Tiger Leaping Gorge

The Yangtze River begins high in the Himalayas in western China. Shortly after the so-called "first bend" in the far west of Yunnan province, the Yangtze pierces through the mountains to head east, unlike the Mekong which passes only 30 miles away and yet ends up thousands of miles south in Vietnam.

Piercing the mountains is no small task. The mountains are routinely above 3,900 meters (13,000 feet), and in fact the Tiger Leaping Gorge slides between the Jade Mountain at 4,900 meters (16,000 feet) and the Haba Snow Mountain (only a bit shorter). From the top of the gorge down to the water is a remarkable 3,900 meters (13,000 feet)! That is one tall gorge!

The gorge has become quite well known in recent years, and attracts an international crowd. Nearly every place we visited in China was mostly filled with Chinese vacationers, but not Tiger Leaping Gorge. This was full of Europeans and Australians.

To get to Tiger Leaping Gorge, you pass through LiJiang. We skipped it and went straight to the trail head. Later we passed through LiJiang again and regretted that we didn't spend more time there. It has a large old town area that has been converted completely to tourism, with tiny cafes and shops in a beautiful setting. The Jade Mountain towers over the city. The old town is full of tiny winding cobblestone alleys and masonry buildings, with shade trees and flower pots. Tourists just hang around town for a few days taking a welcome breather from the difficulties of traveling in China, sipping Espressos and eating pizza.

The road to the Gorge is undergoing construction (and reconstruction). Many parts are gravel, potholed, or single lane. The road is built onto the rock landscapes following the river, and many workers are building roadway the old way. The bus stops for occasional dynamite blasting. Adjacent areas have been converted into quarries and stone blocks are being cut by hand and drug to the road bed. The workers live at the construction sites in simple shelters made of blue tarp, sometimes perched on flat areas only a few yards wide between the road and the cliff dropping to the river.

We don't speak Chinese, but manage to tell the driver where we want to get off. We follow along on the map, but it is simple. The highway eventually joins the Yangtze, and then the hike starts when the river turns away from the road into the gorge. We follow the river, and then surprisingly cross to the other side. Unsure, we just stay on. Then the road leaves the river, and the bus keeps going. However, the driver seems to remember where everyone wanted to go, and has made a couple of unprompted stops for other people already. We trust he knows what he is doing, and sure enough, he pulls over a few miles later and lets us know we have arrived. We pile out, the bus speeds on, and we look around.

We are at the end of a tiny town, one road wide and three blocks long. We start looking for the "Backpacker Cafe", which is the place to get information, leave bags, etc. It doesn't exist anymore, and the old location is vacant. We manage to find the general direction to the trail across the river, and check into a hotel for the night. We wander around and find a different cafe across the river that seems to have good information on the hike. It turns out that everyone calls it the Backpackers Cafe except the owner, who has his name on the sign instead, and he moved the location. Somehow, everyone is supposed to find him away, and I guess we did. We have a nice dinner. After we return to the hotel, the power goes out. We step outside and find the entire town stopped. There is now a line of cars and trucks stopped in the road from one end to the other (waiting for construction dynamiting down the road), and the whole town is black. We finish the night by candlelight. A typical day in rural China.

The next morning we get an early start. We read about a Nasi family just a couple of hours up the gorge that has a bed and breakfast, and plan to get there for breakfast.

The directions to the trailhead are to just wander down the road, and follow the arrows through the school. We manage to figure it out easily enough. The school turns out to be a residential school --the children spend the week there, returning to their families on the weekends. There are no provisions provided by the school except for the location. The kids (10-13 years old) do their own laundry, sweep the school, and other chores. They even cook themselves --as we pass they are finishing off breakfast, having cooked on open charcoal fires, and are beginning to clean up before school. They learn to work hard and take responsibility for themselves, in exchange for an education.

The trail begins to climb gently past a few fields, shacks, and other paths. We begin to see the mountain rising on the other side, although they disappear into the clouds above. We can't really see where we will climb to, but the guidebook says the first four hours are all uphill, much at a very serious incline. I think it rises about 4,000-5,000 feet, but there aren't any topographic maps and we are unable to communicate enough to ask anyone. We brace for a stiff climb.

After just 90 minutes we are at the Nasi family house for breakfast. We stop and have a great meal of potatoes, tomatoes and eggs. Everything on the menu is straight from the garden. Quickly we regret not hiking up to this point last night. The family is very friendly, and while they understand no English (or Mandarin Chinese for that matter), we feel very welcomed. The house is built around the four edges of a square, with an open courtyard in the center. The bottom level includes space for the animals and storing grain, as well as the kitchen. The upper level includes the sleeping rooms, with a balcony overlooking the courtyard and across to the gorge.

We hike on, not pushing real fast but not stopping much either. The trek is rated at nine hours of hiking today, and we don't know how we will compare to their times so we figure to keep moving. No need however. It later turns out that we are at the top in three hours.

