Last Day

Couldn’t have asked for a better last day in China.  We got up at 5:30am this morning so we could leave at 6am for a white-water river rafting trip.  It was awesome.  Three hours away by bus, but I slept most of the way, so no sweat.  The river was awesome, so much fun, we were on the water for almost two hours.  Great stuff.  Two-person boats, so it was just me and Lulu, and we had a blast.  Turns out as we found out quite painfully (for Lulu), I needed to be in front when we went over any kind of falls… the one time we went over with me in the back and her in the front, the boat nearly flipped due to the weight differential, and I fell out, smacking Lulu in the mouth in the process (whether with my foot or the paddle, we are not sure).  We recovered nicely though, and had a grand time.

The trip back was quite interesting… almost everyone else dozed off, but I was awake, and got to see all the crazy-ass things the bus driver was doing.  First of all, the first 45 minutes back was on this crazy little one-lane dirt road (and when I say dirt road, I don’t mean USA dirt road, I mean narrow, bumpy, pot-hole filled crazy ass country road).  One way road, right?  TWO WAY TRAFFIC.  Not busy two way traffic, but two way traffic nonetheless.  That shit was wacked, yo.  Our bus driver did not back down.  It was a minor miracle that no one went off the road.  As it was, on the way there, the bus driver got in an argument with a guy on a motorcycle cuz the motorcycle guy claimed the bus hit him, and the bus driver claimed he just fell over.  Very interesting stuff.  Anyway… the rest of the drive back was still eventful, once we hit pavement, because the road was a divided highway… which doesn’t mean much to the crazier drivers because they pass everyone on the left constantly.  Yep, Mr. Bus Driver was one of those crazy drivers, and I swear, we spent almost as much time driving on the wrong side of the road passing people as we did on our side of the road.  Did I mention that on the way there we almost beheaded some cows?  Yep, that’s right, on one of the small-ass roads, there was a truck of cows going slowly along, and of course we had to pass them.  And there heads were sticking out of the side of the truck.  That was damn ass close.  I actually managed to get a picture of the truck of cows (a novelty in and of itself), so look for pics sometime in the next day or so once I’m home safe and sound.

It was a great trip… then back in the city, one last hair wash/head masssag/shoulder and arm massage, which was really nice after all the paddling and poling on the river.  Then dinner, some ping-poing, goodbyes… packing… more goodbyes… more packing… and now it’s 2:45am, and I’m done packing.  Whoo-ahh.  Getting up at 5am to shower and leave by 6am… then 36 hours of travel.  It’s going to be phenomenal.

I will keep posting to the blog for the next several days at least, detailing travel, and then with lots and lots of pics, so keep checking in, there’s more to come.

Peace out people, time to catch a couple of zzz’s before the craziness begins.