During the end of September and October, 2010, I did my third trip to China. I celebrated my 60th birthday in Sichuan and Yunnan province. I was 75miles from Tibet, but didn’t make it there. It was not an easy trip. One of the goals of this trip was to photograph yellow Larch Trees at 13,000 feet with 20,000 foot snow peaks in the distance. I have learned to expect the unexpected. I was able to photograph spectacular mountain scenery in rapidly changing weather conditions. I was also able to walk 8 to 10 miles at 13,000 to 14ooo feet in a day without any problems. I had a restful sleep for the first time ever at 14,000feet without any altitude problems.
China combines the very best and the very worst of tourism. After walking all day at altitude and walking in the dark to be at a choice sunrise location, my Chinese guide and I were confronted by several police officers. They refused to let us camp at Luorong Meadow because I was a foreigner. They recently had someone die with altitude problems. It was ok to camp there if I were Chinese, and there were many Chinese camping there. But the police didn’t want any foreigners dying there. (very bad publicity) They prepared us a very nice dinner which my guide and I ate accompanied by 15 police officers. The police then arranged a small vehicle to transport us to a lower elevation. The police were hospitable and friendly but rules are rules. That night we camped in a tent we set up inside an animal shed.
The next day we walked past the police outpost into the high alpine. I was expecting pristine high altitude conditions in Yading Nature area, not the hundreds of people that I saw. There were hundreds of people on horses and even people being carried into the mountains. Several had portable oxygen. There are future plans to build a monorail. In China It seems that wilderness preservation has little importance when compared to commercial opportunity.
This was spectacular alpine scenery and I saw lovely old growth cedars and Larch trees at 13,000 feet. We walked around the three holy Peaks of Yading named after three Bodhisattvas in Buddhism and awoke to fresh snow at 14,000 feet.
We walked 10 miles down a valley and stayed several nights with a wonderful Tibetan family in Kasi Village. It is common for tourists to do home stays in remote parts of China without hotels. As guests in this household we were treated like royalty. I got the feeling that Kasi Village hadn’t seen many westerners. The locals wanted to take my photo with them. 90% of people were friendly and very happy to have their photo taken by me. The graciousness, hospitality, and friendliness that I experienced was wonderful. It was a reminder to me that despite the intolerance, control, and suppression by the Chinese government, most Chinese people are “out of synch” with their government. It was similar to how many Americans felt when George Bush was president.
Knowing about how the Dalai Lama fled from Tibet and the devastation of monasteries and Buddhist temples , I was curious as to why Chinese Tibetan people all had huge posters of Mao Zedong in their homes. It was obvious that Chairman Mao was highly revered. My guide explained that at the same time that the Han Chinese were invading Tibet, Chairman Mao made huge agricultural reforms. The Chinese peasants, who were basically share croppers and slaves, were given ownership of some of the land that they worked on.
There are many reasons to go to China. Go soon because much of what you might want to see is rapidly disappearing. So much of China is under construction. The constructions of roads in remote areas is accompanied by much environmental destruction. A Smithsonian Magazine article corroborated much of my experience. In Smithsonian , March 2010 p 24-33, I read a fascinating story “Wrecking History: A Thousand Year old city in NW China, Kashgar was a vital stop on the ancient Silk Road. Why is the Government now demolishing its oldest neighborhoods……….?”
“….Over the next several years, China plans to knock down mosques, markets, and century old houses……Residents will be compensated then moved. … “ The destruction, some say, is business-as–usual for a government that values development over preservation of traditional architecture and culture. In 2005, new construction in Beijing equaled the total in all of Europe….”
The author of this article talks about how he was confronted by the police who forced him to remove some photos of old buildings from his camera. They didn’t project the image of “ burgeoning prosperity that China (wants to ) project to the world”
I concluded the trip in Tiger Leaping Gorge and had a wonderful time hiking there for two days. Tiger Leaping Gorge is a deep canyon on the Yangtze River and one of the deepest canyons in the world. The gorge is located where the river passes between 5,596 metre Jade Dragon Snow Mountain and 5,396 meter Haba Xueshan Mountain. I expected lots of tourists and backpackers, but there were very few.
See some of Howie’s other China photos below.
To see Howie’s photos from seven continents go to wanderlustimages.com
