We hope you enjoyed attempting some of the previous recipes from our Yangshou Cooking experience, so following on from this we’ve decided to tempt you even further with another review of our second favourite cooking course undertaken whilst travelling in Asia.

Helen had previously experienced a Chiang Mai cookery school programme when visiting Thailand back in 2004. Her experience then was good and gave her a real taste for Thai food and cooking, she did find it very inspirational indeed. This time around, Dave having never visited Thailand before was keen to do a cooking class and Helen wanted to have another go too! This time though we were looking for a class that offered something different from the everyday schools in Chiang Mai, and we came across the Thai Farm Cooking School.

We chose this particular school because it is located around 17km outside of Chiang Mai on a beautiful farm where they grow their own vegetables, herbs and organic fresh ingredients to cook with. They have two kitchens prepared for groups to cook aswell as a lovely outside eating area. Go to their website and take a look for yourself!!

Our guide and chef Tommy had a good sense of humour and for his age was a very well accomplished chef and teacher. We chose a curry paste from a choice of red, green or yellow, we also picked a soup dish, a noodle dish and a dessert. There were 3 different dishes to choose from in each section so the choices were good.

We chose to cook different dishes so we could taste each others food. Like the Yangshou Cooking School we each had our own prep and cooking station and Tommy would demonstrate a dish and we would follow by cooking it, he gave us many tips on spice, sauces and flavour. Too much spice would equal sexy lips!!

We both love Thai food so this was never going to be a let down for us! But it was a great day, starting off with a market tour going through the ingredients used in Thai cooking and when we arrived at the farm we had a garden tour taking us through their organic vegetable patches.

We made our own curry pastes – Dave chose a red curry and Helen a yellow one. We cooked a noodle dish each and whilst Helen cooked the hot and sour Tom yam soup Dave cooked a chicken Tom Kaa Gai.  As there was ingredients left over for the spring rolls we even got to make a few of those too!  What we couldn’t eat we took away with us for dinner later on!

This wasn’t the cheapest option of doing a cooking class in Chiang Mai as this is sighted as one of the top activities to do in the area, but it was pretty good value for money and we enjoyed the location, the chef and our tour group were all lovely too!

For a full day class we paid 1850 Thai Baht each, which is considerably more than the 1000 baht offering on their website. This works out to be around £35, which when compared to the Yangshou cooking school is a hell of a lot more!! Cost of travelling in Thailand however is considerably more than China, so for those of you on a budget there may be other cooking schools in Chiang Mai that are more appealing!

So for your pleasure we have a few recipes below, let us know if you try them!

Yellow Curry with Chicken / Tofu for vegetarian option – serves 2

Curry paste:

3 red dried chilles (soak in cold water for 15 minutes before use)
1 tbsp of chopped shallots
1tsp of chopped galangal *
1 tbsp of chopped lemongrass
2 cloves chopped garlic
1/4 tsp roasted cumin seeds
1/4 tsp roasted coriander seeds
1 tsp chopped tumeric
1 tsp yellow curry powder
1 tsp chopped ginger

Other ingredients:

70 grams of sliced chicken / Tofu (vegetarian)
1 cup of coconut milk
1.5 cup of water
1 cup chopped potatoes
1/3 cup of sliced onions
1 stem of spring onion
1 tbsp of fish sauce or soy sauce
1 tsp of sugar
1/4 tsp of salt

For the curry paste:

Put the ingredients for the curry paste in the mortar. Pound with the pestle until everything is mixed and ground thoroughly.

(we were doing this for at least 10 minutes!)

For the curry:
Put half cup of coconut milk in a pot and heat until boiling. Add chicken or tofu and curry paste. Stir until almost done. Add water, onions, potatoes and the rest of the coconut milk. When the potatoes are soft season with fish sauce or soy sauce, sugar and salt. Add spring onions. Serve with rice.

You can try different vegetables with this curry, we’ve tried butternut squash, sweet potatoe and courgettes, anything that will absorb the spices and flavour nicely will work. A little hint with the rice – we love to add coconut cream, cardamon and star anise to add some aromatic flavours.

* you can pick up dried Galangal from alternative supermarkets such as asian, chinese or organic.

Fried Noodles – Pad Thai

This has to be one of those dishes everyone loves from Thailand! It’s always first on the list when we arrive! There are prawns in this photograph but the recipe below is vegetarian with tofu – if you want to add prawns then feel free to do so!

Ingredients – Serves 2

80 grams rice noodles
1 cup of bean sprouts
2 tbsp of tofu, cut into small pieces
1 egg
1 tbsp of chopped pickled white raddish
1 tbsp of crushed roasted peanuts
1/3 cup of ripe tamarind juice (or 2 tsp of white vinegar mixed with 3 tbsp of water)
1.5 tsp of sugar
1 tsp fish sauce or soya sauce
1 tsp of chopped Chinese leek or spring onion
1 tsp of dried shrimps
a pinch of chilli powder
3 tbsp of oil
a pinch of salt
3 cloves crushed garlic

Heat up the oil in the wok on medium heat. Place tofu and fry until crunchy. Then turn the heat down to low. Add garlic, pickled raddish, (dried or fresh shrimps optional), chilli powder and stir until fragrant. Add tamarind juice (or vinegar ) and noodles and turn the heat up to medium. Stir fry until the noodles are soft. Turn the heat down to low. Make place by moving the noodles to another side of the wok. Add the egg and scramble. Add fish sauce, sugar, salt, crushed peanuts, bean sprouts and Chinese leek and turn the heat up to high. Stir fry thoroughly until well mixed. Serve with a piece of lemon and fresh salad.

Something for the sweet toothed!

Mango with sticky rice – YUM!!!
Serves 1-2 so double your ingredients for this one!

