As 2009 begins, I thought it would be fun to take a look back at 2008…and what a year it has been!!

In January…

I lived in the best 1 bedroom apartment in Portland

and my favorite jeans decided they couldn't take it any more

In February…

I walked to work every day,

Nik and I spent a weekend on the Oregon coast,

and he laid down in the beach grass.

In March…

The first building I ever worked on was dedicated,

Spring started in Portland,

and my Dad had heart surgery, so I mowed the lawn.

In April…

We went to Denver to meet my niece for the first time ever,

and Nik and I celebrated our 2 year anniversary.

In May…

We stayed at a lovely B&B

in Nik's favorite American city, San Francisco,

then we said goodbye to so many good Portland friends,

and packed our life into one of these little rooms before saying goodbye to Portland, not knowing if we'd ever return.

In June…

I took a solo road-trip from Tennessee to Atlanta,

Attended the family reunion with our little Sinz extension,

And hopped on a big plane the very next day to go to...

Thailand!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

In July…

We climbed a big hill in Krabi to see a big Buddha,

We watched soccer at sunset on Rai Leh Beach,

We rode a longtail boat to Koh Phi Phi,

We found an apartment in Chiang Mai,

and I turned 27 so we took our first long distance motorbike trip to celebrate.

In August…

We discovered the best boiled chicken restaurant in town,

We visited the Reservoir for the first time,

we got lost on our way to Pai,

and we wandered around town....A LOT!!

In September…

We spent some days overlooking Chiang Mai,

we took a trip to Doi Inthanon,

and then we went to India.

We slept at hawk level near Jama Masjid during Ramadan in Delhi,

we walked to Shey to see a monastery in the Himalayas,

we rode a local bus along the Indus River,

and we fought off touts

while we admired the bathing ghats in Varanasi.

In October…

We joined the masses at the Taj Mahal,

we took an Indian cooking class

and walked through the blue streets in Jodhpur,

we slept under the stars in Osiyan,

we dined on rooftops,

witnessed celebrations,

and paddled through Lake Pichola in Udaipur,

we looked at books,

watched the sunset at Chowpatty Beach,

joined the morning commute,

and drank sugarcane juice in Mumbai,

Nik caught a cold in Goa,

I got food poisoning in Bengaluru,

and then we saw the King of Thailand in Bangkok.

In November…

we made it back to Chiang Mai just in time for Loi Krathong,

and then left Thailand for good (at least until next year).

But we didn't go home. Instead we went to Beijing to meet some friends,

ride some bikes,

and hike some km's on the Great Wall.

In December…

we acted like we had money to spend

and climbed to the top of the Lulu bridge in Shanghai,

we went to a bonfire with Chinese college students,

ate lunch at a long-haired-lady's home,

and hiked along the rice terraces in Longji,

we biked through the countryside

and ate citrus fruit in Yangshuo,

we were amazed by Hong Kong,

and then we came back to America.

2008 truly was an amazing year, and I am thankful for the opportunities I had.  Most of all, I loved doing all of this with my one true love.  This year was like a year-long honeymoon, only there was no wedding.

HIP HIP, HOORAY!!!  HIP HIP, HOORAY!!!  HIP HIP, HOORAY!!!

Hong Kong

Friday, Nik and I took a casual morning at our Yangshuo hotel to catch up on emails, blogs and general news on the internet.  I also logged on to Skype, and was able to talk to my sister and her family for one last time while we were in Asia.  It was nearly 10pm her time, so I didn’t expect to see my oldest neice, Aubrey, because her bedtime is normally around 8pm.  So you can imagine how excited I was to hear, “Mommy, make it bigger” in a little 3 year old voice as our webcams connected for the first time.  (She was talking about the camera display of me on her computer screen)

Aubrey, from a previous conversation on Skype

Aubrey and I chatted for a little while.  I asked her how her day was and she gave me all the details.  Then I learned that they are now calling me “Toot” because of a children’s book I gave to Aubrey a few years ago called “Toot and Puddles” where Toot is a little piglet that travels all over the world while his best friend, Puddles, is happy to stay at home.  Of course, they correspond with postcards so that Puddles knows what Toot is up to…and that is one of the many ways I have found to talk to Aubrey, so it’s appropriate that I am now nicknamed Toot.

