Private: 9th September 2006
September 9th, 2006 - Posted in UK to NZ - by Sarah|
by Sarah & Brendhan
Our next day in Songpan was spent thoroughly exploring the town. Songpan is roughly in the middle of this map, just north of Zhenjiangguan. It was especially pleasant because all the rest of our group had gone on a 2 day trek and the daily bus doesn’t arrive until late afternoon so we had the town pretty much to ourselves (as far as ‘big noses’ go anyway). We spent quite a lot of time walking round the newly restored city walls, originally constructed by the Qin emporer to keep the barbarian horse tribes at bay. It afforded us great views over the rooftops of the traditional wooden houses (these days rendered with cement plaster). We wandered through the vibrant local market and took a break at a shady tea house where they served us sunflower seeds, raw peanuts and soem kind of roasted bean with our tea (for some reason we got glasses of tea while everyone else there had mugs).
We bought 2 traditional woven scarves from a very old lady with bad eyesight who was remarkably good at non-verbal communication (a bit like Kathleen – Brendhan). Although they were probably made in some huge factory near Shanghai – they cost all of 2 pounds 60p.
Yesterday we set of at about 8am up the valley and over the mountain pass to the grasslands. We spent hours hypnotised by the grass, getting exited over the occaisional herd of Yaks. In total the journey took about 9 hours but in a few years when the roadworks have finished it will probably take closer to 2 hours. They don’t muck about doing a bit at a time – there must have been about 2000 workers on the entire 200km stretch of road, bridges and tunnels. It’s going from a 1.5 width dirt track to a four lane highway.
Different stratches were at different stages, a few bits obviously just finished but others just begun so we had some bumpy detours over side roads. At one point they were taring the entire width of the road and we were told that we wouldn’t be able to get through for another 6 hours. However the lodal herdsmen were taking advantage of the opportunity and charging a grass toll to drive over their fields and avoid the section. We paid up (about 10 pounds) and bounced across a couple of miles (including fording a stream) to the delight of the herdsmen’s families.
When we finally arrived at Langmusi a few people on the bus seemed a bit disappointed at the rough and ready look and feel of the place. It’s a trading and supply town for the local herders and the two Tibetan monasteries here. It is in every sence a wild western town, with pigs and ponies roaming the streets – although most of the cowboys seem to have traded their horses in for motorbikes.
No photos today I’m afraid as the PC we’re using has been locked down (probably to prevent the monks cheating at their shoot-em-up games!).