1 cup of steamed sticky rice *
1/2 cup of coconut cream
1 ripe mango (peel, remove seed and slice)
1-2 tbsp of sugar
1/4 tsp salt

Put the coconut cream, sugar and salt in a pot. Heat until boiling. Turn the heat off. Add steamed sticky rice. Mix well together and let to cool. Serve with mango.

You can buy this dish on the streets as we did one day on our way to the train station. It’s a very sweet tasting dish but works so well with the mango.

* You can buy sticky rice online or at Asian and Chinese supermarkets. The best tips for steaming sticky rice is to soak it first in cold water for a minimum of 4 hours or even overnight. Afterwards wash the rice with fresh water at least two times. Put the sticky rice in a steamer and steam for about 30 minutes until the rice is sticky and soft. When the rice is cooked always keep it in a closed container to prevent it from drying out and becoming hard. If the rice cools you can always steam it again.

Ever so the relaxed Thai ways we love how ingredients are measured out in cups, and the old fashioned tablespoon measures! Cook things for about this or about that! Ha! but seriously the food will taste amazing! Let us know if you attempt to try any of these dishes and if you’re feeling brave you could share your photos online!

Enjoy!

People in this part of the world get up early, so you get up early too. We awoke at 6am and decided to watch the sunrise from our floating house looking out across the water. The sunlight colour and luminance changes so fast that its a photographers dream to be somewhere so unique and interesting. Breakfast was provided by our guests and we happily ate yet more fried eggs, bread, jams and fruit which would set us up nicely for another day of boat travel and beach time. This time we headed back on ourselves from the following day and docked at beach 6 which was again very isolated and offered the chance of some snorkeling action. The water was relatively clean, not crystal by any means, and there were a few fish around the rocks which made it interesting. After all feeling the power of the sun on our skin yesterday we had a slightly more sheltered day under the trees on the beach front when not swimming or exploring the beach.

Lunch was again provided by our guide and the boat driver which was amazing again. We think they had learnt that we eat quickly and therefore fill up quickly and they did not produce as much food as yesterdays lunch which was a relief to us all. The boat left at 1.30pm and we made our way around the island, past the homestay and onwards to the Mangrove forests which we did not arrive at until nearly 5.30pm. We walked through the forest along a raised wooden platform exploring the trees and their amazingly alien like roots. Sunset arrived swiftly and we departed for Koh Kong where a tuk-tuk was awaiting our return. We felt the tour was amazing and our guide and driver were great, so we tipped them a few dollars as it was well deserved. The tuk-tuk drove us back to the tour operators and we grabbed our bags from the Dugout hotel as we were moving to a cheaper hostel. Big thanks to the Dugout for allowing us to leave our bags, whilst we were away, however on our return arrogance and rudeness seemed uncalled for, as well as asking for a tip for the girls who apparently looked after and carried our bags, but if tipping was not our thing, don’t worry about it. Even though it is in many review books, we are not sure how long it will last with attitudes like that and at $16 a night in a tired room we did not feel a tip was warranted.

We moved up the road to were Ali and Carl were staying and we got a great room for $7 and then $10 the following night as it was Chinese New Year. We freshened up and all met for some evening food. Ice cream followed from a great place on the water front and then an early night before heading off in the morning on a bike ride into the Cardamon Mountains Conservation Corridor to find the Tatai River and Waterfall.

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f2.0 & Olympus PEN, 17mm f2.8 & 100mm f2.8, processed in Lightroom 3)

We booked a 3 day 2 night tour with Sinhbalo tours (tour – “SBL8 – Cycle from MyTho to Cai Be, Vinh Long and Can Tho (3D/2N)”) along with new best friends Justin and Jules. We had been recommended the company by other travellers we’d met in Halong Bay who’d actually made the statement that it was the best thing they’d done in Vietnam, so based on this we thought they would be a strong bet for a good cycling tour. Other companies tend to charge more for similar tours and we didn’t want to stretch our budget too much.

The first day involved a mixture of bus, boat and cycling. The bus took us from HCMC to the Mekong Delta and took around 3 hours, as soon as we arrived we took a boat journey along the Mekong to an Island where we were introduced to local life, food and animals! We had some lovely very fresh fruits and tea as well as some baked rice cakes (a little like sweet poppadoms), our guide Duat talked us through the family home and traditions, they were getting ready for festive family celebrations leading up to TET. This led onto a little boat trip through one of the Mekong canals, the whole route to ourselves led us back peacefully to the boat where we had got off. So it was a pretty leisurely start to the day that ended seeing us having lunch at a crocodile and coco-nut farm. Crocodile was not on the menu fortunately but they were there for us all to see and others to tease. The food served was fairly good, but we almost expected a little more, especially after the food of the Halong Bay tour.

We made another crossing of the Mekong river via boat and met the tour bus which had a fine selection of mountain bikes ready for us to explore the area. Our guide lead the way on a 20km ride along roads and trails which included plenty of “hellos” from children along the way, this is something you get used to very quickly when cycling around. Another boat journey landed us at the home-stay for our evenings stay. It was more like a simple eco guest house on stilts rather than a homestead but non the less it provided double beds with mosquito nets. A short walk around the local area gave a flavour of local life and then it was time for our evening meal. This was quite similar to lunch which was a little disappointing as its nice to try different menu items, however it was well received by everyone. Some card games, beer and a glimpse of fireflies in the trees finished the day off nicely and we were all looking forward to the next installment of cycling.

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f2.0 & Olympus PEN, 17mm f2.8 & 100mm f2.8, processed in Lightroom 3)

Up early at 6.30am and then breakfast was served, consisting of bread, jam, eggs and watermelon. We climbed aboard our stallions for the day (21 speed mountain bikes) and started off the 1.5hr bike ride through the delta area. We passed many little villages and homes with yet more screams of “hello” from the kids we passed, rice fields and cows. The heat of the day was quite oppressive however we had plenty of water supplied by our tour guide and eventually we arrived at a town and increased our energy with a good feed. We were informed that it was 35C by a local who was sheltering from the midday sun.