Then I told my niece that I was going on a Choo-Choo train tomorrow, and she was very excited.  Of course, my sister explained that my train probably won’t look exactly like the trains she is used to, but I still promised to send Aubrey pictures of my adventure, so here they are, beginning with one of many Choo-Choo trains.

The prestine platform at the Guilin Train Station as our overnight train waits for departure

The interior of the overnight train: Windows to the right, private cabins to the left

Nik and I arrived in Hong Kong on the overnight sleeper train from Guilin on Saturday morning around 10:30am.  Wait, I take that back.  We arrived in Schenzhen, a town in mainland China that hosts the border between China and Hong Kong, at 10:30am.  We didn’t actually arrive in Hong Kong until 2pm after a torturously long procession through customs.  I will never complain about the customs lines at the airport any more after this one.  Not only was everything being conducted in underground subway stations where every check point was a mile away from the previous one, but we were also carrying all of our luggage AND there were about 50,000 other people trying to get into Hong Kong at the same time.  Luckily we had slept a little bit on the train because we had our own 4-person cabin to ourselves, and we were smart enough to bring some snacks with us.  So it wasn’t as bad as it could have been, but we still arrived a little tired and very hungry.

Carrie Chau's Indigo Child Art Exhibition at Times Square, Causeway Bay, Hong Kong

Carrie Chau: Indigo Child collection

Once we were through customs, we made our way to the Lo Wu MTR station and boarded the East Rail Line train that took us into town.  Three connections later, we arrived at the Causeway Bay station on the Island Line and made our way through the upscale underground shopping mall before emerging into the Times Square plaza that was filled with this beautiful art installation by Carrie Chau.  We whizzed past all of the Chinese teenagers taking photos of themselves, and found our hotel, The Causeway Bay Guesthouse.  As expected, the alley was narrow and the room was teeny tiny, but it was impeccably clean and the manager that greeted us was extremely gracious.  We set down our bags, relaxed for a bit, then took off to explore the neighborhood before dark.  We came back pretty early and called it a night to rest up for the next day.

Sunday morning we found pastries at a local bakery then stopped by McDonalds for good cheap coffee, and headed to Victoria Park.  Victoria Park is one of the largest urban parks in Hong Kong, just north of Causeway Bay.  We had hoped to see the morning exercises like we did in Beijing, but we were a little late so we only saw a few stragglers.  We were able to catch a few of the more Anglo weekend sports like bocce ball, tennis, swimming and basketball.

Bocce Ball at Victoria Park

Sunday Foot Traffic

We also witnessed one of the most phenomenal things I have ever seen.  Around 10am on Sunday mornings, the women of Hong Kong and surrounding areas flock to the Causeway Bay, Admiralty and Central neighborhoods.  At first, I thought they were coming to shop because these areas are really just huge street level shopping malls, but no.  They were coming here to be here.  Sure, some were shopping, but most were sitting on the sidewalks, streets, stairs, park benches, overhead walkways and underground subway connections chatting and eating with their friends.  They were in groups of 4-15 and each group staked their claim by patchworking small plastic squares together, and some even built extravagant cardboard walls to protect them from the view of their neighbors.  It was like one huge city-wide pre-game tail gating party, only there weren’t any tails and there was no game.  They were all women, they all had delicious home cooked food, and they all took their shoes off before stepping onto the sacred plastic picnic cloth.  Absolutely fascinating!!!!  And if you happen to know more about this bizarre ritual, please let me know.

