Leshan - 10.21

(This entry is written 3 weeks later according to original key-word jogs)

Our day of repose over, it was back to rush rush rush today as soon as we peeled open our eyes. Walking out of the back of our hotel we just caught bus number 8 heading to the New South Gate bus station of Chengdu. We had a day of sightseeing planned in the city of Leshan. The early rise was not without its rewards. After getting off at the guestimated stop, we oriented ourselves on the map and walked a few block to the bus station. As luck would have it, a main road was under construction so we were rerouted to a small alleyway where we chanced upon a young woman selling a few breakfast items out of a converted home/store front. I was like "Yippy! You Tiao!". She also had sweet and savory sticky rice squares and of course, fresh soy milk. I was a happy camper. Further along other vendors were selling noodle bowls and wonton soup; their happy camper customers sitting on makeshift roadside tables and benches. It was cool.

There was a slight question as to whether we would go to Leshan first, or Du Jiang Yan first. The latter was this supposedly amazing river control system designed and built in the wee days of primitive human technology. Well New South Gate didn't have busses to Du Jiang Yan, so we got on the 8:30 bus to Leshan. First, there was misty empty highway. Then there was a big blank. Then I woke up and we arrived at Leshan city bus station. All transportation should be that restful.

As soon as we exited the coach bus, some woman on the street were yelling out "Leshan Da Fuo" (buddha) to all the coach passengers, pointing at a bus stopped on the road. My natural chinese tour defense kicked in and we ignored her. But after walking around the bus station to find out that the Leshan Buddha dock has moved, we found out from bus station people that indeed we were supposed to take that woman's bus, number 13. That's the problem with such a uncontrolled hodgepodge of travel operators; the tourists are unable to distinguish the real from the ripoffs.

If the bus driver was no help in letting us know where to get off, the bus stop signs were even more useless. Before I saw even one sign, we already passed apparently 5 stops. So we got off, and it was like this central plaza place with a lot of street vendors (not for food) and little holey restaurants (very holey). So we felt it was fairly certain this was not the docks.

We walked towards the river and reached a river-side promenade, with little gazebos and citizens doing various activities like jogging. A bit of way down along river we discovered a shabby ferry apparently used by only local people, carrying baskets of vegies and stuff. Not a hundred meters into the river was a long shallow sand bar, one tip of which comes fairly close to the big buddha obscured by the drabby misty weather. So we hopped over, for a mere 1Y per person. I secretly chuckled at all the tourists that were being shipped by the boatloads to in front of the buddha, for probably 30, 40 times our cost.

	Street serenade: Mendelssohn
	Cruising with the locals

On the little islet, we walked through sand dunes, past a "road side" um.... diner? Some place that made food and had a mill and two furry puppies running around. Then a big field of smooth river rocks. I had to quickly take a picture of syl so she can do some "urgent business". Alone by myself I squatted at the tip of the islet snapping shots at these fishermen and the giant ass buddha carved out of the mountainside - the object of our trip. Biggest stone statue in the world, you know.


Anyway next thing I knew the fishermen rowed away in their boat and all the other people around me disappeared, and then sinyee was yelling something at me. I stood up and saw that I was now on a mini islet, separated from the little islet by the tides of the rising river. Shit. So off came the shoes and socks and on the slippery rocks I went. When I got to sinyee, we saw where she stood was cut off too. The water was coming up fast. Thankfully I had on my convertible pants, so we could dry ourselves on the zipoff pantlegs.

Buddha views flooded sandbar

Rocks hurt

Back on main land, we went in search of bus 13 again to take us to the actual big buddha scenic area. Of course, no walk through a chinese city would be complete without a little food detour. We saw a pastry store displaying a beautious offering of Husband cakes and Wife cakes, and egg tarts. And of course we had to get one of each. Syl hoarded all the egg tarts so I didn't get to try any. The husband cake was a flake pastry with a black sesame filling, but somehow with a slight savory taste. Interesting, I liked it, syl didn't. The wife cake was nothing like the cantonese style ones. This was the size of Shanghainese mooncakes, flakey, and with a white sesame filling. Very yummy! We both regretted not going back for more. Later, we saw another pastry shop of the same chain just blocks away but we were already on the bus.

This time number 13 took us straight to the entrance of the big buddha scenic area. Inside, we tailed tour groups for some barely interesting stories about the weathered buddha figures on the sandstone walls, the cool lichen-covered dragon pond, and deep orange grottos inhabited by big belly buddhas. When we ascended the mountain top, the massive head of the Leshan Buddha came into view, foregrounded by a square jam packed with people. Quickly we ducked into the adjacent Ling Yun Si with the hope that this line down to the Buddha base will diminish later.

Behind the buddha status there was actually a whole mountain top of structures, including several temples, pavilions dedicated to past poets, cave of dead monks, gardens and waterfalls and carp ponds. I couldn't help but wonder how much of it was built recently to "enhance" the marketability of this scenic area. When everything had a once over and we got back to the lineup, it had, of course, gotten longer.