After a good rest and a rendezvous with the support (ford transit) van we stocked up on bottled water and then headed off along sealed roads towards the suspension bridge. This was a great climb to the top and certainly got the blood and sweat pumping, but we were rewarded with a lovely view of the area, and the best thing about going up, is the knowledge that you go down on the other side! Much speed and fun.

We arrived at the next town and settled into the provided accommodation which was very nice. Our guide met us after some rest time and took us to a nearby restaurant on the water front of the Mekong. The food was again great with lots of variation and options for the vegetarians. We had a walk around the town which was in preparation for TET and very busy, a few beers and then bed time.

On our last day of the tour we started early again with a 6am breakfast followed by a short bus ride to a taxi boat that ferried us to the famous floating markets. The boat journey took around 10 minutes and as we arrived at the markets there was a real buzz in the air, people shopping for their store supplies, pulling up alongside bigger boats in their small long boats, transporting vegetables, fruit and other wholesale items between each other. Some of the boats are huge and in between you’ll find a little lady selling street food from her tiny boat. We stopped at a pineapple sellers boat, got off ours and onto the top of theirs, we sat and they prepared freshly picked pineapples for us to eat there and then, they were so juicy!! After this we got back onto our boat and continued to drive past other sellers and vendors. It was a really impressive and insightful start to the day, just seeing how this type of community trade and all between boats is so different from what any of us expected. It’s good to get to the markets earlier in the morning or as early as you can manage as they finish at around midday having started at something like 4am, by 10am many tourists appear and it gets really busy. We were there at around 7am and there weren’t too many other tourists around.

We left the markets after an hour and continued up-river to a point where we met our trusty driver once more, he was there waiting with our bikes ready for us to ride on the last leg of our cycling trip. The last bike ride of the trip was quite tame and took around 2 hours, going through more villages, over more bridges and passing my many children shouting ‘Hello…what’s your name?’ and so on. At around 11am we found ourselves back at the hotel where we had time to shower and check out before starting the journey back to HCMC. The journey back took around 4 hours with an hours break for lunch at a posh service area called the Mekong Service Area where it seems most upper end tours take you too, it was a little like a 4 start resort made up of just restaurants. The food was good and Helen even had her own fish and vegetarian menu, they made some rice balls that came up into big balloons probably the most interesting thing about it. It was also our last supper with Justin and Jules so we toasted to good times in Vietnam.

Back in HCMC we said our goodbyes to our 3 week travel buddies and went our separate ways to our hotels. Later on we managed to get to the post office to send on our winter gear to Australia (we shouldn’t be needing it until then!?) We sent two 2kg parcels costing around $25 for airmail delivery. We ate at Zen once again for a tasty vegetarian feast, walked around the area and then went back to Luan Vu to get ready for our trip to Phnom Penh the next morning.

We left Lotusland at 7.45am to walk to the International Tourism Distribution Centre only 15 minutes walk away which was perfect for us leaving Nanning. The bus station we came into from Yangshou was at least a 40 minute bus journey from the centre so we were pleased not to be making this journey again. We were joined by a few other backpackers at the bus station and saw the first bus leave packed with passengers at 8am, ours was at 8.30am and was considerably less full.

We had a hostess who handed out a bread snack and water to all passengers and it was quite a smart bus. We traveled through Southern China and saw more agriculture and rice fields along the way, it was still cold and dull. We stopped once for a toilet break and then again for lunch, we were only about 20 minutes from the border at this stage but we were provided with a free meal which consisted of egg and tomato, tofu and rice it wasn’t too bad. There were also quite a few touts waiting to exchange Chinese RMB to Vietnamese Dong. We didn’t have any Dong ready with us so we changed what we had left of the RMB which was around £10′s worth. The exchange rate isn’t great when you do this with touts so we’d probably recommend to change only what you need for taxi’s etc on the other side. One girl changed around £200 worth and we don’t think she did so well on the exchange rate.

The journey from Nanning to the border took around 4 hours and as we got the border the bus pulled into a parking lot, we exited with our bags and were carted off on a little gold-like buggy to the Chinese exit border. It took around 40 minutes to complete exit from China and entry into Vietnam, with 5 or so passport checks. It was pretty relaxed and we were asked a few questions on the Vietnamese side but they were friendly enough and off we went to another golf buggy before being shipped onto another bus. This bus was full and we could only just get a seat.

The journey to Hanoi took 5 hours with one break at a restaurant/service area. The bus was okay and again we had a hostess on board handing out water. We were pleasantly surprised with the journey as we had read about some horror stories on the Vietnamese buses, but all in all it was pretty swift. The traffic coming into Hanoi was very busy so it took a while to get into the city. Once we arrived a lady came on board and asked to speak to the westerners, we had read that this would happen so were a little skeptical as to whether to take her advice or not. Contrary to this though she was quite helpful and as a group of 4 she advised on how to bargain for the taxi and made sure we knew how not to get ripped off!!

We traveled with a Finnish couple we’d met on the bus to The Hanoi Rendezvous and agreed a price with the taxi driver. We knew that we’d be paying around 100,000 dong between us but at first he was quoting $150! Dave kept getting out of the taxi refusing to agree to that price and we eventually managed to get him to agree to our price. The journey was around 15 minutes (the taxi driver had said it would be 50 km!) be prepared for scams!! When we arrived at the Rendezvous he stopped the car a little away from the hotel and said it was much further asking for more money. We knew where the hotel was though and didn’t take any of his shit. We paid the price and that was that. Perhaps getting into Hanoi from your bus or airport is where you’re more likely to get ripped off by the taxi drivers as you’ll be new to the city so just be prepared for this.