Sunday Ladies: Subway underpass

Back to Nik and I’s day.  As with most of the cities we have visited, our first day was spent wandering through the streets seeing what we could see.  After Victoria Park, we made our way to the water’s edge and around the exhibition center, and realized that this town really is amazing.  It has a huge, busy and beautiful waterway that is respected by the people that live here as well as those that travel here, and it works as a major international port.  We eventually made our way to the Central area to go to the IFC Shopping mall because Nik wanted to check out the Apple retailer to gaze at his new dream computer, the all-aluminum MacBook Pro, then we walked around the streets to find a camera supply store that no longer exists so Nik could look at the wide-range Nikon lenses and look into a camera cleaning kit.  After visiting 3 of the Apple retailers and no less than 8 camera stores, he decided he wasn’t ready to buy the computer and did purchase a small camera cleaning pen.  It was a successful shopping trip in his mind…to me, it was a little silly.  But I can’t complain because I did get to see the city, which was my only goal for the day, and there was a continuous stream of women tail gating on the sidewalks, so they kept me entertained!

Sunday Shopping

Signs

Street Things

Swimming near the Harbor

Give Way

Nik's disobeying the "DO NOT LEAN" sign. At least there's a life preserver nearby.

Pacific Princess

Elevated Walkways

50

24 Hour McDonalds Delivery

We also made our way to the Central Mid-Levels Escalator, which is the longest outdoor escalator system in the world and spans over 800 meters.  It carries pedestrians from the commercial center up the steep hillside into the “mid-levels” which is filled with residential towers, little boutique eateries and shops.  The escalator was opened in 1994 and we could tell that it has created a thriving vertical main street that would not have been possible without it.  No one would have ventured that far away from the subways and streetcars on foot just to go to a little Italian restaurant.  But now, they take a leisurely fifteen minute ride on the escalator, and they’re there.

Looking down on the Central Escalator

Costume Market near the escalator

Residential Tower

Amazing Color

More Color and Texture

Unfortunately, the highest point of the escalator was beyond the scope of our little tourist map, so we had to wind blindly through the midlevels hoping we were going the right way for at least an hour.  Luckily, Nik has a pretty good sense of direction and we made it to Hong Kong Park around 4pm.  This was not a specific goal, but it turned out to be fantastic.  Hong Kong Park has a pretty large walk-through aviary that houses over 600 birds, and we walked in around 4:15pm, which is about an hour before sunset, so the birds were very active.  They were so beautiful and colorful that we sat there until they closed at 5pm.  It was getting pretty dark, so Nik wasn’t able to take many good photos, but the ones he did are beautiful.

Hong Kong Park Aviary*

White Bird*

Red-Eye Mohawked Dove*

After that, we headed back to the hotel and Nik did some work on his computer, and I went back out to wander through the bustling late night streets of Causeway Bay.  I window shopped and people watched until 10, but I had to retreat to get my beauty sleep for the next days’ adventures.

Subway Station Tunnel

Monday, after pastries and coffee, we took the subway across the bay to Kowloon peninsula to wander some more.  We started out walking through Kowloon.  It was nice, but I couldn’t completely appreciate it because I had the worst headache I have ever had in my entire life.  I finally stopped at the restroom to blow my nose and to my surprise, while blowing, my ears popped and the pressure behind my temples subsided.  Sorry for the gory details, but I never knew that mucus could clog my head so badly.  Needless to say, I was blowing my nose every 20 minutes for the rest of the day.  It seems like my body likes to break down after a month of constant travel.  I couldn’t keep anything in my stomach after a month in India, and now I can’t seem to keep stuff out of my head in China.

Around Town on Kowloon Penninsula

Empty Pool...wish my head was

Flamingos in the Park

After the park, we wandered through the neighborhoods, which were a bit more work-a-day than island, and once again, went to a shopping mall to find a decent lunch.  Then we tried to find the industrial harbor, but were unsuccessful and instead found Toys-R-Us.  Neither of us had been to one in several years, so it was like time-warping back into childhood.  I was disappointed because the entire place was divided by brand, gender and color, and nothing was uniquely Chinese.  Oh, and the entire lower level of the shopping mall where the Toys-R-Us was, was filled with designer kids stores.  It was ridiculous.  Who in the world would pay $2000HKD ($250USD) for a kids pair of jeans?  Not me.

