We then got a bus to Emei Shan where we would stay at the Baoguo Monastery. The monastery was amazing; very tranquil. The living facilities were much better than I expected - comfortable rooms, clean squat loos, hot water 24hrs a day as long as you're willing to use the Chinese showers.
The next morning, most of us (not me) were woken up by the monks' chanting at 4am.
Our local guide, Patrick, who was clearly the man around town, brought an attractive local guide, Aries, with him the next morning who would come with us to the top of Emei Shan.
We took a bus to a spot best the top of the mountain and then a cable car the rest of the way. The buildings and scenery up top was stunning and we could easily have spent an entire day up there.
After lunch together, the group split. Most of the group took a bus back down, while Chris, Dave and I decided to walk down to our nightspot, the Hongchunping Monastery. Chris and I didn't have any sticks to fend off any potential monkey attacks (very common). It turned out that we encountered very few monkeys; we later found out that most of them were on the touristy path that the others took. The scenery was by no means spectacular, but it was a much quieter track. At one point, it was 5pm and we were 15km away from our nightstay, so we were worried we wouldn't get back before dark. As a result, we put our foot on it and dragged Dave with us.
After playing Mallett's Mallet at dinner, we crashed out, but I didn't get much sleep as Chris was snoring like a demon in the room next door!
The following day we walked back down to Baoguo Monastery and then headed to the nearby 5 star hotel to treat ourselves to their hot springs facilities. There were more than 10 different pools, indoor and outdoor, as well as a traditional swimming pool. Aries wanted me to teach her how to swim, but within 5 minutes of the lesson I handed responsibility over to Rachel, who seemed to love it. There was even a pool where fish eat any dead skin you have on your body - couple of the guys were bleeding! I also had a full body massage.
It was Christine's birthday and Patrick and Xin had arranged dinner at the local market. Dinner was awesome, even though we had hoards of locals taking photos of us while eating. Patrick had also arranged a birthday cake and for a musician to play for us - after Happy Birthday in Chinese and English, we also heard Royal Britannia and Beijing Huan Jing Ni (my request). The entire evening for great fun, probably one of my best nights in China and it didn't involve a bar or a club (not possible as monastery had a curfew of 9:30pm).
The following day, most of the group went for a countryside tour. I had agreed to meet up with Aries at her university. It was a stark contrast to anything back home. Students often lived in 8-person dorm rooms, and girls and boys had separate dorm buildings. I had lunch at the canteen which was average at best, but it was an experience at least. Probably every student and teacher who walked into the canteen
must have stared at me - I didn't see a non-Chinese person on campus all day. We then played ping pong with some of her friends (I was surprisingly ok) and a young girl who was keen to try and play, and then spent the remainder of the afternoon chilling.
I met up with the rest of the group and we then headed for dinner and the train station for our journey to Xian.
1 comment:
Nice post. Emei Shan a mountain that rises from earth at a height of approximately 3,099 m. This is most heighten mountain from the Four scared Buddhist Mountains. Mount Emei Sunrise and Cloud Sea is the most tourist attraction place.There are almost thirty old temples located on Emei Shan. People come here with messed up mind but then go with the open mind.
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