At the Rendezvous we checked into our spacious 6 bed dorm room, practically each bed was a mini double with good spacing in between and a shared en-suite. We were paying $7 each for this which was considerably more than in China but it had great reviews and included a good breakfast. We inquired at reception about a few options for getting around Vietnam and as we had no guide book yet we went off to a bookshop called The Bookworm to get ourselves a Lonely Planet.

It was around a half hour or so walk through the busy city streets to Bookworm heading north of the city centre to the second lake. We picked up a photocopy version for 150,000 dong checking the quality first as often the maps are very pale so it’s good to go through the pages. We asked for their recommendation on a good place to eat nearby and were instructed to go to Food Shop (45). We enjoyed some excellent vegetarian Indian food and the ventured through the streets back to the Hotel. When we got there we saw Maayke (from Yangshou) and her friend who were also in the same dorm, we had previously arranged to meet them here so it wasn’t so much of a coincidence. We discussed trip options and then chatted in the cafe area for a while before hitting the sack.

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f2.0 & Olympus PEN, 17mm f2.8 & 100mm f2.8, processed in Lightroom 3)

When we arrived in Yangshou we’d heard that the main cooking school ‘Yangshou Cooking School‘ offered some great half day classes so we booked this for the first part of the day. We had a pick up from our cookery master from Bamboo after checking out and we were taken to the local market, en route we picked up a few others who were also booked onto the cooking class and we arrived at the market ready for our first part of the class. It was really good to see the market in full swing, we’ve obviously seen many markets since traveling but each one always has something different. This one for example sold freshly cooked Dog meat, rabbit and a few sad cats were kept in baskets ready to await their doom. Both of us are cat lovers so seeing them there was pretty distressing, the dogs were already cooked and ready to eat. It’s a veer strange thing for westerners to witness but we don’t have them same approach to food as the east and especially in China food is food and you eat what you can, when you can. This mind set is still very much in place in the south. We were told not to photograph the dogs, and to be fair it wasn’t a pleasant experience, but it’s all part of the process of finding out about different cultures. The rest of the market place was bustling with energy and it was great to see all of the fresh produce and also have an explanation into the different food types.

Following the market tour we were piled into a van and taken to the cooking school. They are situated very close to the harbour where we got the boat to and they’re location is perfect for the environment. They have an open kitchen where everyone has their own cooking place, wok and sauces, the head chef stays at the front of the class for demonstration purposes and then we cooked what she did straight after, as she came around the make sure everything was going to plan. This is the best cooking class we’ve done so far as we did most of the preparation and all of the cooking for each dish. In total we had 4-5 dishes varying from stuffed vegetable/canopy style appetisers to the local delicacy beer soaked fish. The latter really was a delight. After each course we sat outside and ate as a group, except for the last two courses which we ate as 2 dishes togethers.

All in all the cooking class was excellent, the teacher was really coherent and patient and we enjoyed good food and company in a wonderful setting. We would recommend the school to anyone visiting Yangshou for sure.

After the class we went back to Bamboo to collect our bags and walked to the next village along from the pier Shi Ban Qiao the hostel we were moving to ‘Trippers Carp Diem‘ had been recommended to us by fellow travellers and we’d already scouted out the area on our bikes a few days ago so we knew it was in a good location. We sacrificed comfort for location on this one and saved our pennies in booking a dorm room. There is always plenty of space in the dorms in China but the beds are often a little hard. This was the case, but considering the quality of the service, food and location we couldn’t complain too much.

We had some food at the hostel and then set off for our New Years Eve bash at Monkey Jane’s. When we arrived it was pretty quiet, but before long the card playing crew came along and Helen succumbed to wearing the official Monkey Jane t-shirt. We enjoyed some more card games and the beer flowed freely. More and more people arrived and before long the rooftop bar was rammed. The cards stopped and we enjoyed a funny game of beer pong against a couple of the lads, much to our despair we lost!! And we watched them win time and time again afterwards, we think this was something to do with their distracting crazy dancing each time the opposition took a turn!

We met some fun people and a other travellers making the same trip as us – over many drinks, dances and ole langs sine we agreed to meet Emma and Doug the following night for food. The party was a good laugh, it was just great to go out, have a few drinkies and lot’s of fun too!! We enjoyed a good little boogy when the music hit it right and there were even a few fireworks to keep us entertained!

We left at around 2am and walked home along the dark paths to the village. What a fab end to 2010!! Happy New Year!!

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f2.0 & Olympus PEN, 17mm f2.8 & 100mm f2.8, processed in Lightroom 3)

After a little lie-in we got ourselves ready and headed out into the hustle and bustle of Hong-Kong. We wanted to explore the area on foot so we hit the streets and wandered the many little alley ways and roads. Far more Christmas decorations were here than in China and it started to make us feel a little bit seasonal especially around Times Square. The streets are very much alike to those in London with the same traffic lights, double yellow lines on the roadside and even double-decker buses. We headed to Soho as the Lonely Planet had recommend the area for something a little different and more creative. There are hundreds of trendy restaurants and bars situated around Hong-Kong and you have a good choice to pick from, with many all ready very full with patrons.

We found a cool little place at the top of Soho so we sat inside and enjoyed a few drinks. Helen’s pear Halmsted cider (from sweden) was lovely and made for some easy consumption. Just up the road we popped into a small gallery and also found a Canon powered photography exhibition at the former jail in the centre of Hong Kong island. We could feel a lot of history here and quite a few areas were sealed off, we have spotted a fair amount of asbestos in China and we bet this place could have been the same. The exhibition (hkphotofest.org) was ok with a selection of old photographs showing the old Hong-Kong in its Colonial days and also some more modern photographers exhibiting their work. The building for us was the highlight, both wanting to use the space for a photography shoot. We even took our Christmas card photos of each other here, ready to be comped together with our Christmas best wishes.