The Harbor

The Star Ferry

Passengers

Buoy

Finally, we made our way back to the surface and boarded the Star Ferry boat to cross the bay back to Hong Kong Island, and back to the hotel to rest.

Our goal for Tuesday was to get out of town to see the old walled villages.  Of course we didn’t know how to get to them or what they were called, so we simply boarded the train in the direction we assumed would be right, and got off at a station we thought we recognized.  From the train station, we saw what looked like an old village, so we left in that direction and found the Shan Heritage Trail.  It took us through a bizarre makeshift old/new neighborhood where the only access was by foot, and the distance between structures was less than twelve inches (and this is where all the electrical wiring and plumbing was organized…how did they maintain it?  who knows!).

The Outdoor Stove of an amazing old building in the middle of the old walled village

Window Detail

Inside the building I mentioned above. One day, I would love to have a photo shoot in this building. The wall, floor and ceiling textures and color were amazing, and daylight just poured through holes in the ceiling. It was so beautiful!!

From the Top

Umbrella

Awning

Twelve Inch Utility space

Cracking building

We wandered through there for over an hour and received several strange looks, but were generally left alone.  Then we crossed through the train station to a new residential tower complex that was the complete antithesis of the one we just left.  Here, the entire old neighborhood would have fit on a single floor of one tower, but there were eight towers with over thirty stories each…which means 240x more people live in the new complex than lived in the old.  Pretty insane.

Suburban Train Station

Chinese Suburb

The park of the Chinese Suburb

And then it was Wednesday.  The last full day of our Asia trip.  The last day of completely new things.  The last day in Hong Kong.  The last day of just me and Nik for a while.  The last day of life as we knew it.

I was sentimental, Nik was not.  Well, not as much as me anyways.  For him, it was just another day of travel.

Me on the Streetcar*

We had saved the best Hong Kong adventures for last day, the streetcar and the Peak Tram.  Lucky for us, the man upstairs had also saved the best weather for our last day.  The temperature was warm and the skies were clear, so when we made it up to the top, we were greeted with an amazing view of Hong Kong.

These are the trains that Aubrey will love and recognize!!

Hong Kong Streetcar

The streetcars here are double deckers, so to get to the top, we climbed these little spiral stairs.

The Top Level

The Peak Tram*

Last bits of Daylight on Hong Kong

Looking the other Direction

Sunset over the Pacific

Hong Kong at Night

*Photos by Nik.  And here are his Hong Kong blog posts:

First Two Days in Hong Kong

Last Days in Hong Kong

Nik and I will be flying home tomorrow to spend Christmas with our families!!!  I still need to do a post on what we have seen here in Hong Kong, but wanted to send a quick update anyways.

Happy Holidays.

Nik on the Li River

Nik and I have spent the last two days wandering around Yangshuo, China by foot and bicycle.  The town is touristy and for the first night we slept at the Yangshuo International Youth Hostel on the main street, and it was so noisy that we had to leave first thing the next morning.  We found a great little riverside hotel that is still close to all the restaurants with a balcony, free internet, clean linens and it’s quiet after dark.  It was our perfect night time retreat.

We left the town around 10am both mornings to bike through the countryside.  We depended on the free tourist map that the hotel provided, and in hindsight, I wish we had splurged for the 2¥ detailed map that showed all of the major attractions and bike destinations.  Our free map got us where we needed to go, but on the second day we got turned around and I think we could have taken a better path.  Oh well.  Since the days were simple, I don’t have many stories to tell, but here are the photos….

