We woke the next morning to find ourselves seemingly in the middle of nowhere but actually it was probably just too misty to tell and there was undoubtedly a vast city hiding behind the clouds.
Suddenly the light changed completely and I got these two shots, far more atmospheric I think?
And I was right, there was a city hiding in the mist and judging by the number of high rise buildings it's home to several million people.
We've not seen this design of building before.
We watched with interest as this family made their way along the river bank.
They then donned lifejackets and hopped into a little boat.
But what I can't work out is where did his rather large, brightly coloured, wicker basket disappear to!
Our excursion today is to the Snow Jade Cave which is a 30 min coach ride away. Firstly we have to disembark and negotiate the 160 odd steps up to meet the coach.
I paused half way up on the pretext of taking this photo but actually it was just to catch my breath.
And to prove we made it Steve or Tony (their names were interchangeable to me) kindly took our photo.
Walking along the vast promenade we came across these ladies beating the **** out of very large drums.
And a guy "flying" his dragon, which he did so superbly and what was so nice was that he seemed to be doing it for his own pleasure and not to entertain the passing tourists. Certainly there was no hat being passed around for tips.
He must have arm muscles of steel.
A spot of morning Tai Chi
I suppose because such a huge proportion of people live in high rises, certainly in the towns, that every piece of land is precious and so here we see vegetables being grown on the roadside verges.
And nearby a slightly larger enterprise.
The walk to the cave was about a mile from the coach park and on the way we spotted this cute caterpillar. Despite trying Google's reverse image look up facility I've failed to positively identify it as there are just too many similar ones.
Another bit of Chinese signage that make me chuckle.
These though are most definitely macaques.
This is shot through foliage hence the green tinge, but I just love the clarity in the eyes.
Obviously someone thought it was a good idea to put out food for them.
I think these two were doing their level best to ignore me.
Whereas "If I pose nicely, she'll go away quicker" was probably going through this one's mind.
The Jade Snow Cave is apparently rated as China’s most beautiful cave by Chinese
National Geography. It is described as a
fantastic underground labyrinth of streams and caves featuring beautiful
stala-ctites/gmites which grow quickly at around 33mm in 100 years. Around 1 mile long and formed of karst, it was created around 50,000 years ago but was only recently discovered by local farmers and is
the youngest discovered in China at present - one really has to wonder where they’d be without local farmers
discovering their treasures! There are, allegedly, many spectacular and
unusual karst formations but as they are not always so easily identifiable I’m
just going to post a few random pictures to give you a feel of the place, with comment if I can remember. Oh, and the photos are pretty rubbish quality as it was quite dark inside!
The story goes that when said local farmers first entered the cave they ran away because they saw a huge dragon.
As is usually the case when stalagmites are involved, there were quite a few phallic looking ones (always makes me think of "Surprise Cave" in Vietnam).
Some areas just looked like they were covered in snow.
Personally I found the highly coloured lighting a bit too much at times.
I definitely prefer to see the more natural colours.
Some of the rock formations were amazing.
There were lots of steps up and down but the walkways and handrails made it quite easy, although it was very slippery in places.
Another helpful and motivational Chinese sign.
These photos don't really illustrate just how huge the place is.
This is known as the Terracotta Army and I can see why, thousands upon thousands of tiny stalagmites
Eventually we walked out of the cave, blinking in the sunshine and of course I had to stop and photograph more, or quite possibly, the same macaques on the way back to the coach.
It's hard to work out which is monkey and which is pumpkin (or whatever the plant is).
I can just imagine this one whistling as it looked all around hoping I'd soon move on.
One of the few pieces of litter around, unless some idiot was deliberately feeding the monkey.
These last two were probably the oldest we saw and most certainly the ugliest!
This was identified on Google as a Punchinello butterfly (Zemeros flegyas) but although it is similar in colouring to the caterpillar earlier they are not the same species as this one's should be bright green.
The view across the river with the coach park on the left.
A couple of quick snaps from the coach, the first as we were crossing a small river and then a poor old guy looked like he was transporting a bed frame but we were seemingly a long way from anywhere on this road.
I love the sunshade for the motor scooter and the optional crash helmet dangling against the side.
Back in town, which I've decided was probably Fengdu.
Fruit sellers waiting to greet us as soon as we got off the coach.
I thought these Acer seed pods looked so pretty.
It was still quite early and so we decided to have a wander around and try to get some crisps or snacks for later. Across the road we found a little convenience store and bought the necessary then saw these two girls waving to us so we wandered over and had a chat. They spoke very good English and we were surprised to learn they were mid-20s - they looked so young.
As we were on our own and in no hurry I was able to stop a few times and record our route back to the boat.
It really does make you quite dizzy looking up to the top of these flats; I counted at least 22 floors above the tree line.
Standing at the top of the huge flight of steps was rather like looking over the edge of a cliff.
We then had to walk across several gangplanks and a couple of pontoons to get to ours.
Some random shots as we headed further upstream later in the afternoon. Unfortunately there is industry all around but I suppose that is inevitable along a river of this importance.
Our last dinner and so Ian posed with a couple of the lovely waitresses. All the staff were fantastic; nothing was too much trouble and they were very generous with the wine pouring.
Our little table of 8, tomorrow we'll be back dining with everyone else.
