Wednesday 30th January
I'd been talking about visiting the Yellow Mountain for a while now. So last week being one of the few members of staff to get three days of work I made a solo trip to Huangshan.
I chose to go there by train, and 90 Rmb paid for a seat on the 21:24 from the Shanghai Railway Station.
This was the cheapest band but in the spirit of adventure I went for it.
I arrived at my 'seat' it was kind of a PE-mat bench, I sandwiched myself in between two Chinese mid twenties girls and started to offer out some Oreos to them and the family of three sitting opposite.
It soon became obvious that I couldn't play the 'We're all in this together' for the whole night if I was to get any sleep. The bench was kind of part of a compartment of PE-mat benches, two of which were put away to not be used but two lay above us. It was a sleeping compartment without any mattresses or sheets basically.
After initial pleasantries I made a bolt for the top bunk and held it for the whole night. I'm a bad man but hey I did have to stare into the light on the ceiling for the whole night so it wasn't the most pleasant of night sleeps.
'And like a cobra he strikes' Johnny English
Thursday 31st January (HAPPY BIRTHDAY TOM!)
Got into Huangshan. The last hour on the train when the sun rose and shone over the Chinese countryside was quite special, especially when I'd been living in Shanghai.
View from the train
Huangshan City. Immediately hit with hawkers selling me maps, bus tickets, etc. To be fair it was more useful stuff than the plastic goods I see some street sellers trying to get rid off.
Hostel was 30 RMB(£3), right by the station, and later i would find out totally empty. The hostels here remind of Nandos in that the main bit (accomodation/chicken) is fairly cheap, but then its the extras which is where they make the money (breakfast, trips, rental bikes....)
Too late to climb the mountain today I went to a nearby ancient town, called Hongcun.
The town was lovely. It was a UNESCO Heritage town. It was 104 Rmb to enter the town, but they gave me half price. Extra lovely.
Photo's of the city are below:
Things got interesting when leaving to go back to the hostel. The thing is Huangshan the city is 60 km from the Mt Huangshan. Then I in the fracas of buses outside the towns gate went for a ricksaw back to Huangshan with a guy who I think wanted to share the cost of the ride with me.
The ricksaw was seriously uncomfortable and the guy who'd come along was carrying some weight so the motor powered vehicle was struggling to say the least. We'd agreed a price and all. But the big guy thought I'd wanted to go back to Mt Huangshan base city. So halfway in the journey when we all realized the error, we had to get out of the ricksaw to access the situation.
I was pretty tired at this point. I really had not slept last night and was considering hitching a ride on this mountain pass road. But the big guy had brains with his brawn as well as quite a kind heart. We carried on to Mt Huangshan he paid for the whole journey then got me on a bus back to the city. Wishing me good luck (nice guy) as I got on the bus and back to the hostel for an evening of snooker and noodles.
Back of the ricksaw.
Friday 1st February
Today I would climb the mountain and I was mega excited for it. I was picked up by the driver of a small bus at 6:30 am. But it was strange he didn't set off for about 40 minutes and what made it worse was that we had to listen and watch the worst music ever.
Bloody hell it was a weird scenario. 6:30 am. Sitting at the back of the bus watching this small screen at the front of Western going mad for it at outdoor music festivals, but then over the top was like the Basshunter of China, absolutely dreadful. It was strange because the people in the video most of which who looked high were clearly not listening to this Chinese drivel. There I was sitting at the back of the bus with families making the trip as map and mackintosh hawkers knocked on the window to get my attention. Mt Huangshan, Mt Huangshan, Mt Huangshan, I kept thinking.
It was about 10:30 when I was finally at the base of the mountain and of a cable car. The weather was not great but as I got into the cable car to go up the mountain I realized how bad the weather was.
You couldn't see a thing contrary to the intercom. It was ridiculously cloudy.
This unfortunately was going to be the theme of the day, not being able to see more than 20 metres in any direction.
Pictures below...
Cable Car ride
Bridge
Picturesque point
There were many stairs, and the clouds did make these much more awe-like.
I was treated as a celebrity though.
So, yes, arrived back in Huangshan around 5pm. The mountains I will definitely visit again soon. Maybe next week when my sister Jessica comes for a visit!
There is a Chinese saying that 'Once you have seen Mt Huangshan, it has all the attributes of a mountain should possess, that you do not need to see any other mountains'. I experienced it but didn't really see it so will need a second visit.
Took a proper sleeper compartment back to Shanghai in the evening. After the days trekking I slept like a baby.
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