Transport getting there: if you want to go all the way there from Kunming you will need to catch a bus from the new northern station to Fazhe 法者, which on some maps has now been renamed as Hongtudi Zhen Red Soil Township. But you will need to get off before at a cross road locallly known as 109 (it is where the road branches with the right turn going down to Dongchuan). It is only a cluster of a few houses on top of a hill.
Actually it is best to stay on the bus for another two hundred meters and get off right where the km marker says 110, it is where the best guesthouse is in the area. It is run by a local guy who made it by being a most amiable host to all photographers. I was there first when he had only three rooms in his farmhouse which went for Y5 each and local travel was by horse cart driven by his brother. His guesthouse went through a few iterations and last time he had standard rooms for up to Y120 in addition to a number of smaller rooms. His wife will cook, there are no restaurants. Last time I was there the owner also had a minibus which he used to drive people around. Bus drivers generally know the guest house and will stop there to drop you off.
The official time-table of the northern station says there are six busses per day to Fazhe, I do not believe that as only two years ago there was really only one, leaving early in the morning around 7:30 and arriving just after mid-day. The alternative is to take just a bus to Magai 寻甸马街 (there are lots of Magais around, the one in Xundian county is the one you want), which is the next larger town, but on official maps it always appears as something else. In Magai you can easily find a minibus to take you up to 109. Price maybe Y200.
Around 109 there are quite a number of scenic spots, some are within walking distance, others not. Some think that sunrise is best from Damakan (about 15km along the road to Fazhe, you will need transport for this), while others stay more locally. Afternoon is perhaps nicest from a viewpoint down and off the road to Dongchuan, I forgot the name of that place, again, transport is needed. A closer area is '114', reachable via the road (and a shortcut along the fields).
Particularly nice about the area is that you are really in the middle of pretty countryside, no town, just fields and a few farm houses combined with good views over the Wumeng mountains. I have never been there in April, autumn being the prime photo time there, so I would not think that the place will be overrun by tourist, but numbers have steadily increased.
To return to KM you can either go the same way back, waiting for the KM bound bus from Fazhe, or go to the 109 crossroad and wait for the bus from Magai to Dongchuan along a quite spectacular road through desert mountains. Check with the locals on what time the bus passes, I think it is only one per day. From Dongchuan to KM is easy.
Getting away: Daju Town
Posted byThe old ferry stopped working sometime last year, now you will have to go quite far west to the new ferry, which is a long slog (and a little difficult to find) unless you catch a ride with a local driver (try to hail any vehicle along the road - we managed to hitch a ride with some forestry van for 10Y from the old crossing to the new).
There is no fixed time-table for the 'ferry', it is operated by a few local guys who go home when they think no-one is coming anymore.
Daju does make a very nice stop, but as of last year they try to collect the mountain fee as well as the Lijiang old town fee also at the northern park entrance (when returning from Daju to Lijiang), amounting to a whopping 220Y or so. However, the mountain fee is not payable if you do not get off the bus inside the park area and technically the Lijiang fee should not be required if you do not stop in Lijiang, but continue on to, let's say, Xiaguan. Some people have avoided paying the fees by claiming to be locals (works less well for westerners).
The totally rushed (and a bit pointless) version of TLG would be to hire a car to take you Naxi Family Guesthouse and walk from there to Halfway GH, have lunch there and walk down to the road and onto Walnut Grove. There seem to be vehicles for hire at the guesthouses, who then could take you either back to Qiaotou or to the ferry to Daju.
However, my recommendation would be to stay on night at Naxi Family GH (few people do, even though it has the nicest afternoon views of the mountains), next morning to Halfway GH for lunch and continue on a bit to one of the smaller GH along the higher trail for another night. Halfway GH has become big business in the last decade and has lost its attraction.
Forgotten British consulate getting Chinese facelift
Posted byBeatrix Metford, the wife of a British officer, wrote in her 1935 book "Where China Meets Burma":
"About ten years ago the British Government purchased a six-acre plot and started to build a consulate. It was a lovely site, just outside the west gate, with extensive views of the hills and mountains. The house was to be a stone building, comfortable but plain. It was bigger and more costly proposition than was realized. There were no workmen, no masons or carpenters, who had even seen a European house, so they all had to be trained, and when they were trained they struck for higher wages, and so it went on. [...] All tools, all fittings had to be carried by mule or coolie from Bhamo. At last, after eight years' work and vast expenditure, far beyond the original estimate, the consulate was finished and occupied.
It is a very plain house, painfully plain, with it smooth stone walls, its tin roof, its brown woodwork. But inside it is a bit of England. It is most beautifully fitted up and well furnished — a veritable oasis in the desert of mud and wood houses of the borderland. And in its spacious gardens, surrounded by a high stone wall, one can hardly realize one is in China..."
When I first found the building a few years back, the road it was on was called Huanxilu, the western ring road, which illustrates that for a long time its location was on the western outskirts of Tengchong. Today, Tengchong has sprawled beyond it. At that time it was still possible to climb up onto the second floor, where like in any proper English house there were also fireplaces, but everything else had been stripped out.
Two years ago we spoke to a Chinese guy there who seemed to have a certain interest in the building and he told us that the building had been the headquarters of the Japanese, which would not be totally surprising if it was the best-built and best-furnished place in town.
If one travels down to Lianghe, the next county town towards the Burmese border, there is the restored tusi yamen, where some iron-cast window parts still say 'Glasgow' on it if I remember correctly.
Getting Away: Shicheng
Posted byFor those who want to find Shicheng on a map: 24.803N 102.58E.
There is a bus #33 from Kunming to Haikou, but it is not very frequent. Better to take one of the minibusses that run from the corner of Chunhui Lu 春晖路 and Renmin Xilu (this is just a little east of the big flyover). The fare to Haikou is Y8. From Haikou a tuk-tuk to Shicheng is 10Y, as the article says it is about 3km along a not-too-interesting road.
The bus to Haikou also passes the Xihua Wetlands mentioned in a previous post and Guanyinshan 观音山, a Bai village with a large Guanyin temple on a rocky outcrop overlooking Dianchi.
Around Town: Xihua Wetlands Park
Posted byI think bus #33 goes from Renmin Xilu to Haikou.
I found a route plan here www.kmbus.com.cn/line_ssyq_68.html with the stop to get off probably 西华街, but I thought the bus to Haikou does not start at the Xiaoximen bus depot, but further down on Renmin Xilu.