The trip to Shangrila started off with sleeping in and missing our pick up time of 7 am. The good thing was that we hired a driver for the day so we were the only ones he was taking to Shangrila. We woke up to a pound on the door and I answered it and saw our driver, “Oh, Ni hao si ji, bu hao yi si, women qiquang wan le.” (Oh hello, sorry driver, we slept in). Rob and I rushed to get dressed and missed our long anticipated breakfast of Naxi potato pancakes with Yak cheese and butter. I know it does not sound too great, but it is actually delicious with a little salt. We hopped in the car and headed to Shangrila. Our first stop along the way was Bai Shui Tai: the white limestone terraces and birthplace of Dongba Buddhism.
Bai Shui Tai is a natural wonder. It looks like a giant staircase of limestone with small pools of crystal clear water resting on a mountainside (see pictures). The hike to the top of the mountain was not far, but we had long anticipated seeing Bai Shui Tai so the anticipation made the walk seem much longer than it was. The sight did not disappoint, as you can see. Bai Shui Tai looked like a holy place, and, in fact, it is. Like I mentioned before, Dongba Buddhism was born and preached here because it was thought to be the purest place on earth. For those of the Dongba religion, it is the equivalent to Mecca for Muslims or Jerusalem for Christians. After a few hours exploring Bai Shui Tai we hopped back in the car and our driver took us to Shangrila.
Shangrila was actually named after a mythical land. Shangrila, in folklore, was supposed to be this far away beautiful land surrounded by snow capped mountains and blessed with green fertile grass and clear blue skies. Only those pure of heart could find it. As you can see from the mountain and picture of the villages it does not seem like Shangrila was a mythical place after all, but exists in the town that lives up to its name. Also, as you can see, the Chinglish is superb meaning it is far removed from Western influence; refer to the “Notie for Forugn Friends” sign.
Shangrila was a more level expedition once we reached the town and we decided to walk to the monastery of Shangrila. This monastery is the most important and famous in west China. It is also the largest, as you can see from the picture. The best part of the monastery was talking to the monks. The monks were impressed that we could speak Chinese, but every conversation ended up talking about India and if we had visited. It seems like every monk loves to talk about the birthplace of Buddhism and see if foreigners have traveled there. It was just strange at the frequency of the question. The off-duty monks were by far the most fun, and because they had no religious ceremony to uphold they were much more laid back. They asked us to teach them swear words in English! We did and got a good laugh out of hearing monks say “Shit!” It is really odd how often my interactions with people in China lead to an exchange of curse words in the other’s language…I might need to grow up.
The monastery was followed by a trip to the natural hot springs of Shangril. The hot springs are right outside the city limit and has been made into a public swimming hole with water of 80 degrees F coming from a natural hot spring. The spring runs over some caves creating natural saunas and the whole side of the mountain is now a spa created by nature. It was pretty neat to take a dip in the water and lay in a cave sauna. What made it even better was that it was not well known to foreigners so there were not many travelers(see picture).
After the monastery Rob and I went back to town and checked into a hostel. We explored the town center after checking in, and like any good story, we ran into our friends again! The Canadians, Germans, and Dutch. We repeated what we did the previous night and had a great time at a local restaurant eating and drinking. Starting at the bottom right of the picture are Janis and Matt (the couple from Canada who got engaged on the trip), Rob, myself, Toby and Linka from Germany, and Sina from France and Ari from Holland. It was great how it all worked out that we ended up in the same town and even the same hostel the next day without even discussing plans. As you can imagine not all backpackers are like Rob and me and when you ask them their plan their frequent response is, “Not sure, dude, I’ll see where today takes me.” The night ended late again and this time Rob and I promised ourselves we would wake up on time because we had to catch a train back to Lijiang to finish our trip hiking the Jade Dragon Snow Mountain from bottom to top and back down, which would be the most strenuous hike of our vacation.
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