I have been many different places on my birthday from Guatamala & Puapa New Guinea to drunk in the backyard in Brisbane.
But this year is going to be hard to beat, this year I was in Yading, Szechwan China and I had not only the company of my wife, but my parents as well.
Yarding is a snow mountain national park in remote Szechwan dominated by three towering mountains, one of which you can see in the photo below.
We got to Yading from Daocheng by minivan, organising with the driver to pick us up late the next day. The driver tried to take us to a hotel up in Yading town, but we insisted to go down to the park gate, where we walked up a little hill to another, much closer hotel. This was the much better option because if you stay in Yading town you will need somebody to take you up and down in a car from the park entrance.
As always click on the photos to get a better look.
The first day having the morning taken up by actually getting to the park we walked up into the park past the locals trying to get us on one of their horses and to the right at the bridge to see the closer snow mountain, Xiannairi, the mountain in the gallery below with the lake in front. It took about 2 hours to get up to the lake and a bit less to get back to our hotel.
It has to be said that the pictures don’t convey the way these mountains tower over you. They are just huge and standing this close to them awakens something quite primal inside of you. We sat below Xiannairi for hours, just staring in awe of this majestic giant.
Some very cute local girls.
Below is a picture of our guesthouse.
The river on the way to Xiannairi.
Chickens at the monastery on the way to Xiannairi.
Liz: These chooks are cool, I want one, does any one know the breed that these are or the generic breed of the Chinese chickens?
That night there way a huge thunderstorm and large amounts of rain, but come moring the weather was clearing, revealing a fresh coating of snow on the mountains above.
What a place to wake up to on your birthday.
Our goal for the second day, my actual birthday, was to walk to Milk Lake. This involved walking all the way up the valley underneath and even bigger mountain, Yangmaiyong.
We made it up the pass as it started raining, where the boys made a sprint for the lake, while the ladies (who were feeling the altitude of 4750m) started on the way down.
All in all a fantastic two days and sure to be one of the top highlights of the trip.
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Oh right this is a food blog right? Well above is a wild strawberry we found along the way. It wasn’t sweet like the ones we know so well, but it wasn’t bad either
One Response
wish i could have been there too!