Day 38 - To the quaint village of Baisha and the Fuguo Monastery ruins

Catching up on some sleep, we rose to an already busy and crowded old town, so we made a hasty exit to the quaint Baisha village, about 10km north of Lijiang. Baisha was once the capital of the Naxi kingdom - the Naxi people were the first people to settle in Lijiang about 1400 years ago.

At Baisha we got to explore the Temple frescoes that were painted by Tibetan, Naxi, Bai, and Han artists during the 15th and 16th centuries. The frescoes are housed in Dabaoji Palace and Liuli Temple. Unfortunately, many of the frescoes were destroyed during the Cultural Revolution, but being here and experiencing them for ourselves, we can imagine what they would have been like hundreds of years ago. We were not allowed to take photos of the frescoes - one more to add to the many reasons why you should come to China for yourselves!!

Leaving the frescoes but holding onto the images, we meandered through the alleys of Baisha along with the cows, pigs, dogs and horses of the village! The houses in the village are predominantly made of mud-bricks, but appear sturdy.We asked the locals for directions to the Fuguo Monastary we found ourselves in wonderful mud alley-ways while walking between villages, eventually making the 1 hour walk uphill to the remains of the monastery ("remains" for the same reasons as above). The monastery was once one of Lijiang's largest, but now what remains is surely only a fragment of what once was.

Upon arrival we were met by a forgetful but equally as delightful monk who has taken it upon himself to run the temple ruins. Don't let the photo fool you - he was definitely a monk and there were plenty of photos around showing him in full dress.His favourite saying was "it's nice to meet you" and "please have a safe and successful journey" - which he said to us many times! We shared sweets while sipping away at the tea he had brewed for us, while Adam helped him with his desire to learn English. He enjoyed pointing out objects he knew the English to, such as "book", "trousers", "desk" and few others we couldn't quite pick up! The monastery is set in the middle of the mountain, so we had panoramic views, that were hard to tear our eyes away from. Inside, our eyes also had a treat - prayer flags surround the walls and incense fills the room. The forgetful monk treated us to a prayer ceremony where he chanted, beat his drums, blew his shell-horn, and clanged him cymbols.

We hitched a ride down the hill, after reluctantly saying goodbye to our new friend, the forgetful monk. It was nice to give a donation, when it clearly wasn't required or expected.

At the bottom of the hill, we walked until one of the many minibuses stopped and offered us a cheap ride back to town - we had already declined some overly expensive offers.

Back in Lijiang we headed straight to the bus station to purchase our bus tickets for Lugu Hu (Lugu Lake) - our destination for tomorrow. We were happy to get tickets, as we had left the purchase a bit late, considering there are only two buses a day, and there are so many Chinese travelling to the lake, tickets are in high demand!

We treated ourselves to a browse around the supermarket to stock up on travelling supplies for tomorrow - the bus ride is about 7-8 hours. In the supermarket we liked not having to bargain for everything we bought. This was short lived as we headed out to the streets for snacks, including naan bread (with chilli of course) and mini toffee apples on a stick YUM!

We found ourselves at Black Dragon Pool Park, which we were keen to look at until we realised the price was double than what our trusty Lonely Planet had told us! This is becoming very common, some site entry fees have more than doubled in less than a year - and you have to pay to enter almost everything in China, which definitely takes its toll on our budget.

After eventually finding an internet cafe to update the blog and read about news from home, we are now off to find a (hopefully) cheap meal before packing for the next adlibing adventure!

Adlibing it with our forgetful friend.