West Street, the tourist center before breakfast

A bamboo raft on the Li River at dusk

Water boot

Crops with karst mountains beyond

Scarecrow in the field of greens

Our road through beauty

Wheat drying in front of a village home

Me*

Wooden wheelbarrow

Nik leads the way

On our first day, we stopped for lunch in the small village of LiuGong.  The owner was a fairly young Chinese man whose daughter spoke very good english and took the orders for all of the foreigners.  The dining porch overlooked the river and was full of casual reminders that all of the food served came from the land.  A huge pile of potatoes was tucked into one corner, fresh sausage dried along the hand rails, fresh greens sat in a basket waiting to be washed, and bushels of mandarin oranges and pomellos sat off to the side.  Our lunch of pork with green peppers and pumpkin was delicious.  After we finished we arranged for a boat to take us back to town, and while we waited for it to arrive, the owner took us on a short hike through the town to see a couple caves, the temple and a couple vistas of the river.  We could tell that he was proud of his village and this was an opportunity for him to show off.  I think he enjoyed our short 45 minute outing as much as we did!!

The view from my seat at lunch: chili sauce and coke on the table, hundreds of potatoes waiting to be eaten, home made broom resting on the wall, bike lock dangling, fake snakeskin jacket draped over the rail, and Nik's new favorite hat

The friendly restaurant owner demonstrating his skills on his bamboo raft

Much of the farmland we passed through were citrus groves. This is the kumquat tree we snacked from...don't tell!

Nik and I follow

Our river chariot...ours was not the authentic bamboo raft...instead it was made of PVC pipe shaped like bamboo

The mystical river

Me and the citrus*

The mountains at dusk with a hot air balloon in the distance...Mom, you would have loved it!!

If I could, I would bike through fruit trees and mountains and along rivers every day.  China, you are a beautiful country.

*Photos taken by Nik. Visit his blog: Riding Bikes in Beautiful Yangshuo, China

First, I need to add a disclaimer to this post.  Nik took all but two of the photos shown below, so if you think they’re wonderful…let him know on his blog.  My camera battery died shortly after we arrived in Li Jong and I was unable to take many photos….and his are just better than mine anyways.  And to hear his side of this story, go here.

Motorbike looks up as our bus passes dangerously close

Sunday afternoon, Nik and I went to the Guilin bus station to purchase tickets to the Long Ji rice terraces.  Five minutes later, we were sitting in seats 9 & 10 and the bus was rolling away from the station.  The two hour trip costed 24RMB each ($4) and took us to the town of Heping where we boarded a second bus that took us up the mountain to the village of Ping’An.  This one took about an hour and cost only 7RMB ($1.20).  The transfer was smooth…we got off the bus, walked across the street, and got on the other bus.  We didn’t realize it at the time, but our first bus driver had actually flagged down the Ping’An bus driver just for us.  If we had missed that transfer, we would have been waiting on the side of the road for over two hours.  Thanks bus driver!!

When we arrived in Ping-an, we still had to hike up a narrow stone path through handicraft shops and local women before we reached the village.  Normally this wouldn’t be anything to worry about, but we were carrying 6 months worth of luggage and we were exhausted.  To add to the excitement, we didn’t have a clue about where we should stay.  We stopped at the first decent looking hotel and booked a double room for 60RMB ($8).  The manager walked us up to our room, and I really thought the building might collapse under our combined weight.  Everything was wood.  The walls, stairs, hand rails, floors, ceilings.  Everything.  Everything was very thin wood that creaked and moaned.  I swear that the floor sank at least two inches every time I took a step.  Luckily, we appeared to be the only guests, so we wouldn’t have to worry about being disturbed by neighbors.

The red lantern on our teeny tiny balcony

Local ladies play cards on the porch

Me sitting in our rickety wood room

After spending the past two weeks in big cities, we quickly dropped off our bags and headed out on our first hike.  View Point #2, also known as Seven Stars Accompanying the Moon, was only 30 minutes away, so we had just enough time before sunset.  We walked through the village to reach the trailhead and discovered that there are quite a few farm animals in this little town.  We saw dozens of hens and roosters, pigs large and small, horses, ponies and ducks!  There was also evidence of the crops being grown…corn hanging from eaves, red peppers spread out to dry in baskets and barrels full of rice stowed under porches.  Oh, and the view was pretty nice too!!  Mountains covered with rice terraces surrounded us and seemed to go on forever.

