The weather forecast looking promising, we decided to head for the hills. Rick put the plan to his Chinese friend, Joseph, a keen photographer. After some confusion, we understood Joseph's plan. He had a wedding to go to on Tuesday morning, near Yang Shi Mu, a local mountain. He suggested that we also went to the wedding and then climbed the mountain with him.
He had to stay in the town where the wedding was the night before (I think it was called 'Wanlongshan', but I'm not sure), so we set off on Wednesday morning, having arranged to meet him. All went reasonably well - apart from one of the bags falling off the bike and into the filth just after we set off, and Rick having to reclaim ownership of his sleeping mat from a local who'd picked it up out of the road thinking it might be useful!!!
We met up with Joseph just before lunchtime on the morning of the wedding. As we rode into town it was like being in a cowboy film, or something. You know the one where someone walks into a bar and instantly it's silent and everyone stops what they're doing and looks round? Well, it was a bit like that. Even with our helmets on people spotted us as 'laowais'. On the way through we passed lots of tables set out by the side of the road, with people sitting round them.
We waited on the edge of town and Joseph called in a little while to say he'd arrived, so we went to look for him. Sure enough, Joseph and the wedding we were looking for were at the place we'd seen the people sitting round the tables in the street. We pulled up on the bike. More staring. And when I say staring I mean that EVERY SINGLE PERSON was staring. Hell.
The bride arrived to a barrage of firecrackers and we all ate what turned out to be a good meal. We got away with drinking only a tiny tiny bit of the evil baijiu and a little later were on our way in a mini-van up the mountain.
We got out where the road ended and walked [or in my case struggled] up the path, which was mostly concrete steps. Rick and I had decided to take camping gear and so we were quite heavily laden. That night we slept in a 'hotel' (more of a mountain hut) and ate dinner there.
The next morning we got up reasonably early and tramped around taking photos and carrying our heavy bags everywhere. The weather was beautiful - warm and sunny and the views were pretty reasonable (a bit hazy as usual, but not too bad).
In the early afternoon Joseph set off to climb down the mountain and we went off to find a good place to camp. We camped that night in a beautiful, quiet spot, with amazing views. It wasn't cold and it was almost as light as day in the moonlight.
The next day we had a quick look at another area where you can stay. Unlike a lot of the mountain, this place was clean and tidy, with no litter to be seen. [I spent much of the trip up and down the mountain feeling saddened by what people do to beautiful places in China, dropping litter everywhere].
We walked down the mountain and then out along the road, back to the town where we'd been for the wedding. The road itself was about 16kms and most of it was downhill. Our legs got more and more like jelly as we went on and it was difficult to resist the numerous offers of lifts we got from the motorbike taxis and even an ambulance at one point! No-one could really understand why we wanted to walk and we had to be quite firm in our refusals.
At one point a white four-by-four and a black government-type car passed us on their way up and stopped. We didn't think much of it as people often stop near us, if only to have a better look! However, it turned out to be Joseph and some of his photography friends who come along to take photos of a tree which had come into blossom. I think it was a kind of magnolia tree and it smelled really nice.
We made it back to the motorbike and had to refuse more offers of food and accommodation etc. from the people who'd kindly been looking after it.
On the journey back to Pingxiang we saw that the plume of smoke we'd seen as we were coming down the mountain was actually the product of a fairly long strip of forest fire that was being fanned by the strong wind that was blowing. I was horrified by the noise and the sight of the huge flames and also by the apparent lack of action to put the fire out. A few people seemed to be watching and we saw one police car, but little else. Some of the houses back directly onto the forest area.
Eventually we arrived home safely - tired and a little stiff. However, we decided to return this yesterday morning to look at what had happened because of the fire etc. As we got close we could see big areas of the hillside blackened by the fire, but some trees poking out from the blackness, clearly still alive. The fire also seemed to have stopped before it got to the houses and in one case had actually gone round a house and carried on.
We went up one track into the blackened area to have a closer look and to take some photos. On the way up we saw some police officers coming down - two on foot and three on a motorbike. On the way back down we also passed a couple of police officers. A bit later on and further down the road we met a police mini-van coming the other way. They flagged us down and asked for ID. Rick had his driving licence (as always) but I didn't have any ID. Now, as far as I'm aware, you're always supposed to carry ID in China. However, as ours is our passports plus Foreign Expert Certificates, we don't generally bother when we in and around Pingxiang. It's always seemed to be an unnecessary hassle and likely to lead to completely wrecked passports!
Might have to have re-think on that one, though...
We ended up having to go to the police station, fill in some forms (I managed to write my Chinese name on the form, after a fashion!), drink some tea and explain our whereabouts over the last few days. Rick spoke to our contact in the English Department and he also spoke to the police. We found out that they were investigating the forest fires and unfortunately we were in the wrong place at the wrong time, and without ID.
In the end they seemed satisfied with the information we'd given them, and invited us to have lunch with them! Soooooooo typical for China. Get taken to the police station and questioned, then invited for lunch.
As a postscript, under any other circumstances I'd have been pleased with how much Chinese we managed to understand and to reply to. Sadly, I wasn't really in the mood for feeling very pleased with myself...
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