Shangrila

Yes, this is indeed paradise*! I can attest to that fact since when I got off the bus in Shangrila (Zhongdian). After hopping out of the cab that whisked us away from the bus station into the old town we immediately fell in love with this quaint little town. It has a very weird vibe to it. Somewhere between the Bolivian Altiplano, a Colorado mountain resort and some hippy tourist town with Tibetan influences. I just love it. We were greeted with dancing in the main square as today happened to be the mid autumn festival (though I later found out they do this every night).


Then while walking around looking for a place to stay we happened on a staring contest between two young boys, they couldn't have been any older than 6 and 7. When we finally got to a place to stay we set out and quickly picked up the potato on stick, which is basically 4 baked potatoes covered in chili sauce then grilled...mmm so good. Then we went to eat at the Kamapa Cowboy restaurant which was something like a log cabin with a mixture of Native American and Southwest US decor and Tibetan influences. Our meal was the most divine pork ribs and cucumber salad ... And to those of you who know my fascination with popcorn I almost cried when I saw the waiter bring out a fresh bowl of sweetened popcorn to the table of people eating and drinking on the patio. The town has truly lived up to its name...at least for me ;-)
Oh and we happened to run into the hikers we met on the Leaping Tiger gorge. Its so fun to run into the same people again. We are off to explore the Napa Hai Lake tomorrow.






*For those of you unfamiliar with the work of James Hilton, in his novel "Lost Horizon," Hilton describes an idyllic Tibetan mountain monastery that has discovered the fountain of youth. The town's name was Shangri-la. In 1996, the Chinese government created a task force to find the really Shangri-la based on on clues from the novel. Zhongdian fit the bill due the presence of a Tibetan monastery in the general area described by the book, and the supposed discovery of a plane crash that occurred in the 1930's.