Wednesday June 17 - Xi'an to Ping Pliang - or .... Ping Pliang Revisited (400 km)

We are on "Gertie" now, our new Truck with Anthony (Ant) as leader and Adam as lead driver. Our Chinese guide is John. Six of us from Daphne continued (Emily, Rachel, Mike, John, Ray and I) and 4 new people joined us (Sui May, Stormy, Olivia and Will, a professional travel photographer from England. Did I tell you about Globebusters? We met a guy last night in our hotel in Xi'an who is working with them. They do motorbike tours similar to the truck tours. They re on their last week of an exploratory trip London/Beijing. Can you imagine what fun that would be! They also do a trip Alaska to Ushiaia. So, if you are a bike lover, check it out!! And you are right...we are heading BACK to Ping Pliang and the Tao Mountain. Not sure what happened there, but I think our previous leader was hard pressed to find somewhere to go when we were denied entry to Xiahe. Anyway, we were supposed to spend 2 nights there, and Ant has promised we will only do one night and put in an extra night elsewhere. Despite being upset at retracing our steps we loved Mt. Kontong. Kongton Shan is on the border of Ningxia in the Linpan Shan range. It is the most famous mountain in the Tao religion. It was first referred to around 399 - 295 BC. The mountain has various paths that lead up and down over the hilltop past dozens of picturesque, small, temples. As well, we climbed the Ladder to Heaven which must be a million stairs that lead up to the Tian Shi Temple, and the Yu Huang Palace perched almost at the summit of the mountain, then we came back down by Thundering Peak and through a series of three old minute temples, with rickety, worn, stone steps right in the middle of the mountain. We visited temples with names like Dragon Kings Temple. I lit incense sticks in one temple, and received a blessing from the diminutive Taoist monk. We bought bright red ribbons which we were told to tie around our heads and did - didn't know what they read and hoped it was something nice. On the way up the extremely steep and unending steps, we got looks of amazement, words of encouragement, and requests to stop for pictures with old and young Chinese, male and female. On the way down, one handsome, young, Chinese man coming up, looked up, saw Ray and immediately piled our hands full of delicious red dates. I reckon he thought Ray must be 110 with his white hair and must therefore be in need of energy!! Actually, he was just being incredibly kind. The spontaneity of the people is both refreshing and intriguing to us inhibited westerners. Instead of taking the mini bus back down, Ray and I walked down the switch back road, about 36 minutes. It was peaceful, pretty, and gave us some much needed exercise. Incidentally, did I mention that the ride up in the mini van was a thrill ride at break neck speed up the switch-back bends narrowly avoiding hitting the trees so awkwardly placed in the road itself! Back at the camp site (same one as last time here), over looking the "Zhang-plucking Lake", Ant and Adam cooked a delicious meal: leg of lamb, gravy, mashed potatoes, green beans, carrots and broccoli, and we ate it sitting around a glowing camp fire. No Chinese fire crackers this time!!