Jiuzhaigou

From Chengdu we caught a 12 hour bus up to the north of Sichuan (China is massive). The drive was stunning. We travelled through massive gorges and countless tunnels, some over 5km long. We saw lots of Tibetan villages (including prayer flags and gorgeous white yaks), and stopped in the ancient walled city of Songpan.

We made it to Juizhaigou in the evening. It is a tourist town spread kilometres along a road with countless hotels and restaurants. We found ours after a 45 min hike up and down the strip with our backpacks on. We went out for dinner at a bbq skewer joint and had delicious seasoned sticks of meat and veges al fresco.

We spent a day at the Juizhaigou national park, a stunning place despite the hoardes of Chinese tourists. The park is famous for its huge peaks, massive waterfalls, and clear blue lakes. We walked down the western arm of the park, after catching buses to the top at 3000m. The peaks towered above and must be 6000m+.

The morning was testing, as the sheer number of people made it difficult to move along paths. Plus Chinese families like setting up picnics in the middle of stairways for some reason. We saw only a couple other westerners, and we seemed to be as big a spectacle as anything in the park. People were taking photos of us any chance they could. We still managed to find a few quiet corners of the park. The evening was much better as people started leaving.

We finished the day exhausted, having hiked over 15km at altitude. We hit up the skewer joint again as it was so good the night before.

We found out that the day after we left, a 7 magnitude earthquake struck this town on 8 August, killing 20 and injuring hundreds. Lucky for us we had already left, but our thoughts go out to those affected by the quake.