We drove back into Te Anau to get a weather update for the area, which was looking better as the days passed. From Te Anau we took the Milford Road north and once again took in the amazing views, from meadows and lupin lined roads, glacier formed valley’s to the mirror lake and mountains forming around us.

 We did a half day hike to Lake Marian which was a tough 3 hour return hike signposted around 7 km from Gunns Camp. We passed over a swing-bridge which led us through forest and to a pretty immense series of waterfalls. The track was steep with a few scrambles up trees and rock fall but the effort was well worth it, and chatting to a few locals they had been informed by a guide that this was perhaps the best half day hike in South Island, New Zealand. A statement!!

Lake Marian is in a hanging valley formed by glacial action, reflecting the Darran Mountains surrounding it. We waited for the low cloud to lift and a few blue spots of sky joined us too. It was pretty amazing and we worked up a good sweat along the way. Heading back was much quicker and less of an effort but we still had to be careful as parts of the path was slippery and steep.

When we left the parking area we drove down to Gunns Camp which had been recommended to us by friends Vic and Dave. It’s a quirky place with a lot of history and a free museum for guests which is well worth a peek. We learned a little about the legend of Davey Gunn aswell as taking some time to photograph the campground with it’s cabins and funny oddities lying around the place. It cost £12 each to stay in our van and they have good cooking facilities and a spacious common room. We enjoyed cooking a pretty fabulous dahl which was taken from the Wholemeal Cookbook purchased in Takaka. We know it was good because our American friends tried it and were raving on about it too! ha ha!

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f/2.0, Leica 90mm f/2.8, Zeiss 18mm f/4 ZM processed in Lightroom 3)

We woke up early to the sound of eager cockerels the first going off at around 4.30am. It wasn’t the best night’s sleep with a very hard mattress indeed and snoring echoing throughout our eco-shack. We had a cooked Laos style breakfast in the form of noodle soup, eggs and fruit, Helen was getting her appetite back and starting to feel a little more like herself again. We left the village at 8.30am and began to trek once more through forest land, past more karst peaks and made our way up and down a hilly terrain which required a little more effort than the flatness of the day before. We had a few descriptions of plant-life and the area and we walked for a good 4 hours before arriving at the second village for a home cooked lunch. We sat inside someone’s home at the back of a shop and chilled out awaiting more food, it was really kitsch inside with old wardrobes, bright wall colours, retro tiles and clothes everywhere. It was a good little stop for photographing! More rice, more soup and stir-fried egg and we were all ready for a nap. No time for this though as we were waiting for a pick up to take us to the Blue Lagoon.

On the usual itinerary there is a tractor ride involved whereby you get pulled along on a cart by one of their home-made style tractors; not like ours at home. This didn’t happen for us because there were 8 in our group and the tractor wouldn’t cope with all of the western weight. So we had a mini-van take us to the lagoon instead with music blasting out of the over-hyped stereo. It took around 15 minutes to drive to the lagoon, packed in on a bumpy ride. The lagoon lives up to its name and is a very intense copper sulfate looking colour, it’s hard to believe that the lagoon is natural as it seems more like a chemical phenomenon. There were no scientific descriptions available from the tour guides only spiritual ones. It’s quite deep and plays host to shoals of large fish. Most of the group plunged in for a cooling swim after we walked around the edge of the lagoon, we both decided to photograph and observed from the sidelines. We hope the photographs show the intensity of the colours and the subtle reflections that glowed.

After a group photo we continued in the minivan to a point from where we walked a further 2 km to meet our pick up trip. At around 3pm we met our pick up back to Tha Khaek and we were back in the town at just before 5pm with an en-route detour to the bus station so that we could book bus tickets for the next day of travel. Back in Tha Khaek we checked into the Travel Lodge along with the rest of the group and settled in for a relaxing evening of food, chat and planning. It’s a really good spot for meeting other backpackers and they have a good outdoor seated area. We would recommend staying there and the dorms are good value for money if you’re on a budget, we paid 50,000 kip for a double with shared bathroom.

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

We got an early bus to Koh Kong, although as per usual it took over an hour to leave the city and then we were still stopping along the way to pick up other passengers, many of whom didn’t have seats so were sat on plastic chairs in the aisles. After around 5 hours or so we landed in Koh Kong at a bus stop a little way out of the main streets, tuk-tuk drivers once again were hassling us to take pick up into town, but we knew from the scale of the map that it wouldn’t be too far to walk. We met Ali and Carl who’d been traveling mainly in India on the bus and we all decided to walk in together. We landed at The Dugout Hotel, which is quite easy to find on the main street leading towards the market. The manager is Australian and pretty helpful when it comes to advice in the area, we opted for a room that was more than we were hoping to pay but thought we’d just stay there the one night. They have a small pool there too so we were keen to go in for a dip to cool down from the afternoon heat.

