We said goodbye to Chengdu and flew to Zhangjiajie, a small town in the province of Hunan. In Hunan lies the amazing Zhangjiajie National Park, known for its odd karst stone pillars. If you’ve seen the movie ‘avatar’, you might know what I’m talking about, because apparently the makers of the avatar movie were inspired by the scenery in Zhangjiajie.

I had been to the park before together with my brother in February. The scenery was much different from the views we had now. In February there were no Chinese tour groups with megaphones and matching hats, no tourists trying to secretly take your picture but also no sun, no blue skies and only thick white mist. Both pictures taken at the same spot!

Loud megaphones eliminated the sound of insects, birds and the water running next to us in the ‘golden whip stream’. The paths were crowded with red, yellow, blue caps. And in the midst of a sea of chinese faces, 4 laowai’s… We walked along the Golden Whip Stream for about two hours. This is the lowest part of the park and gives you views of the karst formations from below. At the end of the walk you can take the Bailong Elevator, which is made out of glass and built along a 330m high cliff. It’s a pretty impressive ride with amazing views.

Once you’re in the upper part of the park, buses take you from one viewing point to another. We decided to take the bus to the ‘Enchanting Terrace’ (yes, all viewing points in china have bizarre names and it requires a lot of imagination to actually see the resemblance between ‘name’ and ‘view’) and walk all the way to ‘First Bridge of the World’, where we could take the bus again, which would drop us at our hostel. Again, amazing views but too many loud tourists, carrying umbrella’s to protect them from the sun. The accidental “umbrella-in-eye-or-other-bodypart-move” occurred a lot that day. We got pretty tired of it so we decided to relax at the hostel and enjoy our meal.

The next day, we woke up early to take a bus to the highest point in the park. There, you can take a cable way all the way down, where again, busses take you to other sites. But unfortunately, a thick mist and rain put a halt to our plans. After about an hour of walking around we decided to take the cable way anyways and try to make the most of our day. Once down, we were stuck in a thunderstorm. Fortunately, China is great at providing you with back up plans and so, dressed in flashy yellow ponchos, we entered a little tent and enjoyed some tea.

We then started our hike back up to the highest point, where we started off in the morning. It was a hard walk (5km of steep stairs) but it was amazing. The grey clouds were replaced by blue skies and sunshine and all of a sudden, you could see as far as the eye could reach; karst spikes in a sea of green.

The day after, we took a bus back to the city (which is also called Zhangjiajie). It was one of the craziest bus rides I’ve had in China. I think we were more than 30 people all trying to get in a bus that could only seat 10. The bus had definitely seen better days (probably when the soviet union and china were best buddies). So, we run (literally RUN) towards the bus entrance and push our way in together with the other 30 people. Don’t underestimate the Chinese. They are small…but there’s lots of them! We were the last to get on so this meant we had to stand for the 2 hour ride back to town. My dad was the only one to score a seat, next to a mom with a half naked baby on her lap and a 6-year old girl between her legs. As the ride got more bumpy and zigzagging, more and more people surrendered to the “laws of the road”. Chinese Nr. 1 vomited only 10 cm next to Caro’s backpack, Chinese Nr. 2 vomited in a bag, Chinese Nr. 3 vomited in the alleyway and vomiting Chinese Nr. 4 was the 6 year old girl sitting between her mom’s legs, next to my dad.

Two hours later, we arrived in Zhangjiajie, where yet another beautiful park was waiting to be visited. The other park is actually a mountain, called Tianmen Shan (literally ‘Heavenly Gate Mountain’). The entrance of the park is located in the town itself, where you take a cableway (apparently one of the largest in the world!) all the way up to the top of the mountain. There, you follow a footbridge along the edge of the cliffs and admire the spectacular scenery below. You walk all the way around and take the cableway halfway down. Where a bus takes you to along the Tongdao Avenue. This road had 99 hair pin bends and is not for the faint hearted! I would like to see the Top Gear Crew try out this one!

In the evening, we took a plane back to Shanghai, where I spent my last two days…shopping! One last trip to the fake market could not be avoided!

One more final blog coming in a few days! 

P.S. As my dad pointed out in his comment, I forgot to mention his performance! Climbing 847 (very steep I must say) steps in 12 minutes: watch him go 😀