The route up is called "28 bends" for all of the switchbacks. Locals differ on how many switchbacks there really are, with estimates from 29 to 34. There are some small ones that nobody counts, but it is unclear about others. Fran stops counting past 40.

The views are well worth the climb. Since the trail mostly goes upwards, the view doesn't change by going down river, but instead by going up. Looking across, down below is the same view as the last viewpoint, but a new one is now directly across. First the view is of the silty, muddy river. Above that is vegetation and contoured farms. One farm is built along a narrow stream. The beds are perhaps only 50 feet wide, but the terraces climb up the hillside from several hundred feet. The farm is more vertical than horizontal. We watch it as we climb, and it slowly disappears. Above that zone is different vegetation, then a zone of dark jagged rock, then softer lighter rock with a bit of grass, then another color of rock topped by snow glaciers, with jagged peaks at the top. As you climb more of the upper zones come into view, and the ones below drop off.

We decide to spend the night up in the gorge rather than hike down. It is just too beautiful. We stop at the local favorite guest house, but it seems to be too busy, too noisy, and not friendly. We wished we had stayed at the Nasi house last night. We hike on to Five Fingered Mountain Guest House. It is a simple guest house, much like the Nasi family in which we had breakfast. Again, everything on the menu is in the garden or running around the yard. There is just one other group of hikers, three men of whom one can speak a bit of Mandarin.

The family consists of one very old woman, well hunched over and under four feet high. She later tells us she is 72. She slowly ambles over to us, her wrinkled hands extended from under her hunched frame and her head lifted to reveal a very welcome smile. She speaks, but we do not understand the words. The eyes and hands however extend a deep "welcome" and she invites us to tea.

The family includes a man in his fifties, two younger women, and one little boy. There may be four generations here, with many missing family members. It is a hard life. Westerners sometimes refer to such hunched-over old women as "Mao's women", since their bodies were broken with years of toil. However, nothing has broken this Grandma's radiance.

We relax and enjoy the hospitality with tea. We order dinner, and it is great. We watch as the preparation starts with a trip to the garden for the vegetables. Afterwards Grandma invites us into her den, a dark windowless room with a few sticks burning in the center of the dirt floor for heat. She has a heavy pot of water for tea on the fire. She smokes and talks to us with her hands, her eyes, and her words. We motion, and think we have exchanged our ages, our number of children and their ages, and such. Much is lost, except for the warmth of her heart.

Later the family eats. However, they consider it too rude to eat without inviting their guests to join, so we must sit at their dinner table with them. There is barely enough rice for them, and just a few other treats. We take a small pinch to not offend and then allow them to eat their meal as we all sit at the table. One of the younger women speaks some Mandarin, as does one of the travelers, so a few words get translated from English to Mandarin, and then to the local dialect. But mostly communication is with gestures and smiles. This is a very gracious and generous family. The man opens a beer to share, so I buy a beer also and we all share the two of them.

The next day we decide to extend our hike by going part way up Haba Snow Mountain toward the glacier. The family is very concerned that we might not be safe, and offers to guide us for a few dollars. But we would rather just stroll along ourselves for a few hours, and do not intend to go to the more dangerous parts. We are unable to convince them. The other travelers also want to go up the mountain unguided, but we encounter considerable resistance. Eventually, we just begin to wander off and the family decides that they need to move their goats up the hill, so one of the women needs to go up the same trail. They just can't bear to have us travel alone. We have a nice walk and our escort stays with us for several hours. Eventually, we turn around and the other travelers continue, and the escort returns with us. We all pay her a small sum, but really believe she came just because we were guests and it was her responsibility to ensure our safety.

Later we hike down all the way to the water. The upper trail is fine, but down by the river there are a few tricky areas. One involves holding onto a cable while climbing down a vertical rock face. We are glad that Jamie showed us a few rock climbing techniques last year! Once we locate a few key toeholds it is not very difficult.

Fran has several "character development" moments on this trek. With her fear of heights, the peak was the first challenge, since the trails have drop-offs of literally thousands of feet. The rock climbing descent was also enough of a challenge that she wanted to find a different route back up. We did, but then encountered the bigger challenge. One segment was a rickety wooden ladder up a vertical rock face, with a couple of rungs broken. It was actually more stable than it looked (or we wouldn't have used it) but it took some nerve.

Coming out, we encountered several people who took the trail the wrong way (from the east instead of from the west). That end has major road construction, so the entire trip consisted of walking into a head wind on a hot dusty gravel road past road construction equipment and dynamiting. Needless to say, the simple choice of direction (which was wrong in some guide books) turned the hike of a lifetime into a horrible, sweaty trudge. We talked some of them into taking the other hike, just to overcome their horrible day and leave with good memories.

Unfortunately, the camera was not working during this hike, so there are no pictures.

I noticed in our message board that several of you made reference to Fran traveling with an Old Goat. I assumed that meant this hike, since there were many goats. In fact we had to scramble off the trail twice to let goat herds pass by. Since the camera wasn't working, and we hadn't written up the stories yet, I am impressed that you figured out that we saw goats!