On this day, we started at Yunnan Nationalities Village, which highlights the many different ethnic minority groups that call Yunnan Provence home, include the Yi, Bai, Hani, Dai, among 25 in total. Yunnan is the the most ethnically diverse province in China.
As in other southern cities, Chinese tourists can rent local costumes and wear them while traveling in the park for photo-shoots. Mostly women and kids, but men rent the costumes as well.
We walked under the huge gate,
into the shopping area of the park, which is free to enter. Off the main drag, we found a walkway along a pond and took pictures with Baji Mountain in the background.
We walked more through the shopping area, with buildings like those found in the park proper.
Then I wanted a snack and a lime tea, which has become a favorite drink for the both of us; they mash up sliced limes and sugar, then add the tea. It’s so good and refreshing, and they even put it in a bag (they put all to-go beverages inside of plastic bags actually). Jessica ordered a coffee, and as we sat and drank, a guy took her picture, from the other side of the window, like she was one of the ethnic minorities (which she is, here in this part of China, as a blond, blue-eyed, tall woman).
We found the entrance for the park itself, but couldn’t buy tickets there. We walked around some more and finally found the ticket booth, and it was not cheap. So we changed our minds and left to find a taxi to take us to the base of nearby Biji Mountain. There is a cable car that takes people to the top (and back down), but we figured we could walk back down, as there were trails (it appeared) to descend.
It did worry us when the ticket woman reacted quizzically when we said we wanted a one-way ticket only, and up we went in the cable car. High above Dianchi Lake, which is the largest fresh water lake in Yunnan, and known as the “Plateau Pearl” of Kunming, we climbed in the cable car. The views were pretty spectacular.
It was 20+ minutes to reach the top, and at the end was quite steep, but we made it. From our hotel, it did not seem like Kunming was that big a city; but from way up on top of the mountain, we could appreciate how big it actually is.
We could have paid another entry price to climb higher, but we chose not to, as it was busy with tour groups and lots of people so we headed under another gate (there’s always a gate) and down the mountain.
There are many paths down the mountain, and we started down on the asphalt road; but not too soon after we saw a group head off on smaller trail, and Amaps said there was a trail they were following, so we figured, why not? Down, down, down we went…for a couple of hours.
The trail was mostly stone/concrete but the light drizzle added to some slippery stones, luckily, we made it without any major falls.
We also passed what we later learned were tombs; they were strange and different, and there were many signs saying not to burn incense, as that is a popular thing done by the relatives of their ancestors. Jessica writes more about them on her blog, as these were not the last we encountered in Southern China.
It was a long, humid trek down, but we knew we were close when we saw the pink village below.
Finally, we reached the bottom, and we saw the sign to be ware of the slippery steps (we had to translate the sign). Duh, would have helped to tell us that at the top.
Kunming off in the distance, we traversed the narrow streets and pink buildings of Longmen Suija Village.
It was really quiet, not too much happening on the streets, past so many Bonsai trees, kept by residents as outdoor, potted plants.
We kept walking toward the lake, and eventually reached a road, but it was for bikes only, and a public bathroom that was one of the worst we had encountered thus far (but when you gotta go, you gotta go). We could see Kunming off in the distance, with no easy way to reach it, as the road above us was not easily accessible (Jessica is on the bike road, with the car road above us).
We crossed the road, and found a red bench to rest our weary legs, near the water, and sat for a while.
Amaps showed a restaurant about a mile away, so we started walking again, up another pink building street (where a couple guys also took pictures, not slyly either, of Jessica).
We finally found the restaurant, Sunshine Shan Shui, and we pointed at some cooking pork belly, and a few other dishes that were on the sign (it truly helps having big pictures of food to point at), and were led into a big room to eat.
And eat and drink we did, as we felt we earned it after our impromptu woods hike. Kunming continued to surprise us with adventures!
Phil's WayPastCool 