Later on we met up with Ali and went to have a chat with a local eco-tour operator ran by a friendly chap called Mr T, his office is located at Dugout, and they are owned by the same guy who runs the Oasis Bungalow resort a little way out of town. We found out about tours on offer and what was possible for us to do and see on Koh Kong Island, after going back and forth and realising we couldn’t stay on the Island, Mr T made a few calls and pretty much made up a tour for us on the spot. We could take a 2 day boat trip to Koh Kong Island, visit the beautiful beaches, have barbecues on the beach, all of our food and stay at a fishing village called Alatan that is connected to the island via stilts and wooden bridges. For the 4 of us to go it would cost $55 each! This was a good price considering the tours we had paid for in Vietnam. So we agreed and decided to leave the following day. If you do go to the tourist office at The Dugout please note that this isn’t a tour they do on a regular basis so don’t expect it to be advertised. They offer other types of tours including jungle treks and mountain biking in the area, Koh Kong itself doesn’t have much going on, it’s a small town which can be used as a handy base to go off and explore.

We were picked up at 8am and taken to the harbour where we had a boat, driver and guide waiting with us along with a fridge full of food. It was a long boat that they had decked out for our comfort, Mr T came along to make sure everything was ready and set up for us and off we went. The first part of the boat trip took around 2 hours and on the way we even bought our fish from a local fisher-mans boat! We took a brief stop at beach number 1, we all jumped off the boat and went for a swim in the crystal clear waters. The beach was beautiful with no-one else around so we were excited about going to the further afield beaches.

After around half an hour we carried on towards beach number 3, here we stopped and the driver threw in the anchor. We had until around 4pm here, and so we swam, sunbathed, ate a fantastic fish barbecue meal, swam some more, the guide built us a shelter from the sun, Carl tried to catch a crab and so on. All in all it was absolutely gorgeous, we had the whole place to ourselves, the sea was beautiful and clear and it was so serene. At last we had found a paradise. We had heard that not many people come to Koh Kong Island other than on day trips because the military operate the Island so it’s not the safest place to stay, also the trips only go when there are more than 4 people so this meant we didn’t see any other tourists, only fishing boats.

After a lazy afternoon on the beach we got back into our boat and made the hour journey to Alatan fishing village. We weren’t expecting what awaited us at all. The village is build up of around 50 or so houses all built on stilts going away from the Island for around 1km. As we arrived many local children were waiting for us, all shouting hello and smiling and laughing nervously in anticipation of our arrival. We instantly felt very humble and privileged to be there and were taken into the house which would be our base for our stay. As soon as we got inside the children were posing for photographs, asked Dave to do some English spelling and took us up onto the Island where their school is based. We were quite overwhelmed by the whole experience, they were so happy for us to be sharing their home with them, showing us around their school and attempting to speak English with us. The photography opportunities here were fantastic.

After an hour or so of playing with the children we sat down for dinner and enjoyed more fish, rice, salad and fruit. We had previously seen two full size snooker tables in one of the houses a little further away from where we were and asked if we could play some snooker/pool. We have no idea how easy or hard it was for them to get those things in there, we were amazed that they had them and they clearly kept them in mint condition. It was also amazing to see how each family have some way of making money; either by fishing, selling groceries, a little cafe at one end and then the snooker hall!

So we played for an hour until going to bed at around 10pm, we had an audience watching us the entire time and Helen didn’t play well at all. We kind of just wanted to be unseen at this moment in time wishing for a game of pool on a snooker table to end!! Unfortunately for us Ali and Carl beat us 2-0, but Helen always makes a point that pub sports…just ain’t her thing! ha ha!

So to our bedroom which our hosts had vacated for us for that night, 4 of us all lined up on a thin mattress, with water underneath and noises from loud televisions, babies’ crying and the like meant we were on for a restless night. Still the experience of being there far outweighed any of this and we were very happy to have stayed in Alatan that night.

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

We arrived at 8am in Hue after a bumpy overnight sleeper journey. The bus was packed with westerners which made a change from those our travels in China, but it was nice as Helen befriended a South-American Fashion journalist and watched a few episodes of Arrested Development. When we got to Hue we took our bags off the coach and were pointed towards the Google Hotel, here we had a quick pick me up in the form of some fruit and coffee and then went off to see a few sights before our onward bus scheduled at 1.30pm.

