Tiger Leaping Gorge

Our hike to the Tiger Leaping Gorge was phenomenal. We ran into a pair of Brits at our hostel that were going to do the gorge trek. So we decided to coordinate with them in order to share a cab to the bus station. We also got some great advice from them on leaving most of our stuff in the town at the trail head then picking up our stuff after the 3 day hike to continue on to the next town called Zhongdian (also known as Shangri-la). I had seen pictures online that show these jagged mountains and spectacular views on the hike. And I have to say the pictures don't even come close to how beautiful it was. The hike is fairly vigorous 20km up and down semi-steep mountainsides with a few areas proving more of a challenge than others.

Since we weren't on much of a schedule we decided to take a leisurely three days to hike the gorge rather than the more grueling two day hike. The trail is fairly well marked with red arrows pointing you in the right direction and the trail is fairly well worn. And along the trail at various points there are guesthouses where you can stay the night or just get some food and water. Our first day we did the short 3-hour hike to Naxi's Guesthouse. It was so nice to get a hot shower and be able to lounge around for the rest of the afternoon and evening and eat some very good food.

The second day was a bit more taxing since we would be walking from early morning into the evening in order to arrive at the base of the gorge where a tiger is supposed to have leaped across, hence giving the gorge its name.

All along the last 2 hours of the hike we kept seeing signs pointing to Tina's guesthouse. I felt like I was on the road to Las Vegas from Los Angeles with those famed "Eat at Joes, 200 miles" - esque signs. So when we finally got there I was eager to check out the guesthouse that was responsible for all that trail graffiti. It was only so-so. Fortunately it did have a warm shower and beds for us. The third day we got up to hike down the final leg of the gorge. There was a perilous ladder and a safer route to get down.

We took the safe route down though we did take the perilous ladder to come back up. It wasn't as scary coming back up, but I did notice that one part of the ladder had just a tree branch propping up the ladder...yikes!

But Andrea and I survived. The river at the base of the gorge looked like it would make great white water rafting if it weren't for all those jagged rocks.

After getting our fill of the gorge(eous) views we decided to head back to continue on our journey to Zhongdian. Since there had been some concern at the start of our trip if we would even be able to the hike due to a landslide we were a bit curious at how we were going to get back. The landslide blocked the road but not the hiking trail so we had no idea what to expect. It turned out we could take a taxi to the landslide and then have to cross over on foot then find another taxi on the other side. Since it was early enough and we didn't feel like paying the now 4 x's higher taxi fare we decided to walk to the landslide and see if we could get a taxi from there. It was a pleasant hike, though we had an unspoken fear every time we saw rocks on the road, knowing that another landslide could happen where we walked. We made it to the landslide zone and saw that a tractor was being put to use to clear it up.

We had to wait until the tractor had a mouthful of rubble and was taking it to be dumped over the cliff so we along with everyone else that was waiting there could scramble over the rubble. I almost made it over unscathed until my left foot sunk about 2 feet into a soft patch of sand and gravel leaving me with a few cuts and now a quickly fading scar that I can show off to prove I had an adventure. After walking on for another half hour or so a taxi came zipping by and stopped. There were already two hikers in the car asking if we wanted to share the cost of the cab for the remaining 10 km or so...it didn't take long for Andre and I to jump on that offer. We got back to the town, picked up our stuff and found a our bus that would take us to Zhongdian.