Stone path through the village

It is a farming village after all

The view from Platform #2

Before calling it a night, we walked over to the Countryside Inn & Cafe to check out their rooms and have dinner.  The rooms were twice the price (120RMB, $16) and twice as nice.  We reserved a room for the following night, and enjoyed a nice meal of greens, kung-pao chicken and a beer.  Satisfied and tired, we headed back to our wood heaven to relax before a long night’s sleep.

As we approached the hotel, we could tell something was different.  A few people lingered on the porch, and the entire place seemed to be buzzing.  We walked through the dining room towards the stairs and found that we were not the only ones staying in the hotel.  In fact, every single room and hallway appeared to be filled with college students chatting and laughing.  Every door in the place was open for the coeds to find their friends, except for ours.  We quietly walked to our door, unlocked it, went in, and quickly shut it behind us.  Nik and I looked at each other, and said so long to our peaceful evening!!

Five minutes later we heard a knock.  I figured it was someone looking for their friend, but it was actually one of the students inviting us to come to a party with them.  We said sure since we weren’t going to get any sleep anyways, and how often do you get to hang out with 48 Chinese University students?  Not often.

The fire

We joined the group on the porch a little bit later, and were instantly the circus attraction of the night.  All of the guys wanted to practice their English skills with us while all of the girls shyly stood off to the side.  We learned that they were all business students from a university near Hong Kong, and that this was their graduation trip.  When they learned we were from Portland, Oregon, they asked us about the Trail Blazers.  I was impressed with their knowledge of the NBA, which far surpassed mine. We also learned that the party was a bon fire about a fifteen minutes from the hotel.  Of course, I pictured a good-ol’ american bon fire in the middle of nowhere soaring 15-20 feet in the air with everyone sitting around roasting marshmallows, singing campfire songs and telling ghost stories.  The party we went to was not like this.  Instead it was on the outdoor basketball court of the local primary school in the middle of town.  The fire was contained in a small iron stove and we all sat on one side while 8 women from the local minority tribe performed traditional songs and dances on the other.  I thought it was a little bland but interesting, even though I didn’t understand it, but it was obvious that the students were bored.  After four or five songs, the women asked for volunteers to dance with them.  For some reason, everyone looked to us to make the first move, and since we didn’t have any reason to be embarrassed, Nik and I stepped up and everyone else followed.  All 50 of us circled up and joined hands for a traditional dance that turned into a strange form of Red-Rover-Red-Rover.  Now that everyone was riled up to play games, the women brought out ten long bamboo poles to play a jumping game.  It appeared that this was typical in China, as everyone seemed to know exactly what to do.  As the women moved the poles in unison, everyone else formed a line to jump through the rhythmic maze one, two or three at a time.  Nik asked me to hold his camera, and he joined the line.  He watched everyone ahead of him go, and when it was his turn, he stepped up proudly.  He made it through the first four poles without any problem, but then something happened, and he lost his balance and fell flat on his butt!!!  It was obvious that he wasn’t hurt, and everyone got a good laugh out of it, including Nik.  He was grinning ear to ear the entire time!

Traditional Dance

Attentive Students

After a little while, they started dismantling the fire and that’s when we decided it was time to go.  The novelty of having foreigners in the group had worn off, and it was time for us to leave the college students to their own devises.  We kindly thanked our hosts for inviting us and journeyed back to our temporarily quiet room while everyone was still at the party.  We didn’t get very much sleep that night, but it was worth it.  This was a once in a lifetime thing, and we relished in it.

The following morning, we woke up pretty early and immediately packed our things to move to the other hotel.  We had a relaxed breakfast and took off for the 5 hour hike to the JinKeng Terraces around 10am.  The weather was brisk, but sunny and clear.  For the first half hour we were the only ones on the trail.  As we left View Point #1, also known as Nine Dragons and Five Tigers, another group of foreigners was coming up.  We said hello, and went on our way.

Rice Terraces...

...rice terraces...

...Nik...

