Day 11- Oxygen

Day 11- Oxygen

We had another early morning wake up call. We got on our bus and were taken to a big shop where we were told to purchase oxygen, water, and snacks for our trip to the first nationally protected park in China. I was a bit skeptical, but we bought the stupid pump of oxygen which we didn’t use at all. It was raining quite heavily, but luckily the bus driver let us get our rain gear out from under the bus.

We had to walk through several buildings selling hiking gear (I felt like I was going to be hiking Everest) until we reached a set of buses that took us to the first “hiking” spot. In my mind, I had built this up the hardest hike of my entire life, but then we got there and the “hike” was a flat sidewalk around a lake! It cracked me up. We had a nice walk in a beautiful forested area, though, and Joyce put up with me telling her about my sixth grade level forest science education. At the end of the lake, we were transported to a scenic spot to take pictures. I was amazed to see so many different types of trees! It was beautiful. The bus took us to another site where we were able to walk for a bit before going back to meet the tour group. I was disappointed that we weren’t able to walk anymore, though.

I was really sad to leave Shangrila after spending less than 24 hours there. It’s a beautiful place full of gracious people. I hope I’ll be able to visit there again in the future.

We spent a long time on the bus back to Liquiang. I was able to finish one of the books that I had brought with me. Joyce and I ditched the normal dinner for going back to eat at the “Little Venice” of China instead and did some more shopping.