After purchasing some Santa hats for some festive fun we continued to explore the streets on foot and found a great local restaurant that specialised in Wonton. We had a clear broth, with a free refill, and then started on the noodles. Helen’s wonton was packed with around 5 or 6 prawns and the lemon and honey cold beverage was great. Jumping on the underground network we made our way to Kowloon were on Christmas eve we were informed by the Alison Guest House that there would be fireworks on the Hong-Kong island and looking across the bay was the best way to see them. We asked a local police officer and they told us no fireworks, but there is an event taking place up the road, a street carnival.

People in the Hong-Kong territories really celebrate Christmas Eve more so that the actual day and there were lots of people walking the streets as a lot of the roads were sealed off to traffic. For a few hours we wandered around Tsim Sha Tsui and were absorbed further into chaotic streets and neon, they were getting ready for street parties and around the pier looking across to Hong-Kong Island thousands of people were waiting and photographing the Christmas decorations. It was rammed!

Not wanting to get stuck on the wrong side of the bay once the street procession had passed we headed back to Causeway Bay via the Star Ferry. For 1 HKD it’s a great view of the skyline and an essential part of any Hong-Kong visit. Not far from our accommodation was City Super which is like a food hall at Selfridges in the UK. They had some very nice items to buy so we invested in some Christmas Day luxuries and a really good smoked salmon wrap and a chicken caesar salad.

The streets were packed with people at any time of the day or night, maybe last minute shopping, some carol singers and others just out to feel the Christmas vibe. Once the sun had gone down the streets were even brighter with neon fluorescent and shop interior lights. We felt like we were inside the indent for Channel 4 in the UK which uses neon lights and signs to create a big number four. The inspiration must have come from here.

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f2.0 & Olympus PEN, 17mm f2.8 & 100mm f2.8, processed in Lightroom 3)

We used Cloudland once more as a base for our luggage and set off to get a bus to Dali. The west bus station is easy to get to from town and we got there by 1pm just in time to get the next bus for Dali. This left at just after 1pm and took around 4-5 hours to get to Xiaguan which is the new town of Dali, from here we paid around 2yuan each to take a local bus to Dali old town. It takes around 30 minutes to make the journey and we had some guidance at the other end from a school girl willing to point us in the right direction.

We booked 3 nights at The Dali Hump which we soon realised was a good move. It’s a good place to meet other travelers and most people tend to stay a lot longer than planned. We arranged a few things for the next day and went out to get some food. Cafe Du Jack is another Lonely Planet recommendation and served a lovely tofu claypot dish with a nice spice to accompany it, Dave enjoyed some Singapore style rice with egg and then we followed this up with a calzone-style looking apple pie, it did the trick.

For the first night there were only 3 of us booked into the 8 bed dorm and it filled up as the nights went on. The rooms are really spacious but at this time of year the cold nights settle in and the thin curtains do nothing to contain heat. We did pay a little extra to go in the dorm room with en-suite and electric blankets which was a nice bonus.

On our first day in Dali we hiked up one of the Cangshan Mountain routes, walking up through the top end of the village and out into farmland. There is a 30 yuan p/p entrance fee for the mountain area but there weren’t many walkers on the mountain so we had the paths to ourselves. We passed by many gravestones and tombs located around the hillside and there was a strong light coming through the tree tops. We wanted to get around to the Zhonge Temple which is located on the mountain side and is where the cable cars go to, from here there is a steep path down to the bottom where you just stay under or around the cable cars and you’ll reach the bottom okay. Along the way we had landscape views of Dali city, Erhai Hu (lake) and farmland, it was a good 4 hour hike from start to finish but we were keen to get back to The Hump so we could join a group for a market tour to buy food for that night’s meal.

We just about got back in time at 1.30pm and the others had waited for us, we all went to the local market with Chung Lee who was our cheeky cheerful hostel guide. She certainly added personality to the outing. We took in the market, put 30 yuan into the pot each and chose fresh vegetables and even picked out our own chicken from a cage. Dave witnessed the 10 minute aftermath of the chicken being killed, de-plucked and ready to go in the back of the basket. In it went with the fresh aubergine and herbs bought earlier on. It’s a pretty crazy environment compared to British markets, traditions here are very different and it’s quite normal for people to pick out chickens, fish and even dogs to be killed for their evening meal.

We arranged to meet everyone back in the kitchen at 4pm to start the preparation for the evening meal. So we joined a few others in search of a talked about Tibetan bread on the street, we’ve eaten something similar in Beijing, it’s a large flat bread with herbs and spice on top, often there is minced pork added onto it, but this one seemed to be meat free? Before going back to the hostel we went to another talked about favourite in the area The 88 German Bakery (a somewhat controversial name by all accounts according to some German backpackers at the hostel) but don’t let this put you off. The deli style cafe is very welcoming, and we tasted a fantastic chai and granola biscuit enough to warrant another visit a few days later.

So after being spoiled at The German Bakery we found the others in the kitchen and began to cook. It was a little messy and perhaps disorganised but Chung lee loved toggle us all a role and asked us to cook some dishes we want to. She was pretty fussy though and preferred to be the one dishing out the instructions, at times it was a little ‘too many cooks…’ but it was all fun and we managed to cook up quite a feast including eggplant and peppers, spicy fish, mushroom soup, vegetable stir fry, chicken and beef dishes. Aside from the slaughtering of the chicken and then watching Chung Lee massacre it in the kitchen it was a pleasant experience! We all ate together in the bar upstairs and enjoyed cheap beer too. We followed this with a few drinks in town at a crazy little place ran by a frenchman called Mushroom…go there and you will not be disappointed.

