Jinghong, Yunnan:
house at the Mekong River
An overnight bus took us from Kunming to Jinghong, the capital of Xishuangbanna (for a map see here). This autonomous prefecture is far in the southwest of China and borders against Myanmar and Laos. Jinghong with a population of around 500,000 is a relaxed backpacker paradise with many nice restaurants and cheap hostels. It serves as a great base to explore the surrounding lush countryside. The town itself has a few small temples and several parks which make for a nice stroll, but the best is to leave the city centre and get a glimpse of the local life. The colourful markets with their hustle and bustle of friendly as well as hospitable people are definitely worth your time. We even got invited by a dentist to observe him treat a patient in the middle of the market! Later, a ferry took us across the mighty Mekong River to visit the vast tea plantations in the area.
After relaxing in Jinghong for two days, we already hopped on a bus again to nearby Sanchahe Nature Reserve. We wanted to get away from civilization and experience the quiet as well as solitude of nature… well, at least that was the plan! But you have to read the next post to learn what we experienced in this nature reserve!
Matt Travels 
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nice post, and it seemed that you took the right choices by getting out of the cities and more inland…and then…according to one of your last sententies…I remember (back in 2004) that I was really excited about going to a bird reservaat. I thought I would finally see some free flying colourfull birds in that country. when I arrived there were loads of different trees and the birds? they were all caged, and hanging in the trees.
China is a good trip to open your eyes and make you feel very strongly that the culture is opposite the Noordelingen. and that the love we have for animals is altmost opposite
a lot of words, oeps
hope you are good
kind regards
🙂
ohw…those sleeping busses
haha – thanks for your comment!! 🙂 where did you go to exactly?
🙂 I was coming from Luzhou going direction Chengdu (nice), and if I am not mistaken it was somewhere in the middle in area;….chongqing… I traveled around for one month. Again have to say that when you get out of a big city the places are interesting. Finally I ended up being in Hohhot. Mongolia is heaven after China for I got the blue skies, horses…green fields, wild flowers and those people…they are the best! 😀 love to go back there again
yes, Mongolia is also a dream destination for me!! It must be really nice… well well – there is so much to see out there!! 🙂 Let’s just go!!! 🙂
The picture is very much similar to my place Kerala :-O
thanks for your comment! I’ve been to Kerala in 2011 – maybe I will post about it some day!! 😉
You travels in China looks absolutely amazing. Great photos! Such an amazing architecture and I love seeing all the photos for everyday life in China!
thanks a lot!! 🙂 I was in China three times so far… consequently, there are still a lot of posts coming in the future!! 😉 you may stay tuned… 😛
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Seems like we have traveled to many of the same places. My three-part Yunnan blog will start on Friday about when I visited there in 1987.
Changed my mind after seeing your post and published mine today.
haha – very good! I will check it out just now!! 🙂