Dragon Well	Cool dude

What followed was in my conscious memory the worst time we spent in china. One and half hours of those doubled-up lines, shuffling feet and trying to stretch our necks as far away from the smokers around us as possible. And past every turn, there were nothing to look forward to except the same old ugly faces, the same spitting smoking baboons just circling the lines and coming back again and again. Damn the efficiency expert that invented this coiling line thing!

	This is why the people were unruly: the sign is wrong!

Finally we get to the edge of the square and start down the stairs. Here order has given way to mass pushing and shoving. Which I was glad because I got to shoulder all the damn smokers and pretend it wasn't me. The stairs narrowed and gotten steeper as we turned to face the buddha. There weren't many good vantage points to capture a real good shot at the buddha, or get one of us into the same frame as that giant, especially being rushed by the mobs. Despite all the suffering we endured to come down here, it was nice to see this incredible statue in all its glory, to even touch his toes. Not that we would do that line again. Hell no.


From the vantage of the buddha, we could see how fast the rivers were. This big guy sat at the cross point of three major rivers, supposedly using his divine powers to sooth the raging waters and protect the area of Leshan. We returned back up the mountain from his left side, following the same red rock path. Back outside, we talked to this lady at the bus stop who has been waiting for #13 for more than 20 minutes. She was also trying to catch the last coach to Chengdu, so we all hopped on the next bus that showed up thinking it will take us at least back into the Leshan city. Our plan was to get off as soon as that bus turn off the path that we came on (yes I remember the path). Well it worked except bus stops in china are hella freakishly long so we had to walk like 10 minutes to get back to where we want and caught the bus #1 to the city bus station.

Of course, we could've just hailed a taxi and probably paid like 3 bucks to get there as well. But then there'd be no story would there?

In the copious free time we had before boarding our coach, we sampled the snacks sold at the bus station. A roll of Dragon Eye pastry, flaky rounds stuffed with black sesame filling, not the same as the Husband cake earlier but good. I bought a package of Sichuan preserved radish (made right there in Er Mei) to try, and man was it good! Crunchy, savory, and so spicy it makes your nose run. So I bought 3 more packs and also a pack of Zha Cai (preserved vegetable).

In Chengdu we checked out the Travel Hotel, a hostel honorably mentioned in syl's book. It was right beside the New South Gate bus station, and looked more like a standard hotel. We decided against moving out of Holly's hostel just for convenience sake. Also because we wanted to book a panda trip with them for tomorrow morning. After Holly's we hurried over to the Chengdu CYTS office to get my Three Gorges tour and flight out of Wuhan taken care of.

For dinner, since this was the last night we would stay at Holly's, we wanted to check out all the places around there. Went to a retaurant specializing in Bao Zi (buns), just ordered a steamer of 6 pork buns. Good, but they were not freshly steamed and I imagine they were much better before. Then we hopped over to a hopping hotpot restaurant where (finally) we met a nice waitress. She made us some excellent suggestions on the kind of pot we should take (a reverse "phoenix" white/red pot) and the kind of raw food we would want to order. Took her suggestion, duck intestine, We got a plate of beef, lamb, some strange bamboo, enoki mushrooms, some vegie, and tofu skin. And a plate of duck intestines. Yes, because it was what all the Chengdu people eat, and it came highly recommended by the waitress. And two local beers to help cut down the spiciness we know that was coming.

Oh how was the duck intestine? Patience hopper. So yah, beef was good, lamb was tender and fatty, enoki mushroom was, well, enoki mushroom, what more do I need to say. The red spicy broth was laden with spices and herbs, but man was it ever delicious. We pretty much stuck with the red broth, only taking the mushroom and vegies out of the white liquid. Even though I had to take a 10 minute break because it was just killing my mouth, I couldn't stop dipping in the spicy soup. At one point, we were so spiced out, we had to cook the food, then line them up on the plate to cool and therefore reduce the heat, and then heat from the queue. The beer helped, it was light and relatively cold, but the carbonation added some irritation to the spiced out mouth.

Alright, duck intestine. Sounds absolutely gross right? Well beyond mine and certainly syl's expectation, the duck intestine was by far the most delicious item. It didn't have much of a particularly taste to it at all, merely smooth and chewy like squid but softer and it just went so perfectly with the hot spicy broth. Add to that the special-ness of it all. I mean, when will we have duck intestine again?!


When that gourmet experienced finished the clock was nearing 11. Way way past our normal bedtime. But, we were both running out of clean clothes to wear and in JZG we would have even less time to do laundry. So, half standing half snoozing, I washed a pile of my dirty clothes using detergent borrowed from the hostel. Then we strung our floss-line cloth line up in our room with a makeshift (prop) to hang or undies and soxies. It was all very proper and all....


bus 8 2. breakfast 5. Leshan bus 37. bus 13 1. Ferry 1x2. pastry 3 each. bus 13 1. Leshan buddha 70. bus 1Y. bus 1 1Y. Preserved radish 0.5Y per pack. Dragon eye 3. Panda 70. Holly hotel night 3 70Y. bao 5 for 6. hotpot 80.