Tiger Leaping Gorge Trek and the VIM Incident

That morning was the fir st time so far I'd awoke feeling ill. In fact I was quite concerned I wouldn't be able to do the walk, or, at best, have to make potty-stops every 10 minutes! Never even sip snake wine - its not worth it! A banana pancake and three toilet trips seemed to ease the situation though I definitely wasn't 100% still.

Having left Mama's nice and early (after being screamed at to get moving!) some heavy consultation took place between our driver and the lifesize Team America puppet driving the se cond van, taking up a good 20 minutes whilst sitting no more than a kilometre from the guesthouse. Having witnessed this concerned exchange, and being completely bemused by it, we kept a close eye on him for the rest of the journey, expecting him to break into the Team America emergency signal at any given moment!

We could see the dramatic snow-capped mounta ins of Tiger Leaping Gorge's southern side, towering 3000m above the river which was already at 2500m above sea level a long time before we got there. After getting student discount on my entrance fee (I must remember to remove the valid-until date) we began our climb, quickly stocking-up on snacks.

We had hit the gorge just as the leaves wer e turning for the autumn, which made it all the more beautiful with the strong contrast between the many colours of the trees and the grey and white snowcapped mountains behind. Following a vertical climb from 2,700m to 3,700m over the course of 28 bends we reached the most famous viewpoint on the gorge, where paying a local Y15 each gave him ambitions to be the most prolific photographer ever to visit Tiger Leaping Gorge - throwing himself on the floor and directing us to move about the cliff-edge for all the best angles!

The rest of the walk was significantly easier than the climb which had put our 20% faster-than-average walking speed (according to the sketch maps) back at normal pace due to a multitude of necessary stops to catch our breath during the climb. Too bad Jamie - or can we still manage it all in one day?! Cummon' Team!!

The walk took us through little guesthouses and resting places in rural unspoilt villages, goats which we surprised along the footpath and others being hearded by the locals. That night we stayed at the Halfway - the guesthouse Michale Palin stayed at on his BBC tour along the gorge. We even found where he signed the visitors book (now isn't that exciting mum?!)

Next morning I was up before the sunrise to see if I could capture any great photos along the valley, though it would have been equally good to just laze in bed and watch the sun lighting up our amazing view of the snow-capped mountains. Frustratingly the sunrise was happening mainly on the other side of the mountains!

A healthy portion of oatmeal porridge and museli with fruit and yogurt saw us on our way back out along the ridges of the steeper part of the canyon, by way of waterfalls and pick-your-own weed. At lunch we stopped at a place where a guys had clearly been slowed by picking more than his fair share!

Having been told about the Sakura Inn that morning by two Israeli women we'd met, after a few Y3 (20p) beers at Mama Naxi's following dinner we went to check it out. It turned out to be a great little venue. People at the front on the top floor were engaged in a no-prisoners-taken shouting match with the bar opposite, whilst at the back people paid to either sing along to the resident guitarist or if you're one particular old bloke - get on the bar and dance in a dress. Go figure.

A few coctails and beers later and we realised we'd lost Martin. Not to worry though - all we needed to do was look for the noisiest drinking circle and there he was having just won his third downing competition against a local! Eventually it happened though - after seeing-off his last contender he had a Vomit-In-Mouth incident. Fortunately Alexis' reactions were instantaneous as she grabbed the camera from her pocket and caught the look of surprise and disgust on Martin's face, just microseconds before he ran for the bathroom! No language was needed to explain to the Chinese what was wrong with him - one look did it as they let him push past them to the front of the queue and the waiting sink! Then it was our turn for dancing on the bar (now a total free-for-all) and completely clearing a table of its 30 or so glasses in just one game of "What the F**k". It seems we made quite an impression as Jamie and Alexis were identified later that week at a hostel as the glass-smashers from Sakura Inn!

Convinced he hadn't done enough damage already, we lost Martin and a couple of our more foolhardy lads to a pub crawl challenge against the locals. Martin and the keys keys for my room that was, so come home-time, having clomped about the hostel for halg and hour trying numerous ways to break into my room I ended up having to settle for getting screamed at by some scary Swiss girl who rather liked her sleep whilst (well I thought at least) quietly finding a spare bed in Andrew's dorm. "Shut your whinging you psychohosebeast" or similar words probably left my mouth before drifting off.