One Night in Beijing

Sichuan 15/7 to 22/7

It's been really long since I last posted here. I have waiting for the photos to be developed and scanned. In the mean time, I had been deliberating between starting a new blog to record the finale trip, or to write it here, or to write it at my home blog.

To save the trouble of posting a new post for each day of the trip, and still maintain some sort of logical arrangement, I have seperated the whole finale trip into two parts, documenting the time I spent at each province. The first part records the starting of the trip at Sichuan, while the 2nd post will record the 2nd leg of the finale at Yunnan.

Here it goes:

Day #1 - 15.07.06 Saturday Chengdu
Lodgings: "The Loft"
Travel companions: Jo, Jeff n Aristal

Jo and I flew in to Chengdu from Beijing. The plan was to meet up with Jeff, who took the 26 hour train from Beijing, and Aristal who arrived 2 days earlier, at "The Loft". Jeff actually reached the hostel first in the wee hours, but there were no available rooms and beds. So he dropped his stuff at the counter and went to the bus station to buy the bus tickets to 九寨沟 for us.

It was steaming hot in Chengdu!

Jo and I reached at about noon, and tried to check in. The hostel initially reserved non a/c beds for us, which were really unbearable. When Jo and I went in, the 2 chaps inside were stripped to their undies, and still perspiring. Felt back stabbed coz whoever answered my phonecall for reservation told me that the hostel has a/c. Thought about it for a while, and decided that if they could not spare us any a/c rooms, we will shift to the other hostel which I have also reserved (a sucker's move, a bane to all hostels).

Eventually, LaoCheeHong Jeff saved the day for all of us. He went and cheehong the counter staff with 龟鳞膏, and that got us a/c beds! Nvm that means some bugger got bumped off a/c beds ... hehe Felt like a true blue bastard. One of the staff (Louise) is quite good looking though. To paraphrase Jeff, 四川食物辣，四川女子更辣.

We went to 武侯祠 after settling our beds, and lunch was a fiery event. The weather was super super hot, and the food sold near 武侯祠 was super spicy.

At evening time, we went to see the Sichuan opera and 变脸 shows. We paid low price and we got shitty seats. It was also very hot, luckily got complementary paper fans. Came back to hostel to find Aristal back in Chengdu. Glad to see her again.

Ratings for "The Loft": 10/10 - Cheap and good.
Minus 10 -> if you get the non a/c rooms
Minus 1 -> super hot internet lounge
Minus 1 -> Lack of common space
Plus 1 -> for Louise


Day #2 - 16.07.06 Sunday 九寨沟
Lodgings: "??? hotel"

Today was just a damn shag 12-hour bus ride. And we dio duah into a non a/c hotel for the same price we were offered at the place we originally booked. The hotel we originally booked said that we did not call back to confirm, so they released the space to other guests liaoz. Well, we are a bit pissed about the a/c being not part of the room package. Fortunately, 九寨沟 is still very cooling at night.

Walked about the area near our hotel at night. Basically nothing to do at night lah.

Day #3 - 17.07.06 Monday 九寨沟
Lodgings: "??? hotel 2"

We started the day very early at 6am, and it ended at about 6pm. We checked out and hope to find better lodgings, somewhere else. We 'fleeced' the bag deposit counter at the 九寨沟's entrance and saved 10 Yuan. We squeezed 2 backpacks into a small locker and 'zao' just before it burst open.

We then entered 九寨沟 and negotiated for 'student price' for the entrance fees. Jeff, Jo and my PKU student pass has already expired, whereas Aristal's FDU's student pass des not have a expiry date ... darn. Our 'application' were initially denied, then I actually told the staff that our next sem's card is not ready yet ... So they relented and gave us a refund of 50 Yuan (abt 10 SGD).


So got off to tour 九寨沟 and it was stunningly beautiful. The weather was very cooling (almost freezing) and we saw smoke out of our breathe once again. We spent the whole day taking the internal shuttle up and down and walked on the roads whenever we were not caught and taking lots of photos at the same time.


Lunch was the killer. Heard of the 15 Yuan lunch box from a fellow hostellite at Chengdu, but never found it, until we had our killer lunch. We were forced to eat a 'VIP' buffet lunch that costed a princely 48 yuan. Not particularly exciting, not at all. Especially when we came out to see the 15 yuan lunch box laughing at us. Sian 1/2. In Chinese terms, 郁闷 1/2.

We looked for another hotel after exiting the fairy tale land. And the new place was slightly better. The standard lie applies; 1) Air con costs additional and 2) Hot water is provided, only at selected hours, and only revealed after u probe.

Day #4 - 18.07.06 Tuesday 黄龙
Lodgings: Hotel at 川主寺

We left 九寨沟 in the morning to head towards 黄龙. Poor Jeff kenna puke from a fellow bus passenger and had to endure 'stepping' in the puke pool. His dear tripod was not spared either.

黄龙is very beautiful as well. In fact I liked it more than 九寨沟. Did a straw poll with the Jo Jeff and Aristal and I am the only guy who liked 黄龙 more.


