Songpan to Chengdu
Songpan lies at the very edge of the Tibetan world in northern Sichuan. Tibetans are a minority here. The town is set in a valley, and is something of a tourist draw. The surrounding scenery provides the bulk of the attraction – horse treks, national parks, etc., but the town itself seems a pretty good place to relax.
While “modern” China is busily decimating its history, Songpan has left its city walls intact and, like Krakow, has built a park around them. The north and south gates are towering and ornate.
Inside the old town, Songpan is largely car-free, an astonishingly insightful bit of civil decision-making. The main street is filled with shops offering clothing, eletronics and Tibetan souvenirs. Off the main street things get more real. You see hidden courtyard teahouses and stores selling piles of yak’s feet. The teahouses are a great antidote to the town’s atmospherically-challenged restaurants. Some of them sell only seeds, but others will serve you a bowl of noodles, alongside jasmine tea (made with real jasmine flowers in the glass), conversation and mah jongg. I spent a cloudless afternoon exploring these.
With the brilliant gates at the ends of the old town, the charming wooden houses that hug either the river or the surrounding hills, and the tangle of colourful sidestreets, Songpan is a visual delight. At night, lanterns light the streets, heightening the effect. There is no doubt that tourists have discovered the town, and yet it doesn’t feel touristy or tacky. Perhaps this is because most visitors spend much of their time in the surrounding countryside, but whatever the reason, Songpan is a great place to spend a few days.
Leaving Songpan for Chengdu is a heck of a ride. Not always in a good way, but you get a bit of everything.
Those of you who’ve studied human physiology will be well aware of the phenomenon whereby a person who needs to wake up early the next day gets a huge rush of energy right at the time when they ought to be getting to bed. So at 10pm with a 6am departure, I found myself going out with a couple of Israelis for a second dinner and some beers.
After little sleep – poor sleep at that – I awoke and headed for the bus station. A disappointing trend on this trip is the tendency for yours truly to be stuck in the smallest seat, despite being the biggest passenger. I get no mercy either. Well, on this day I was staring down a nine-hour ride and decided to take a better seat. Once all and sundry had boarded, a general kerfuffle erupted over seating out of place. This was the first time anybody has actually cared about this. However, the issue at hand appeared to be that someone without a reserved seat had taken one, leaving someone with a reserved seat to stand. So for twenty minutes, much screaming and musical chairs took place all around me. This is why I’ve perfect the art of the blank stare. I figure that in this type of situation I can only win if I don’t get involved.
The first half of the 335km journey was great. The road was new and although I was a little concerned about the recklessness, I appreciated the driver’s desire to make good time. Then we stopped for a break. Not a quick leak and get back on the bus break, either. This was a bowl of noodles, couple cups of tea, good chin-wag, smoke and a whizz sort of break. It took almost an hour to get going again, proving once and for all my theory that the Chinese really suck at long distance travel. I did the whole nine hours on an apple, 250ml of water and one pit stop.
The scenery during the first half was outstanding. We followed a surging river through a series of gorges. Villages of stone and timber punctuated the vistas of mist-enshrouded mountains. As we descended, the foliage changed, culminating in lush subtropical forest – my first of this type. It was outstanding. This is panda country, too. The chances of seeing one anywhere near the road are basically nil, mind you. Didn’t stop me from trying, though.
The second half was distinctly bleaker. In part this was because ‘half’ refers merely to mileage and not to time. The traffic increased and the road worsened. The villages grew uglier and more numerous, leading to traffic jams. Then the road turned to dirt. At one point, we spent an hour going 15 kilometres. That kicked ass.
I had time to reflect on the state of public facilities around the world. It strikes me that the nastiest places to conduct business are invariable the ones that charge you for the privelege. You could, for example, use the spotless squatter at the KFC for free, or you could pay for the pleasure of a squalid roadside hole/trough combo with no running water, soap, TP or privacy. And in China, the driver will always bypass the clean-looking biffy in town for the filth-encrusted disgrace further on.
Approaching the town of Dujiangyan, the river widens and the mountains start to shrink. Then it all disappears altogether, hidden by imprentrable haze. The haze continues all the way to Chengdu.
This last bit is an expressway. The conductor passed around the hat for the toll booth. The blank stare is imperative to avoid ridiculous squeezes like this. I mean, they weren’t serious, right?
Chengdu is, at 11.5 million people, the third-largest city in China and a certified megalopolis. Thus, we became ensnarled in traffic trying to get into town.
Sometimes, you get off the bus or train, walk to your accomoation of choice, and it’s as smooth as silk. Other times, it is as smooth as a hand-me-down Soviet-era minibus on a Kyrgyz country road. I grabbed my bag from the back of the bus. Someone else’s bag had leaked God-knows-what all over the place, my bag included. Naturally, some of this gak ended up on my pants.
Then I was flanked by a squadron of taxi sharks. They all had meters, but wanted to turn them off in favour of a negotiated fixed price. I can’t believe they’d try this scam – but I guess there’s some moronic white people who fall for it so they do. It is not a result of altruism that they wish to negotiate a price rather than work off the meter. Even if you truly believe deep down in your heart that taxi drivers are capable of altruism – something I’ve never seen evidence of – surely you wouldn’t believe that all twelve taxi drivers AT THE BUS STATION are such tremendously giving people as to all be eager to give you a special, off-meter deal. And Vinne Rizzo down at the pool hall will lend you $5000 because he genuinely cares about your mortgage arrears and can’t bear the thought of you living under a bridge.
I found out that bus no. 75 would get me to my desired location for less than one yuan. It took in the bulk of Chengdu before it got there and the seat was murder, but it ended okay.
Tags: China, Songpan, Travel
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