How cool is it that I get to live somewhere that Chinese people go on vacation to? I mean, its awesome. I am so so lucky.
Anyway. Huangguoshu made it to the top of my list of places to go while living in Guiyang. And finally, two weekends ago (I know, I'm a little behind...) it finally came to be and we went, saw, and conquered that waterfall. What an experience it was too. Every time I think I can't possibly see a place more beautiful, I see a place more beautiful than anything I've ever seen before. The green trees, the blue waters, clear and sunny skies. Beyond words.
But I'm getting a little ahead of myself. Let's start from the beginning.
Trains. I've already said how much I love trains and this was no different. Granted, the train ride is all of 1 hour so it wasn't too terribly exciting (just wait til I get to the train ride home!). But we arrived in Anshun kind of late and then had to make it to our hotel via taxi. I don't think any of us were prepared to hear that our hotel was an hour drive away and no one would take us there until the morning. How much does that stink!? So, with little options, tired feet, and annoyed minds we trudged across the train station parking lot to a hotel. We figured we would have to pay quite a bit but we were out of options. What we didn't know was that we were also paying the board for some unexpected roommates. Cockroaches. Tons and tons of cockroaches.
Now Zazu may have had a lovely bunch of coconuts, but we had a lovely bunch of cockroaches. There were big ones, small ones, and some as big as your head. Okay, maybe they weren't that big. BUT one did climb on my head.... I was already having a hard time sleeping regardless of our many legged friends because I was sick and we were sleeping on a wooden board, and Amber and I were sharing a teeny tiny bed. None of us wanted to change our clothes or take off our shoes because everything felt so dirty. So when I felt a little patter across my head at 3:30 in the morning, I sat up and just starting whimpering because I couldn't quite cry and I wanted to laugh. So at 3:30 I started my day. The others obviously woke up too, Amber couldn't quite sleep with a roach in our bed and Jake couldn't sleep because we needed him to kill the little bugger. So we watched Stuart Little (1 and 2...in Chinese), discovered Jake lost his wallet, found Jake's wallet, watched the sunrise, and tried my best to get comfortable without having skin contact with anything by my clothes.
The next great adventure came in the morning and trying to find the right bus to get to Huangguoshu, which actually wasn't too difficult at all. What was difficult was finding the entrance once we got there and bought our tickets.We discovered that we would each have to pay 50 RMB for a bus ride to the entrance which was only about 4 km away. So we said a big fat "yeah right" and walked. And of course we got so many extra lovely photo ops because of the walk. But let's try to remember really quick that 1) I am sick and 2) I had about 3 hours of restlessly broken up sleep. So yeah, I was kinda miserable and dragging my feet. But I knew that the end result would be worth it.
There were a couple different areas of waterfalls as well as gardens, ponds, bonsai trees, and karst rocks to check out as well so I pretty much had my camera ready at every single second. But obviously we were most excited to get to the main waterfall, Huangguoshu, and the Rhinocerus Pool (where the waterfall lands). We also discovered that you could walk in the caves behind the waterfall which was super cool and wet. But I am happy to announce that I did not once fall or slip or trip and nearly die. What a feat for me.
The waterfall was simply breath taking. So beautiful and powerful yet serene at the same time. It amazes me how much force is behind the water as it cracks into the surface of the pool below it. It actually kind of reminded me of the glaciers in Alaska. In a way, you can picture those frozen chunks of ice suddenly breaking free of their slumber and cascading down the mountain sides as waterfalls. You can equally picture the power of a waterfall coming to a defeaning halt as it freezes into a block of motionless force. Or maybe I'm just crazy and you really can't picture those things. Either way, it was awesome and life changing and awesome. I feel like I've used the word awesome too many times.
Because of the roach ordeal from our first night, we decided to head home on Saturday instead of staying until Sunday like originally planned. I wasn't as bummed because I really needed a good night sleep and I was pretty worn out from the whole day. My suggestion to any and everyone, try to stay healthy. Because when you are in China, being sick is a major downer.
And I almost forgot to mention the train ride home. How silly of me. So we went and bought train tickets and were really confused because we weren't given a seat number. We later discovered that meant we were supposed to stand, which shouldn't have been that big of a deal. I mean we stand on long bus rides all the time and those are far less stable and smooth than the train. But on the train people come by with little trolley carts. ALL. THE. TIME. I swear, we were on for only about 1 hour and we were passed by carts at least a dozen times. And when they only place for you to be is standing in the aisles, it can get annoying, fast. But for the last 20 minutes or so, someone gave up their seat and I sat down next to a little boy with a toy gun. So we started playing a little game. He would yell "pia pia!" and kill me. So I'd slump over dead. But when I woke up again, he would kill me again. And so on and so on until I didn't die anymore. So he would start banging on his gun trying to fix it. Once he hit it five times I would die again. It was all great fun until he accidently pistol whipped me in the face, which really wasn't that bad either. The kid was adorable. I fell in love.
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