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f2.0 & Olympus PEN, 17mm f2.8 & 100mm f2.8, processed in Lightroom 3)

We left one big bag behind at Cloudland hostel as they offer a free luggage storage service for 3 days (thereafter its 3yuan per day). So we took advantage of this and packed most things into one main rucksack and had the smaller ones for cameras and so on. The bus left from the one bus station in Kunming which is way out of town, it takes around 45 minutes to get there and will cost 50 yuan by taxi. We were lucky as two girls from the hostel were making their way to the bus station so we shared the taxi ride with them. They were also going all the way to Yuanyang so it was good to know there were more travelers making their way there.

The bus left at 10am but it was a chilly start to the day, much cooler than previous days and all the way to Yuanyang this weather seemed to stick with us. There were a few stops along the cliff edged roads, one of which led us to some interesting outside toilets others were drop offs for extra parcels and passports the driver seemed to be transporting. There was a bit of a traffic jam coming into Xinjie where the main buses will stop at for the terraces and we eventually pulled up at 4pm. Greg from Sunny’s Guesthouse was there to meet us, he’d been staying there for some months helping out and as their English speaking guide for the guesthouse. His English was perfect and this in itself was very helpful in negotiating the mini bus fare back to their village. The two girls we had met on our way to the bus also joined us, so all in all we had managed to save a few yuan by sharing taxis and so on.

It was pretty foggy which we’d heard is very common at the terraces as they are set at altitude so often the mist settles into the valleys and takes a day to clear. We stopped at a few vantage points along the way which gave us a hint of what to expect when the weather clears. Sunny’s Guesthouse is one of very few accommodations in the Douyishi village. It is run by husband and wife and their sun Frank, they are currently doing some renovation work (as is often the case in off season China) and they are limited when it comes to heating, but it has amazing rooftop views and is located at the foot of the rice terraces in the village so we were spoilt for choice! We opted for a double room mainly due to body heat, it was freezing!! We did have an electric blanket though so there was comfort in that. The mist didn’t clear but we got a few shots of the landscape before dinner and two of the other guys staying there turned up from a stroll so there was a good group of us around the table. Dining takes place in a separate outer building from the main guesthouse, Frank is the chef and he kept churning out top quality home-cooked organic dishes one plate after the other. We also enjoyed the red rice which is grown in the Yuanyang rice fields. The family ate at the table next to us which is great in itself as they really do welcome you to their home. We stayed up and chatted next to the little fire in the communal area and then settled in for the night in anticipation of a good sunrise the next morning.

We woke early but the fog was still with us so we stayed in the warm bed a little longer before getting up to join some of the others for breakfast. They were disappointed as the whole time they were there the fog was too! Still even the fog offers some great opportunities pictorially. For breakfast we enjoyed an eggy bread style theme; egg pancakes with jam (very tasty) eggy french bread (good) and fried egg…it did the trick but was a little too stodgy! Still it was hot food and the air was cold. Nathan from San Francisco had arrived at 5am so he joined us and we chatted about plans for later on hoping to catch the sunset if the fog cleared.

After breakfast we went for a stroll into the village. Still foggy, adding atmosphere to the surroundings, we wandered past the pigs, chickens and cows roaming around people’s houses. There is very much a sense of community here and we learned that the rice terraces belong to the villagers and they share out between themselves what they grow, we figured it must be the same for the animals. The houses are very simple, many with straw roofs and it’s a very basic way of living (although we’re sure they have large flat screen TV’s tucked away in some of them!) It’s a very picturesque place and making our way down to the terraces was really rewarding even in the fog. You can walk into them quite far on the small paths, the terraces can be quite abstract too with left over rice plants sticking out of the water. At times the sun peeked through the cloud and offered some strong reflections, but the fog would soon swallow it up again.

We arranged to meet Nathan, Frank and one of the girls at 4pm to head out in search of some better weather later on. This meant we had the day to catch up on editing, the electric blanket was turned on, we wore all the clothes possible and every so often we would pause for a run up onto the roof terrace to catch the views before going back down again. Helen got pretty cold so along to the Chemical Brother’s Push the Button album she had a boogy in the room to warm up!

We met up with the others at 4pm to go in search of a sunset, Frank had heard that the sun was out in a few areas of the region so we went off to find them. Some of the best views were found at roadside platforms where we could catch the terraces for free, the bigger more well known viewing areas are all charged on entry so we had to toy with the plan…if the weather isn’t going to be good over there let’s see what we can find for free rather than getting there, paying and having no views. When we originally came into the Yuanyang region we managed to avoid the entrance fee by sitting in the back of the mini van and being unnoticed by the gateway keepers. To access the villages alone there is a 60yuan per person fee for tourists, but if it’s foggy, the weather is bad or you can hide behind local drivers then you will miss this fee. We were nearly charged on the second day but Frank managed to talk us out of it.

Finally we reached an area that had clear views and strong sunset colours reflecting off the water filled terraces. It was quite a special moment, we could see the fog coming in on different sections of the terraces. Wow! The terraces go on for what seems like miles, and this was only one section!

We did have to pay Frank for ferrying us around but it was only 30yuan per person so that wasn’t too bad at all, he also took off some money for us as he didn’t take us all the way to other viewing areas, this was mainly because the weather wasn’t as clear there anyway so it did us a favour. Back at Sunny’s we enjoyed another family meal, perhaps not as good as the first night, but there was plenty of choice and we were joined by some more guests. We stayed up with Nathan and Greg sipping on hot tea and chatting away until it was bed time. We were leaving early the next day but had vowed to be on the rooftop for the sunrise.

6.30am and we were on the roof watching the sun rise over the mountain tops and Dave shot some more slow shutter imagery on the Olympus Pen. If we’d have had more time we would have loved to stay for that day as we knew the weather was getting better, but we had other plans to go further north from Kunming and we were happy with what we had seen.

