Shaxi is a series of villages north of Dali, en route to Lijiang, and Mandy decided we needed to get there next. It all sounded a bit hard to me, involving stopping local buses on undefined parts of the road, minibuses and, no doubt, mountainous roads! Mandy, however, was insistent and with the ricewine and Tibetan Jim's help we hired a driver (in fact two, I think the drivers mate came along to keep him company, cos he wasn't going to get much intelligent conversation in Chinese from us, and boy did they talk) to take us the four hours into the Shaxi Valley.
The driver was careful ( our one concern at all times!), the scenery picturesque, and on arrival the drivers summons the girls from the hotel to take our bags.....all very civilised and easy. Sometimes, as we have said, it pays to spend a little more on modes of travel.
We are not allowed (I don't think) to promote products, but the people from Osprey would have been delighted with the way our girls managed our wheeled rucksacks through the cobbled streets of Shaxi!!!!
The village that is loosely called Shaxi was a major trading stop on the ancient tea and horse caravan route and the southern silk road ( thats about the extent of my historical knowledge!!) and boasts a preserved square from that time and was a glorious step back in time, narrow cobbled streets and ancient dwellings. Our hotel was a cultural centre in a restored Bai courtyard home, and our room was wooden and delightful and our single beds took up one side of the room facing each other, so we could sit up in bed and have a chat face to face.
We learned, soon in our travels, that it was better to book twin rooms with single beds as they tend to be larger rooms......Mandy was very dubious at first about my motives.
Having settled in, we looked for somewhere to have lunch. There was a lot of activity in the square as a movie was being made.....was interesting watching the process but the subject matter looked a little tedious, seemed to be mostly children pushing ancient hoops around. Off the square was a Cafe sign so we entered the building and wandered around until we came to a room that was obviously a restaurant and a well set up one at that. Eventually after a lot of throat clearing a young girl appeared, and, after a charade or two realised we wanted to eat, and brought the menus.
It was unbelievable.....the menu read like a Michelin Star offering. Flabbergasted we settled ourselves with a beer and wondered how on earth they were going to recreate the menu....things like parmesan cheese on salads, mashed potato with pork and olive oil dressing, mozzerella, roasted honied walnut salad, sundried tomatoes and amazing soups.
There was no-one in the kitchen, no sign of activity, but we ordered none the less, some soup and the walnut salad...we had already decided to come back for dinner. As sooon as we ordered people appeared, the manager materialised from no-where and sent the girl off to do the necessary shopping for our lunch, the kitchen came to life ( one person, but that was enough) and with very little fuss our meal was presented. It was delicious.
We had that lunch and two evening meals there and the food was sensational. It was bizzare, because none of the few staff new much about the food and we imagined neither did the cook, but he/she had been taught wonderfully well by someone. Of course curious Mandy wanted to know all the details, but we could get very little information from anyone. They had a great bar upstairs....always empty, but Mandy managed to teach the young girl what Gin was (the bar was fully stocked) and how to make a gin and tonic...all very weird, but certainly suited our needs.
The villages within the valley are quite close together and we had one of the best mornings of our trip walking from one village to another, wending our way through narrow lanes and rice paddies and wheat plots, being geeted warmly by all the locals, disrupting a classroom of screaming children, confronting a stubborn donkey who would not let us pass, being shown a hidden temple by an ancient gardener, and walking with an elderly gentleman who had been in the army and had a little English and would every now and then spout a nursery rhyme...Jack & Jill: Baa Baa Black Sheep and a few more.
The walk only took a few hours but it was magical and memorable.....moments like those are so special and make travelling so very inspiring.
We were also lucky enough to experience the weekly market the morning we left. The whole town is transformed into a seething mass of stall holders and the valley buyers...one of the best yet!
Thank goodness Mandy was so insistent on visiting this wonderful valley.....thanks darlin!
Mandy can not believe I have just summed up one of the most amazing markets in one sentence....just too hard to describe...
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