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Chola Shan Expedition |
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In July 23, Nathan, Bruce and I arrived in ChengDu, the gateway to the west. Tao already got to China several days ago to deal with a personal matter in HaiNan. He would fly over to ChengDu that night. At the ChengDu airport, the thing we most dreaded happened. We lost a duffel bag full of Nathan's new gear, including down jacket, pack and climbing boots, harness and all kinds of climbing gear. The cost of replacement was formidable. Moreover, to find all the gear within one day in ChengDu was almost impossible. Ma heard this and rushed to us to help. He immediately decided to take action. He took us to the meager outdoor stores in ChengDu, but mostly they only sell hiking equipment unsuited for technical climbing. Ma then took us to his warehouse and let Nathan to choose whatever gear that would fit him. As Nathan was agonizing over which boots out of the two possibility would fit him better, my cell phone rang. Airport told us that they found the lost bag! Nathan was tossed from the bottom of frustration to the peak of joy. He went around and hugged everyone, and he couldn't help jumping up and down for the next half hour! It was interesting to note that within the 3 hours after I arrived in ChengDu, my cell phone rang dozens of times. While we were searching gears for Nathan, I was also trying to locate a case of my own gear that Tao mailed out from Beijing to ChengDu a few days ago. I had to call several postal offices to track it down. I also kept calling airport to urge them to locate the bag as soon as possible. Everyone else was trying to talk to me and find out what was going on, Tao's mom, Tao's sister, my parents, Tao... At the same time, I was the interpreter between Ma and my two friends. My head was literally spinning. It must be the first time that I did so much talking in such a short time, in both English and Chinese. How I wish I had two, no three sets of mouths and tongues! Gladly, it was a happy ending. Tina and Rod successfully made their way to ChengDu the second day. The six of us re-unioned again. We celebrated that by taking an exquisite meal at a restaurant nearby. We made our best effort to stuff ourselves, but still only consumed about only $10 each person. The next big task was shopping. Before this trip, we were given the description of the meal we would encounter enroute and it was engraved in our head. "... only small bones ... animal insides ... greasy food ..." With that in mind, the six of us raided the shopping market as if we were stocking for a trip to a desolate land like South Pole. By the time we checked out, we made a huge scene with the mountains of food and stuffs. People watched us with both shock and amusement. It was later on the road, we discovered that description was a mere illusion. We actually ate fresh vegetables and rice and found normal Chinese meal served everywhere on the way. Finally, the day came when we embarked on the trip. The morning of 7/24, two middle-sized van parked in front of the hotel we stayed. The loading and stuffing was not an easy job but we managed to stuff all the space, underneath of the seats, the narrow corridor, with stuffs. We also met the the team members of the Chinese team. Besides Ma, there are three clients and three assistants. The road out of ChengDu was crowded and heavily polluted. But eventually as we drove further away from the city, gray curtain of smog gave away to blue sky and fresh air. The road we took was following the legendary ancient Tea-Horse road, where merchants started traveling between the west and the mainland thousands years ago. They risked their lives to climb through high passes and treacherous mountains to transport tea to the west and came back with horses. It was also a living display of the history of human migration, as many types of ethnic groups scattered along this corridor, each with their very unique life style and culture. The first day, our van drove for 10 hours. We arrived at the town of BaMei and stayed at roadside Inn owned by an impressive lady called ZhuoMa. She is a Tibetan, but spoke fluent Chinese. She told us that she had lived in mainland for several years. Although she earned more money in mainland but still felt BaMei was her home. So she came back. Compared to the noise, the pollution and all the turmoil in the city of ChengDu, the tranquil and peacefulness of BaMei did feel like a paradise. However, they don't have tap water installed. Every morning, they would go down to the river and carry water back to fill up a big barrel for a day's use. They still heavily rely on manual labor in their daily life. There is only one hot shower in the whole town (which Tao and I gladly enjoyed.) Their life is hard, according to our standard. But they are no less happier than us, if not more. I did not know what to wish them. As soon as modern facilities and amenities are available, hundreds or thousands of tourists would swarm in this quiet town and the peaceful charm of BaMei would be gone, just like many other places in China. BaMei is perched on a plateau at the elevation of 11,000 ft. I could feel my heart was definitely beating faster. Strangely, I was in a state of high spirit. Despite the fatigue, I could not fall into sleep. All night, I was half awake, listening to the choir of dog barking on the street. In the midnight, I had an urge to go to the restroom. I knew the restroom had a hole on the ground. Before sleep, Tao and I didn't have time to dig out our headlamps out of my duffel bags buried deep under at the back of the van . So I had to somehow find a light before I ventured into that restroom. Otherwise, I would risk falling into the hole, which is worse than a 30-foot crevasse. It was pitch dark outside. From the vague moonlight, I pushed open the door of our neighboring room where Bruce, Tina and Rod slept. Bruce was closest to the door so I woke him up. I got the much-needed headlamp and finished the dangerous journey to the restroom. The dog that was chained in the yard howled at me and made me believe that he would break out the chain in any moment to tear me, the shameless trespasser, apart. I was so glad to return to the safety of my room. However, the next morning, a rumor started spreading on how Bruce was approached by a mysterious female figure at night ... We bid farewell to BaiMai and took off again. Every two or three hours, we would pass a Tibetan village. We were dazzled by the colorful style of the residential structure along the road. In between the villages, we saw prayer's flags more often than we saw people. People here still adopted Normandy life style. They relied heavily on Yak as economic source. Tents set up by herders were dotted among the valleys where yaks can freely graze. The road was extremely bumpy today. At times, we were tossed completely out of the seat. I felt sorry for the poor van; it has a very rough life. In the afternoon, we arrived at GanZi. It is the capitol of GanZi county. It is also a hub of transportation and business for that area. The street was crowded. We made a stop at a local farmer's market. This was the last place where we stocked up with fresh produce before the journey in the mountain. We even got a case of egg.
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