Tiger Leaping Gorge
February 27th, 2006A little disappointed by the clouds, but excited all the same, me and Gilad, my new Isreali travel partner took to the trail, our stomachs full of Margo’s beef and mustard sandwiches. Margo is an Australian woman who runs a small restaurant and guesthouse in Qiaotou, the village of 4,000 where the hike begins. She is married to Sean, who began one of the first guest houses in Walnut Garden 20 years ago and has worked to preserve the gorge scenery and cultural architecture built in the Naxi tradition. Between them, they have sandwiched the gorge with two nice places, and I’m glad that she flagged us down because other guest houses near Walnut Garden favor more development of the gorge and have built gaudy three story dorm blocks to service the droves of Chinese tourists and backpackers that flock here in the summer months. We are lucky to be here now, when the only other people on the trail are old Naxi women collecting fire kindling and the occasional goat herder. In the summer it seems that over 100 hikers can turn up in Walnut Garden making beds a premium. But here we sit in Old Horse guest house in this mild mountain paradise tempered by latitude, at the doorstep of spring, alone.
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