A quick breakfast and we were all squashed into the mini van to take us back to the bus station. This time we shared the journey with 4 others so once again costs were reduced. The bus left at 8.30am and along with Nathan we made our way back to Kunming. It was a much warmer day all round and we arrived in Kunming at 5pm, Nathan shared our taxi and covered the costs as a work expense which we were very grateful for. We said our goodbyes and landed at Cloudland at around 6pm in time for dinner.

A few hellos to other travelers we had met in Shanghai and we went out to one of the local eateries for some great cheap local food. This was followed by a quiet night at the hostel and arrangements to take a bus to Dali the following afternoon.

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f2.0 & Olympus PEN, 17mm f2.8 & 100mm f2.8, processed in Lightroom 3)

We came across The Hutong earlier in the month when we attended a Christmas event at The International Canadian School of Beijing. They had a stand showcasing some of their events and we picked up a schedule for the month. We’d already attended the Tai Chi class a week ago and booked ourselves onto a Chinese vegetarian cooking class too. Our teachers were Sophie from The Hutong who translated for the main chef; a lady from Inner Mongolia. The food we were taught was from the North that you wouldn’t really get in Beijing unless you were cooking it yourself.

On the menu we had:

Vegetable Kung Po with tofu.
Egg & tomatoe with green peppers,
& mushroom and celery stir fry.

We learned how to use the blocky knives that everyone cooks with over here, the head chef was pretty strict when it came to “The” way to chop carrots, tofu and the like. With the Kung Po dish everything was meant to be the same size so that the cooking time is equal. Some of us were spot on with this…whilst others perhaps a little more experimental!!

When it came to cooking there was a hell of a lot of deep frying going on- eek! Especially with the first two dishes. The tofu was cooked first and then put aside whilst the remaining ingredients were cooked, it then rejoined the dish towards the end with the seasoning. The egg and tomato dish is a classic Chinese meal and this was Dave’s chance to shine! He seasoned the dish very well with more pepper, chili and green peppers! We actually preferred this to the one that was cooked earlier on!! Helen had a go at the mushroom and celery dish, which was more like stirring the wok ingredients whilst the chef adds what’s required!

We didn’t get to do much hands on cooking however we really enjoyed the class and eating the food afterwards. There was a great rice dish which we took down the recipe for, although didn’t actually cook as it was ready to eat with the food. Sophie who works there is a lovely lady too! She had great knowledge about the foods we were cooking and info about why dark mushrooms are good for you in the winter.

After the cooking class we walked to the Drum and Bell Towers. They’re based not to far away from Nanluoguxiang and so we knew where we could go to warm up as it was foggy and bloody cold! The views across the city were limited but it always adds an atmospheric feel to the photos when it’s like that. We reached the towers in time for their drum performance, this too is impressive and a nice change from the norm. It was too cold to stay for very long but we lasted until the end of the performance before heading for some hot tea down the road.

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f2.0 & Olympus PEN, 17mm f2.8 & 100mm f2.8, processed in Lightroom 3)

We have quite a lot to fit in on this post so here we go…

We had a night train booked to go to Xian, leaving Beijing West on a hardsleeper. The train was full and we were 2 of 6 in our cabin in a carriage that houses around 10 or so cabins! There are also around 20 carriages so the trains are pretty massive. The price for our bottom bunk was 275 RMB each, not bad as it’s our accommodation and travel in one. Once we were ready to get into bed the lights went out and everyone went to sleep until our arrival the following morning at 8am.

When we got to Xian station our hostel Shiyuan were waiting with a sign saying Helen Roecoe…we knew it was for us! There were a few other backpackers on the taxi bus to the hostels, most were dropped off at Yin Tang Inn a few streets away from us. Shiyuan is a YHA hostel located near to the South Gate of the city wall. It’s a pretty good location and they were really helpful. We were impressed at being able to check into our room at 8.30 in the morning. For our time in Xian we booked a mixed dorm room so we could save some money and meet a few other backpackers. On the first night though we had the place to ourselves. They have a decent cafe at the hostel and breakfast is fairly substantial and at a good price. You also get free coffee and beer every day you’re there!! Not bad!

We had a few things to sort out when we got there – our ticket back to Beijing was one, breakfast another and looking into the tour to the Terracotta Warriors. Getting the train tickets was easy once we found the little ticket office a few streets away!! It’s well located to the hostel but it is tricky to find – appearing as a kiosk to an ICBC branch. You can’t buy return journeys over here, so each time you arrive in a place you need to pick up your return or the connection to your next destination. We got back to our hostel having purchased two hardsleeper tickets for two days time. After some breakfast at the cafe we went to the reception desk to book ourselves onto their tour the next day. We know we could have done this ourselves and got the bus to the site for a lot less, but we wanted to book a tour so that we could meet a few other backpackers/travellers in Xian. Having sorted this out we then walked up to the South Gate entrance to the City Wall, paid the entrance fee of 40 yuan each and then found a bike rental service quite easily once we were on top.

Cycling on the XIan city wall was really good fun and we stopped plenty of times for sights that we wanted to photograph. Construction of the city, demolition areas, temple rooftops, large apartment blocks on the other side of the wall, lanterns and a strange collection of animal shaped floats left on the top after some type of carnival…we couldn’t quite figure out how long they’d been left there and whether they’re still in use!! All of this mean’t that we were stopping every 50 meters or so at some points! We even managed to set up the self-timer on the Olympus to get a shot of us cycling toward the camera! Oh fun!

