3 days in Jinghong

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I arrived in Jinghong at 8 am on Nov 28. Two Israelis has been on the sleeper bus with me so I joined them for the cab ride to the first hostel listed in the China lonelyplanet. We arrived to find that although the signs remained for the hostel, the hostel no longer operated as one. It was now a dormitory for a local college.

We grabbed a second cab and headed for the next listed hostel. Turns out it no longer existed - the street it was on dwindled to a narrow alley without us locating the street address. I finally asked the cabbie to bring us to one of the cafes/travel services listed in the lonelyplanet. The cafe staff was able to arrange for accomodation - I spent 70 RMB per night at a hotel. A long 2 hours after arriving in Jinghong I had a hot shower!

The first day I went for a walk to the Mekong River. It was high noon and the riverside walkway was deserted. It was around 30 degrees and I was stumbling along from lack of sleep and the heat. The riverside is bordered by bars overlooking the water (lack of water in this case, the water level was extremely low). I snapped a couple photos of motorcyclists washing their bikes in the water and the walkway with interesting lamp statues.

After a long seista, I went to the night market. John, a driver/guide, joined me as I was trying on sandals. He was quite practiced, he said he wanted to practice his english. I asked for his help negotiating with the stall keepers for sandals and possibly a round of pu'er tea - he wasn't able to negotiate the price at all! Maybe he wasn't trying either. I agreed to go with him to a tea seller - I agreed that it would be better to test the tea before buying. I ended up trying several teas, but not buying any, although some were quite good - the price was quite high and I didn't trust John to be on my side in negotiations.

By coincidence, I met up with the Israelis, Ben and Shari, and an American, Matt, at a cafe catering to westerner's tastes later that eve. They wanted to hike to the Mandian Waterfall and were looking for a driver/guide. The cafe was offering to arrange the driver/guide for 400 RMB but I offered John's services, since he had offered to drive/guide me for 300 RMB per day.

Day 2 we met at the Mekong cafe at 10 am to start our trip. John drove what is called a "Beijing jeep", it looked like an old military jeep that had seen better days. I got front passenger seat because of age - but the seatbelt didn't work, so I say it was the least safe seat in the jeep. We drove for about 45 minutes to a small village and then started walking up a muddy trail in sub-tropical forest - I was sweating within seconds. The climb was fun, some hairy points in the trail, but overall managable for me and my asthma. But the waterfall was a disappointment - it is the dry season and so the waterfall is just a small trickle. Seuffler (sp) Falls near Nordegg is much more impressive.

That eve I went for a walk in the streets - ended up much longer than anticipated because I got lost. I don't mind getting lost, I carry a business card for the hotel and I know I can always catch a cab back to the hotel. I checked out a locals only night market, watched locals waltzing in public squares and ate a horrible ice cream cone from a fast food outlet called Disco.

Day 3 I relaxed. I spent alot of time in my hotel room reading, eating tons of fruit, and ramen noodles. Just not feeling that social. It was time to leave China - I only had a couple days left on my visa and I wanted to have a second option if I could not cross from Yunnan to Laos.

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