Yuanyang, China

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I woke up in Sapa and headed to the spot where a minivan was supposed to take me to the Chinese border, but the lady I had arranged things with told me I needed to jump on the back of a waiting motorcycle taxi if I wanted to make it on time. So we tied my bags to the bike and my driver floored it out of Sapa. It was a little scary, but an amazing, chilly hour long ride through the mountains at 7am.

At the border, I got out of Vietnam without any problems. At the China border I was asked to fill out a bunch of paperwork; they love paperwork here. I kept checking my watch as I had less than a half hour to get through the long line, change money, find the bus station and make my bus. After the paperwork was complete, a nice border officer came up, pulled out a white thermometer gun and pointed a red laser beam at my forehead. Kind of freaky. It read a little high; he kept checking me then pointing it at his own head to make sure it was accurate. After a while he escorted me to a little room off to the side with some medical suppplies. He gave me a standard thermometer to stick under my arm and we had to wait five minutes. The clock was ticking and I could tell the guy didn't want to detain me. Finally, it read normal and he ushered me to front of the line. I got through without hassle, found the bus station and made my bus somehow.

The bus ride was 6 hours in a tiny bus mostly along the Red River, then up a mountain for an hour. I was heading to the famous Yuangyang Rice Terraces. Nobody speaks english here. Its wierd to be having full conversations with hill tribe girls in Vietnam one night and get to China the next day where not even the hostel staff can say more than "hello". I am definitely not complaining; its a good challenge. Everywhere I have been so far has been relatively easy to get by. Anyway, I couldn't even ask anyone on the bus if there was an ATM in Yuangyang. I didn't have time to change money at the border and all I had was a pocketfull of Vietnam dong (their currency, ha).

Finally I got to Yuangyang and found the only ATM in town. I though I was in the wrong town, not a traveller in sight until an Israeli guy came up to me while I was eating a late dinner in a dive with amazing food. He has been traveling Asia (India, Nepal, Malaysia, Mongolia, etc.) for almost a year and said China was by far the most difficult place to travel. So, if I can get by here, that's good.

OK, the town was not great and I took a minivan out to some of the rice terraces and was a little disappointed as well. They were really great, but no better than Sapa, plus I paid more for this lady to drive me around around for an hour than I had paid for three full days of a motorbike rental in Sapa. The other issue is the unbelievable photos I have seen of this place were apparently taken around October when the terraces are flooded and have no crop. Its then that they reflect the multicolored sky. Oh well, strikes and gutters.

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