Leave your virtue in HuangShan

early steps

 By 6.30am, we are seated on the local equivalent of a minibus taxi (including the hazardous style of driving). Our destination is the foot of the Yellow Mountains (HuangShan) and our journey goes past terraced tea plantations and water-buffalo ploughed rice paddies.

plonking with lovers' locks

The mountains play a big role in poetry and painting, not because of their size but because of their magnificent shape and pine-trees. As a result there are hundreds of Chinese queuing at the entrance to the valley. On a further bus taking us to the starting point of our hike, Wayne gets told by a local doctor that 'Yellow' has nothing to do with the colour of the mountains. They are named after famous emperor HuangDi.

 

The masses head for the cable car and we start ascending the 'West Steps' in a mood matching the glorious weather. After about 20 min of steep steps we come to a ticket checkpoint. A ticket checkpoint for a hike? No guidebook mentioned this. And the ticket office is down where the cable car starts. While a cloud is passing over my mood, Wayne – who has cleverly invested in a dragon-headed walking stick earlier– bounces back down to get our tickets. Twice. He doesn't have enough money on him the first time. The tourist trap warnings about this place are not exaggerated! 

But the sun is so sunny, the mountains are so mountainous and the steps, steps, steps going up so blooming exhausting that we can't sulk for long. 

 

 And we got off lightly: There are porters walking up carrying what looks like 50kg each side hanging from a bamboo pole over their shoulders. The load varies: bottled water, linen, sacks of rice, vegetables – and one flatscreen TV. They have to set down the pole on a thick metal-footed wooden stick every 20 steps. We can't stop staring at their calves which are the size of our thighs.

steps, steps, steps

Back at Tunxi hostel a hun spread the rumour that it only takes 2 ½ hours to reach the top. When we reach the half-way point after 3 hours, we curse the hun. And have a lekker picnic.

It's tough going, and having cleverly put on a white undershirt in freezing Tunxi, I can now enter a wet T-shirt competition. On the other hand, because of the steep path we make height quickly and have magnificent views all the way.

teacher...

... and anonymous pupil

Wayne and Jeannine take a shine to a fellow hiker in blue sweatshirt and bleached jeans. He is so tall that we suspect he must be a basketball player but despite the inevitable photo session we only work out that he is doing the hike with his 'teacher'. 

 

it's a tough hike

After 6 ½ hours of steps and some pushing through the tour groups spilling out of the cable-car we are at the top of the world, 'Turtle Peak' (1780m). From here it's a short walk down to our accommodation, so we check in and return to watch the sunset.

in front of Lotus Peak

view from Turtle Peak at dusk

For dinner we end up at the hotel next door, just the three of us at a table designed for 10 with a huge lazy susan. We try our best to get some food to go around and sample the local beer.

our favourite jinglish

The dorms are gender separated and Wayne ends up with all the pretty boys – and one heavy smoker. We see him off into a blue haze and settle on our top bunks to snore along with 8 women and a baby.