It's hard being an expat wife. You don't have your own car to drive and most of us have someone to clean our homes and do our laundry and ironing. Day to day stuff gets old after awhile. You can only have so many foot massages and lunches during the week. You can only play cards and mahjong so much in a given week. You can only shop the same bargain areas, silk street, lamp street, computer street, fish and pet street and art markets in the Du so many times. You get tired of foraging for international food bargains and safe fruits and vegetables and coming up with new menu ideas for the hubby.
While we do enjoy our weekends together with our husbands doing barbeques, having game nights, royal wedding watch parties, special sporting events and other fun activities, we did get a little antsy this spring for something new to do. What started out as conversations one Saturday night about possible day trips we could take, turned into a full fledged excursion three days later. On Tuesday we met for lunch to plan our overnight trip and the next thing I knew we were on the road!
On Wednesday morning, armed with two vehicles and two drivers, and after first making a stop at Starbucks, me and five of my friends set out on an overnight trip to see the Leshan Giant Buddha and Emei Mountain a few of hours outside of Chengdu. These sites are listed as UNESCO World Heritage Sites. We were armed with food and drinks enough to feed an army. It was a beautiful day and by mid-day we had arrived in Leshan and took a lunch break before heading out see the Giant Buddha. We were quite a site to see when we began unloading our containers for lunch. What more could you expect from 6 southern , middle aged women (1 W. Virginia, 1 Georgia, 1 Alabama, 2 Louisiana and 1 Texas)!
Pit stop at a rest area/tea house - beautiful!
The Girls - Kim, Sandy, Michele, Babs, Renee, Denise
After lunch we boarded a boat that took us out onto the river to get a full scale viewing of the Leshan Giant Buddha. It was a bright and sunny day and we couldn't have asked for better weather. We don't often see this kind of sunshine in Chengdu to we were soaking it up.At left is the Leshan Giant Buddha. Construction was started in 713 and completed in 803. It stands 233 feet tall. Below left is the sleeping buddha and right some of the shoreline across from the big buddha. Three rivers join near this junction.
After seeing the big buddha we loaded up and headed toward Emei Mountain where we would spend the night before starting our ascent the next morning. Babs had made arrangement with a boutique hotel, The Teddy Bear Hotel, the day before where we would stay the night. Upon arrival we discovered our reservation had been bumped by someone overnight online so we relocated to another hotel. It actually turned out to be a better hotel and we were able to enjoy the hot spring facility the hotel had to offer. Boy, were we a sight entering the lobby of that hotel with two full luggage carts for a one-night stay!
After getting checked in and getting another little snack, we headed to the spa, armed with our swimsuits and bottles of wine to soak it up in the hot springs.
Off to the hot springs! A little wine and a hot springs pool go a long way for relaxation. Some of us even took advantage of the fish reflexology.
Sorry no swimsuit shots!
We capped the evening off playing canasta and finishing off the wine on the patio of the hotel. It was so nice; we had the whole patio to ourselves!
Bright and early Thursday morning after breakfast, we were again on the road. It was quite a drive up the mountain, countless hairpin turns. There was some breathtaking scenery along the way. It was a LONG , TWISTY couple of hours until we were finally at the start of our climb to the top. And climb it was! I'm no hiker and I couldn't believe the climb we had just to reach the point where we could ride the cable car to the top. I thought I was dying and I think I actually scared one of the drivers with us. Along the way we got our first glimpses of the amazing place we were about to experience. Needless to say I did get to the cable car (with a little help along the way) and was very grateful for cable car ride to the top!
One of our drivers, Alex, getting our tickets
The only way to get to the cable car junction!
Once we got to the top, there was MORE climbing but we were beginning to see this beautiful place and all it had to show us. There were shrines and temples, shops, hotels, restaurants. A little village up in the mountains. You can even come up here to spend the night so you can see amazing sunrises and sunsets. We were above the clouds and the views of the surrounding mountains were magnificent. Again it was a beautiful day. You could stand atop this amazing ancient mountain shrine and gaze out at God's majesty before us. We were over 10,000 feet in the sky! It is said on a clear day you can see the Himalayas.
What a WONDERFUL day! I had the best time with these five women. We had a wonderful experience and are already talking about our next adventure in the fall. You girls are the best!
Love to all!
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