Hue is quite small so it’s easy enough to walk across the river and over to the main sights. It was raining and quite humid, and we passed by a war museum so stopped to take a look and saw some old American army tanks before taking in an exhibition on the Vietnam war. It’s not that big an exhibition but was a good introduction to the developments of the Vietnam war. As we left along very slippery paths we walked to the Imperial Palace which is probably the main attraction in Hue. It only cost 10,000 dong each which is around 33p so we forked out the cash and went inside along with several other tourists. After a brief stop to feed the fish we continued to walk around the Palace grounds and ruins, the site is mainly made up of old Palace rooms, some have been preserved to their original use whilst many others are still as they were since being bombed in the war. Tiled floors still form the ground to many rooms but only have wooden structures and the odd wall that show where the walls would have been.

After taking in the Palace grounds we walked to a Vegetarian restaurant on our way back to the hotel to meet the bus. We chose a few local dishes along with some rice and really enjoyed it. We then made our way back to the hotel and got the bus at 1.30pm as scheduled bound for Hoi An. We arrived there at around 5pm and went to find a hotel, we had provisionally booked one place but en-route were offered a cheaper and quite decent room so we opted for this one, breakfast was included and the room was a good size with en-suite. After checking in we went to explore this picturesque river-side town, as we ventured towards the riverside we became enveloped by old quaint houses, tailoring shops, restaurants and souvenirs. It is a very pretty town indeed and almost felt like a stage-set at times, perhaps a little over the top in terms of restoration and just oozed hundreds of western tourists on every street.

We opted for the Morning Glory restaurant close to the riverside but not on the river front for our evening meal. This came in the form of Vegetarian curry, salad, soup and grilled aubergine, each dish was bursting with flavour so based on this we decided to book ourselves onto their cooking class in two days time. Back to the hotel via some more quaint streets, tailoring shops and light displays. before an much needed early night was had.

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

We went out for a bike ride with one of the Chinese girls’ Sylvia who was staying in the dorm with us, she was friends with another of the girls working at the hostel. It was good to have her with us as she could help us to find our way by asking the locals which way to such and such a place. She wanted to go to a specific village called Xixhou which is about 20km away from Dali old town. We wanted to cycle through some of the villages closer to the lake so we could explore the farmland, the most direct way would be to cycle along the high way for the entire ride but that’s no fun, so we compromised and spent some time cycling to the villages and some time catching up and taking the highway to the furthest place.

The farmland in Dali is very lush and extremely beautiful to photography. During our stay in Dali the sky was a perfect blue and it was a very comfortable temperature indeed, only being cold in the shade. By night it dropped significantly but we had electric blankets to cope with this!

So we took in the scenery around us, some farmland, some lake and some road. It was stunning. We got to Xixhou at around 3pm and ambled through the village market before stopping for some very good value soup rice noodles. For 3 of us to eat it cost around £2.80, and the food tasted really good. The only bad thing was a local guy pestering us for left over food and drink, he wouldn’t leave us alone and eventually got what he wanted. Still the setting took us away from this. We continued out of the village and took the road to some older parts of the area. Once more fantastic views, terraces and buildings surrounded us.

We decided to make our way back at around 4pm and set off for Dali. We were going quicker than Sylvia on her lady-like bike so we waited for her every so often, plus the drivers on the road aren’t the most reliable often overtaking two cars in one go so we wanted to make sure we were all with us. When we got back Sylvia joked about how fit we were compared to her and she said she’d only ever ridden a bike once before in her life. Considering this fact she did very well indeed.

When we got back we ate at an Indian restaurant down the road from our hostel and enjoyed more chai. Back at the hostel there were a few more travelers, Helen got chatting to Jane who she’d seen at various other places around China. It’s very easy to bump into people when you use Hostelworld for recommendations on where to stay. Many people also choose to travel through South China from Vietnam as it’s a good route and the weather is pretty good in Yunnan.

So it was our last night in Dali and we really loved the town and the hostel had a nice vibe too. We decided to nip back to Bakery 88 the next morning to get some take-away sandwiches with very good cheese and meat! Yum!! We also sneaked in a few more granola slices.

The bus back took the scenic route as part of the highway was closed but this wasn’t a bad thing as it meant we got to drive through some more beautiful countryside and villages. It was quite a luxury bus with only a few of us on board, and we got back to Cloudland at around 7pm. We had some food, chatted away and got ready for our flight to Guangzhou the following day.

(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)