Do not Trust the Internet and Let Yourself Be Scammed

On my last day in Lijiang, I decided I would go to Jade Dragon Snow Mountain, whose allure was all the stronger for the fact that it was hidden in the clouds during my whole trip. I read on the internet that I could take a bus from the northern part of Lijiang to the mountain, but try as I might, when I arrived in the general area, I could not find it. I asked a lady working at a tourist information booth where the bus station was, at which she pointed in a vague direction and said “that road.” Arriving at the end of the road, I sought the advice of a policeman, who sent me in a new direction altogether, and when I got to the third place, another tourist information worker relayed me farther yet. When I finally got to the square where both the policeman and the second tourist centre worker agreed I should go, I could find no bus, but I in turn was found by a man offering rides up the mountain in one of those light-blue ride-share vans. Quite exhausted and very willing to let myself be taken in by the scam, I made a few perfunctory inquiries about how much it would cost, after which I happily accepted a deal of thirty yuan for a ride, and eagerly waited for the driver and his wife on the other side of the road to catch a couple more tourists so we could set off. 

The wait was not long. We soon made our way to the mountain, with the driver and his wife every now and then offering to stop at one place or another to buy snacks or rent warm clothes. I assume they must have been the shops of relatives or friends and that I should be upset we were being used in this manner, but at the same time I was quite impressed by the broadness of the couple’s network.

About half an hour into our ride up the vast mountain slopes, I started to get rather concerned about how long the whole trip might take. True, my flight back was supposed to be late in the evening, but it was already almost noon and I had not yet seen anything. In any case, after about an hour, we arrived at a parking lot up somewhere on the slope of the mountain. Though it was warm and sunny in Lijiang in the morning, the skies on Jade Dragon Snow Mountain were dark and constantly looming with the imminent threat of rain. It was in the parking lot that I realised I was one of the woefully few people who undertook this journey on their own. Flocks of tourists from various parts of China arrived in tour busses and all knew where they were going, while I was shuttling between buildings trying to make sense of how I would get anywhere. 

At the counter for the cable car to the summit, I found out that all of the tickets were sold out – most likely on the internet to the aforementioned tour groups. However, it was still possible to buy tickets to places called cypress forest and yak meadow. Having seen many cypresses in my day but not too many yaks, I made the obvious decision. The bus wound its way up and down through the mountains, and whenever it looked like we were reaching our destination, another snaking road unfurled on the slope of the next hill. I began to become nervous again, and a little hungry, because it was past twelve o’clock now and I had not bought any snacks for fear of wasting time.

When we arrived at the base of the cable car, the top of the mountain was covered in fog and there were no yaks in sight. I was comforted, though, by abundant signs instructing tourists to stay away from domestic animals – and to stay off the grass for fear of leeches. I was not sure how true that scare tactic was, for it did not ward off any of my fellow travellers, but it sure kept me glued onto the designated pathways.

 A sign in the cable car

The cable car

From the upper terminus of the cable car, a pathway looped around the central hill, stopping by a few scenic spots and Tibetan-style structures. The temple, built into a slight incline, was in a sorry state, with crumbling walls and muddy paths that had likely seen better days. A few bricks were lying outside the gate as if to indicate that it was possible to repair the temple, but there were either no funds for it or no one had bothered to do so. The interior, though, was the most fascinating. Pictures of abbots and priests, along with various religious statues, stood around the temple as everywhere else, but watching over the entire scene was the steady gaze of Chairman Xi on a giant framed poster.

 View of the temple from the upper cable car platform 

 Another view of the temple

 A Tibetan-style cairn

 A Tibetan-style cairn with sutra streamers in the background

 Side-view of the temple

 Tibetan-style stupa

The inner courtyard of the temple

Not much of the nearby landscape was visible because of the fog, but there were yaks enough to satisfy even the most cow-crazed, bovine-besotted tourists. Most were just lying about, but the dung dotting the tourist paths indicated that they were much more active at other times of the day. I bought some delicious spicy tofu at the station, and headed back again, making my obligatory replies to the constant “hellos” from surprised children. Being a minor celebrity is exhausting.

 Two yaks

 A wooden house in the misty distance

 A mountain flower

 An oven for burnt offerings

 A prayer pole with more sutra streamers

Another mountain flower

Fog in the hills

Even on the way back I was still not at ease. The bus, instead of heading straight to the centre it left from, took us instead to the cascades at the halfway point which, although very pretty, were another hurdle on my increasingly desperate escape to the airport. When I finally got to the parking lot, I let myself be caught again by a van owner offering rides back to the city, whom – for an extra ten yuan – I persuaded to drop me off at the airport bus station. From there it was smooth sailing. The bus got to the airport with much time to spare, none of my possessions were confiscated, and there was no rain to betray my shoes on my way to the aeroplane.

 A yak for tourist pictures

 The waterfalls are a very popular destination for wedding photography.

 Another view of the waterfalls

The road back to Lijiang