We cycled the wall for around 2.5 hours and paid an extra 10 yuan for the privilege. We would recommend doing this if you get to Xian! Later on we went for some street food in the city’s manic Muslim quarter. This is quite an experience with so much food being cooked right on the street under burning flames, hot pots and local delicacies are thrown into the limelight and under your nose. Mixed in with the food are a few streets of tourism gift stalls, dried fruit and restaurants. Again probably a must if you get to go. We had some of the Cool noodles, which is supposed to be a famous local snack but it is what it is…cold noodles!! Helen had a vegetable hot pot dish and Dave opted for the Chinese sandwich with beef. We got back to the hostel at a good time and Dave rang home.

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f2.0 & Olympus PEN, 17mm f2.8 & 100mm f2.8, processed in Lightroom 3)

26th – Terracotta warriors

We left at 9am for the trip to the Terracotta Warriors with a few people from our hostel and went onto Yin Tang Inn to pick up some more people on the tour. We met a great group who’d all met at the hostel the night before, most of whom were traveling around China and had loads of tales to tell of their experiences. After some brief bonding we were interrupted by our tour guide Jha Jha (“Lady Jha Jha” apparently) who proceeded to inform us about the warriors and the local area that we were traveling through. She is quite a character and well known amongst travellers as she loves the line, “My name is Jha Jha, I’m 27 and single!” which made us all chuckle. Our fellow sight-seer Sam was her target on this trip and we all teased him about this as the day progressed.

Make sure you take some photo ID with you when you visit the warriors as security is tight and you have to go through airport style security twice before you get anywhere near. Whilst walking to the entrance from the bus drop-off point you have to walk through an 80′s style English pedestrianized shopping mall! It’s pretty kitsch!

The warriors are located in bunkers that are covered by huge structures. It did feel a little Indiana Jones with a smattering of easy tourism thrown in. Bunker 3 is the biggest and best site so with that in mind we were taken to 2,1,3 bunkers, saving the best until last.

It’s an impressive site with excavations continuing to be undertaken which all happens after 6pm when the sites close. The visit is a worthwhile one however we were expecting more!? We felt that you would be able to get closer to the masses of warriors, that it would be more of an under ground cave system and that in-fact there would be more warriors. We did learn that there are more sites around the area however they have not been officially located yet. The background story is an impressive one involving Mercury ingestion by a power hungry/eternal life seeking emperor and ultimate death for the workers under his control.

As we are in China and we are tourists we were taken to a gift shop selling various things such as jade jewellery, warriors and the man who discovered the site itself was sat behind a desk signing books for those seeking that extra special touch! We couldn’t quite believe that he was there…it was a little surreal but very typical of the levels tourism have reached here.

Following on from the trip to the warriors site we had a brief journey to the tomb where the crazed emperor is buried, it sounds like an amazing site, but it is yet to be reached due to the dangers of a mercury moat and oxygen damaging the hidden artefacts with his body. So you can see a hill in the distance and after about 5 minutes we went back to the bus to leave! On our way back we stopped at a hotel for a big lunch all at a bargain of 25 yuan. As Helen and Ian don’t eat meat they had to sit on a separate table to the rest of the group…romantic meal for two! The restaurant was huge and only had about 3 tables full so this looked pretty funny! David and the meat eaters gouged on pork and other unknown meat-like objects whilst Helen and Ian were very civilised in their Pak Choi and sticky potatoe spread.

When we got back to Xian we decided to get a taxi over to their hostel a little later on as there would be a dumpling making party! A couple games of pool some beer and a few snacks later and we were all making speed dumplings! We’d say a little more atmospheric than the one at the CCC earlier in the month…Jackson 5 on the soundsystem and we were on our way to dumpling heaven!! They weren’t much better though than the last one’s we made and after a while when they’re cooked they do tend to be very samey! Still it’s all in the fun of making them!!

A couple we’d met the day before came to join us for beers at the bar after the dumpling making session and we chatted about plans for China travel, we are doing a very similar route but at a different time so it was good to get some ideas. We then went to the bar street…hmmm not really Liverpool’s Matthew St but there were a few bars offering cheap beer so we went in for an hour or so before saying goodbye to our warrior buddies and went back to our dorm.

27th – Next day Helen was ill, we didn’t do much as she had some kind of tummy bug so it was a light and slightly teary stroll to the Giant Wild Goose Pagoda, which was a lot further than we had anticipated, we followed this up with a taxi back to the hostel where we managed to get a room for the day. We decided later on that it wasn’t a good idea for us to leave that night for the train. The hostel were very accommodating and let us have a dorm room for 4 just for the two of us. Helen slept and Dave went out for food. We didn’t know this at the time but we could have taken our train tickets back up to 2 hours before leaving Xian in exchange for a refund with only a fifth of the price lost. We didn’t know this so we did loose out on some money and had to buy tickets for the next night. 28th – Helen was feeling better the following day although we laid low in Xian and ventured to a local park in between hanging out at the hostel for most of the day. We could only get a soft sleeper back to Beijing, which was okay but not that much better than a hardsleeper! Still it mean’t we had a quitter cabin. The train left Xian at 8.34pm and arrived in Beijing at around 7am. It took us around half an hour to catch the metro back to Xinjeikou on line 1 as the rush hour was pretty crazy! We literally only just managed to squeeze on with our bags after watching several locals climbing their way off the train. Madness.

On the 29th we spent the main part of the day at the apartment resting, writing, washing clothes, watching Peep Show and only ventured out once to the supermarket. Sometimes you just need to have a lazy day (and have a washing day)! We followed this up the next day with a spot of Christmas Shopping at the Yashow clothing market on the other side of town, it was fun bartering and we managed to buy most of our prezzies too. Good times! The bookworm also delighted us by providing some nice solid western food. We also went out for food with our hosts the chen family, but for some stupid reason we forgot to take our cameras out with us!! What were we thinking! The food was really good aswell…ah well we think you are enjoying the food pics so we will have plenty more to show and we had a very enjoyable evening – big thanks to them for helping us out with our accommodation whilst we have been staying in Beijing.