots of rice paddies, which usually had one or more old women in them picking rice (just about visible beneath their huge straw hats). We also passed lots of farmers herding their cows. Most of the villagers were fascinated by us and shouted an enthusiastic "hallo!" as we passed.
At one point we lost ourselves in a tiny hillside village, which is the most rural place I've ever seen in my life. It's literally miles from any shop, school, surgery and the village was completely untouched by modern technology or Western culture. The houses were little more than huts and there was a cow tied to one of the houses quite casually chewing grass, as though it had always been there. Paul refused to cycle all the way through it though because a dog started growling at him and he was scared he'd get bitten and catch rabies! It did feel a
bit like we were intruding though by going into the village - we were probably the only Westerners that have ever been there. But it was really amazing to see a place that it so far removed from the life we live in England.
Paul - The dogs were out to kill me! Honestly! A local woman came out of her house and I motioned towards the dogs but she didn't seemed bothered. She smiled and said "nee how". I thought "you bloody fool come here and tame those dogs". She just smiled and probably thought "silly idiot with his Real Madrid shirt". Oh well.
Laura - We crossed over a few rivers (on rather precarious bridges) and came to a fjord at one point, in which one of the locals was cleaning his dirt bike with leaves. Because of the heavy rain it was flooded and was flowing quite fast so we couldn't cross. A villager selling fruit (from baskets that hang from a pole resting across the back of her shoulders!) tried assuring us that it was perfectly safe to cross, but we didn't stick around to see if she attempted the cross herself.
The
'roads' we cycled down were little more than rocky tracks (it's a good job we were given mountain bikes - a tandem would have been useless here!) and because of all the rain it was really muddy. Paul tried to avoid most of the big puddles but the inner child in me came out and I made an effort to cycle through them! So by the end of it I was completely caked in mud (Angela you'd have had kittens if you'd seen the state of my clothes!). It was worth it though because we had such a good time.
When we got back (and showered) we went to meet Andy and Anna, a couple we met on a train to Chongquing. They introduced us to another two couples - one from Oz, the other from sunny England. We all ate then went to 'Bar 98' again and drank lots of beer.
Paul - We really enjoyed the bike ride, a good day's exercise for once! Didn't rain either so that was a bonus. As Laura said we met up with Anna and Andy in the evening and had a really good time. Met some new people and
talked to a couple (Michael and Katie) who were our age and Katie also wanted to do Educational Psychology which I thought was pretty funny. So Laura and her talked about that for a long time while me and Mike discussed music. He thought Libertines were the best band ever, wasn't too sure about that! But they were really nice and we were hoping to go Kayaking tomorrow with them but it wasn't to be (explained below!). Anna and Andy were leaving tomorrow so we wouldn't get chance to see them again until we get to Vietnam!
28th May Sunday Laura - Woke up at half ten (an early start for us) and ate a very Chinese breakfast of bacon and eggs in the hostel. We planned on going kayaking down the Li River but were told we can't because it's flooded. So instead we decided to go rock climbing (finally the weather was dry enough to). We went to meet our guides and got a local bus to the peak we were to climb. Now the bus - usual Chinese affair of bad driving and no suspension. But this 'bus' had the
added bonus of cramming 12 people into a 6 people car!! There was a wooden bench and stool added inside to accomodate the extras and one woman had her 2 children sitting on her lap. The strangest thing about it though was that it felt perfectly normal for us now!
Paul - Sorry to interrupt but the reason Katie and Michael didn't come with us was because her knees had swelled up and so she needed to see a doctor. She is fine now although walking a little funny.
Laura - We got to the site and were kitted up then taken into a cave where the first two climbs were. I went first ("Ladies first" Paul said as he anxiously looked up at the 20 metre vertical wall) and climbed about half a metre before I fell away from the wall! Pretty pathetic but at least then I knew the safety rope worked! After that minor mishap I manged to climb the rest of the wall without any problems and was very pleased with myself when I got to the top. It was pretty hard work though and involved a lot of pulling myself up by putting
my entire weight on 1 inch ledges! It was such an adrenalin rush and the view out of the cave at the top was amazing. Paul went next and did it all quite fast without any real problems but admitted that it was harder than he thought it would be (it must be that I made it look so easy!!).
The next wall was slightly higher and was graded more difficult. I managed to get almost half way but couldn't get past one point because it involved pulling myself up to a foothold that was waist high above me - and I had to do it from one hand that had only a tiny ledge to grip with my fingers! As I have no strength in my arms at all I found it impossible. I did have a good go at it though (about ten times, I was determined to get up it!) but after bruising and scratching my entire legs I eventually gave up. I was really frustrated and disappointed because I wanted to get to the top. Paul, being taller and stronger, managed it quite easily (twice, just to rub it in!) but found it hard work.
After that we walked down the road to another peak. There were five climbs that had 5 different difficulty ratings. We had to do the hardest one because there was too much water running down the others. Around 4 metres off the ground there was a ledge that stuck out about half a metre. We had to try and grab onto a wet ridge with our hands while we swung our legs up onto the ledge. I gave it a good go and almost made it at one point but kept slipping and realised 5 attempts later that it was hopeless. By that point my arms were knackered and my hands were sore. Paul stubbornly tried it about 20 times but couldn't manage it either. He did come very close to be fair but it was really difficult. I think the guide was a bit optimistic about our efforts because he had climbed up 50 metres to put the safety rope in the highest loop!
It was such good fun and I'll definitely do rock climbing again. We are bruised, sore and battered, not to mention extremely tired, but we loved it.
We ate a huge Chinese
meal when we got back (we were starving after our efforts and hadn't eaten since breakfast) and met up with Katie and Michael (the English couple we met last night) for a couple of 'happy hour' cocktails.
Paul - So yeah rock climbing was fantastic but here we are in an internet cafe listening to the bloody play off final. 1-0 at the moment. Really nervous but listening to Grimsby on the internet is always awful. They sound like they are playing awful. The BBC commentary is terrible, I'm half expecting Graham Le Seux to pop up with one of his "witty" comments soon. Only 5 minutes left... great! No surprise to see Grimsby throw it all away as per usual! Well that's it. Grimsby are rubbish I'm off to buy a Brazil shirt for the World Cup. You can't go wrong with that.
Laura's comment when they lost "awh". Bloody women.
Look on the bright side though, my new adopted country Brazil have a great chance in the World Cup. If that doesn't work my French accent is brilliant (Katie Darby will testify to that) and those Vietnamese will be easily fooled! EASILY FOOLED!
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Big Bro
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Grimsby
Paul I did have every sympathy with you as I watched the final in the pub yesterday. Yet this sympathy is beginning to wane as you have slagged off Jet and the Libertines. Also the very thought of owning a Brazil shirt - you should hang your head in shame!