...a lake...

...grave...

...rice terraces...

...rice terraces...

...farm animals...

About ten minutes after that, we passed a small shelter where a few local people were sitting and as we passed, three of them stood up and joined us.  I had expected this, but it still annoyed me.  After a little bit, we asked the man in the group to pass, and he did so and never turned back.  Then we asked both of the women to go ahead.  One of them turned around and went back to the shelter, but the other was persistant.  When Nik and I stopped, she stopped.  When we walked faster, she walked faster.  When we pointed at a good view, she said “Good View”.  I understand that this is what she does as her living, but I told her we didn’t want a tour and that we didn’t want to go to her house.  We wanted to be the only two people on the path for as far as we could see, and we did not want a shadow.  But she continued to follow us.  I eventually resigned to the fact that she wasn’t leaving, and engaged her in simple observations here and there.  Once, I pointed a bright red berry out to Nik, and then she stopped to pick the plant out of the ground.  She held it up to me and told me it was tea, and offered it to me.  I must admit that it was a nice gesture, but I still had a little grudge that she had followed us for over an hour so she tucked the plant into her basket and continued to walk behind us.  Eventually, she followed our lead and was quiet and kept to herself.  The hike was still pleasant and absolutely beautiful.

...our shadow...

...red peppers drying in the sun...

Around noon we passed through a small village and stopped for a drink of water.  At this point, she started asking us if we wanted to go to her house for lunch.  We said we didn’t know, and tried to avoid the subject.  But the fact was that we were neither here nor there, and we were hungry.  We were approaching the Zhongliu Village where she lived, so Nik and I decided we would eat with her.  I expected her to take us to a small inn or restaurant fit to feed many people, but instead she took us to her private home.  We were both very reserved about the whole thing, and didn’t know what to do with prices.  What if it was really expensive, and really bad?  We decided we should negotiate a price before we ate so that there weren’t any missed expectations, and we settled on 20RMB/person ($3.50).  We had no clue what she would cook for us, and most main dishes in the restaurants we’ve visited have been between 15-30, so 20 seemed reasonable.  As we sat on one side of the large room of the empty house, our hostess and her son washed, cut and cooked vegetables on the other.  I watched as she peeled potatoes and washed greens.  Then another woman that appeared to be our hostess’s mother joined them and sat by the wood-burning stove and kept the fire going while everything cooked.  An hour later, she brought a small square table over to Nik and I, then set the table with bowls and chopsticks.  Next she filled our bowls with rice and brought over three vegetable dishes: fried sweet potatoes, fried spinach-like greens and boiled turnips with onions.  All three were delicious and way too much for the two of us.  Then she brought over a fourth dish of stir-fried greens with garlic.  We all laughed that it was too much food, and she insisted that we eat more because we had lots of “walky walky” ahead of us.  She was right, we did have at least three more hours of hiking to go, so we weren’t shy, and we ate and ate and ate.

...lunch...

...our guide's home...

...the Zhongliu village...

As we finished our meal, she offered to guide us to the DaZhai Village where we would catch the bus back to our hotel.  We refused her guidance and thanked her for the wonderful food.  We walked away from her house satisfied and thankful for her persistence earlier in the morning.  Ultimately, we were glad that she followed us, and we ate the best Chinese food yet at her table.

With a pep in our step, we continued our journey through the rice fields and we finally had the path to ourselves.  We comfortably lingered longer in some places while we skipped and ran through others…just to be silly.  It was like we were little kids and our parents finally trusted us enough to leave us home alone.

...the path...

...our real shadow...

...rice terraces...

...me in the rice terraces...

...rice terraces...

...DaZhai village...

...beast of burden...

...government issue green canvas sneakers...

...and now it's time for everyone to go home...including the goats.

We made it to DaZhai around 4:30pm and caught one of the last buses down the mountain, then hitched a ride with a mini-bus up to Ping-An and were back to the hotel just before dark.  Once again, a situation that we thought would be terrible turned out to be pretty good, and actually made our day.