Then I got this headache which I couldn't shake off. Must have been altitude sickness.

Our trip (in general, not just today) has been perforated by shitty meals. We refused to eat at stop-over eateries and ate the packed food we bought the day before (I like 妙芙 muffins the most!!!). And whenever we buay tahan and wanna eat at the 'convenience stalls', we always got tokked. It can cost up to 10 yuan for instant noodles or a choc bar, where it costs only 3 yuan elsewhere.

At 川主寺, we went to a few places and finally went into one restaurant that we thought it look cheap. And our instincts were awfully wrong. Poor Jeff got 'conned' when he ordered BBQ chicken wings. “中间那边leh?”. The 4 yuan 'wings' only had the winglet, the part of the wing we never eat.

Day #5 - 19.07.06 Wednesday On the Bus
Lodgings: "The Loft"

We left 川主寺 at 7am, and expected to reach at 3-4pm. But we kenna stupid jam in the mountains, again! We eventually reached Chengdu only at 6pm. We still took the same bus predeparture activites; buying breakfast and lunch for the road. Usually it has my favourite 妙芙 muffins, 旺旺 and whatever bread we can find from local bakeries.

And on the bus, you can only sleep, look at other people sleep, and then alight heavy headed and groggy.

At Chengdu, we broke off for a while; Jeff went off to get his Tibet travel permit, I went to get bus tickets to go to Leshan, while Jo and Aristal went back to 'The Loft'.

We got worried for Jeff because he is the blur type, and it didn't help that his hp ran out of batteries. We also suspected that he got our hostel's address wrong and would not be able to make his way back to the hostel. But well, 傻人有傻福, he got it right after all!

Then we all went to eat 麻辣火锅. Shiok! But Jeff and Aristal only ate from the non-spicy half. Some how it wasn't as spicy as my first experience eating it. But the same thing always happens the next day; you get a upset tummy and a fiery anus!

Day #6 - 20.07.06 Thursday 乐山/峨眉山
Lodgings: "Teddy Bear Hostel"
Travel companions: Jo

Today we parted with Aristal, who gotta go back to Shanghai, and Jeff who bang-seh Jo and me for Louise, while being undecided about his plans. Anyway at that juncture, we don't know where he is going either.

So I went to 乐山 with Jo. 乐山 is a freaking big buddha statue with freaking many people... I cannot imagine how packed it might be during national holidays. It already took us 1 hour in the queue to get from the top to the bottom and back up to the top again. But then again, 乐山 took us a much shorter time than expected, and 峨眉山 was even nearer than we thought. So by 2pm already got our room at Teddy Bear.

Then at Teddy Bear, I got caught in a messy translation shit for an angmoh and a Sichuanese driver. It's really shitty when you are translating conflict of interests. And to make things sound polite to both sides, I always gotta lose something in translation on purpose. I bailed out when I forsee that things are already beyond me.

Ratings for "Teddy Bear Hotel": 9/10
Minus 1 -> lack of a/c. Trust Jo and me, freaking hot both in the day and at night.
Plus 1 -> Towels provided!
Plus 1 -> great cafe
Plus 1 -> great service


Day #7 - 21.07.06 Friday 峨眉山/成都
Lodgings: "The Loft"
Travel companions: Jo

Woke up at 0230 to catch the sunrise on top of 峨眉山. Damned shag already from the warm hotel room, and we were utterly shocked to see, through my groggy eyes, sooo many tiongs are already chionging to see the sun rise as well ... worsed still ... a lot of them are on tour groups ... jitao kee xiao liao.

Before we even reached the top, we had to
Queue up to get the bus tickets to go to 峨眉山.
Queue up to get 峨眉山's entrance tickets.
Queue up to get cable car tickets to get up to 峨眉山's summit.
Queue up to take the cable car.

Sooo many queues!!! Damn xian 就对了lah. Early early morning squeeze with soo many grouchy tiongs. Don't talk will die. Don't complain also will die. 不说话嘴巴会烂！

Jo and I ended up missing the sunrise, coz we were stil in the queue for the cable car. So pissed ... coz it was so expensive. Over rated and over crowded. We ended up leaving 峨眉山 without seeing much of the other stuff, coz already quite shagged from the early setting off ... We had lunch at Teddy Bear's and returned back to Chengdu.

Day #8 - 22.07.06 Saturday 昆明
Lodgings: "Camellia Hotel"
Travel companions: Jo, Esther

Finally we got a chance to 自然醒 after soo many hectic days. We had our last lunch with Jeff at 'The Loft', and took photos with Louise ... what a dangerous girl to know and take photos with ... felt that if the photos 'leaked' I could be blackmailed or something like dat.

Our flight out of Chengdu to Kunming was delayed following cock ups after cock ups ... the poor airport staff was bombarded and abused by the ever impatient tiongs. I wanted to offer him some sort of encouragement but I was in some sort of hurry as well ... we were shuffled to different boarding gates, and I didn't want to cock up either.

And so, we finally met up at Esther around evening time. We checked in at Camellia, bought tickets to Dali for the next morning.

posted by taxi taker @ 9:22 PM