Saturday 16th October
Well I finally managed to upload some photos to the photo pages for anyone that is interested! Slowly but surely I am finding little loop holes that allow me to access the websites I need!
Yesterday we ventured down to the Leshan giant Buddah, which is apparently one of the greatest feats of mankind, although you would'nt think it for some of the chinese!
We had opted to hire a mini van with the Swedish girls that we had met in Xi'an as it saved the hassle of trying to figure out the many different buses needed to get there. It worked out to be about 100 Yuan per person but before they would allow us to book it they made us sign a document detailing the specific ways you could die on the way and that if this were to happen then our Hostel could deny all knowledge of us (a little scary to say the least).
Blowing caution to the wind we diligently signed our lives away and at 06:30 precisely our driver and beaten up minivan were stationed outside the hostel waiting for us. I am very glad that we did it this way as the fog was horrendous and we came very close to reinacting at least 2 of the ways to die that we had read about on the booking form.
The entrance fee was about 90 Yuan and after paying we joined the mass of people makiing their way to the top of the Buddah where the queue for the viewing platform at the bottom began.
In order to reach the bottom you need to decend down a very steep set of single file stairs, however the journey was akin to a level from a super mario brothers game. Every time you had a chance to move a 4 foot stealth granny with sprightly legs jumped into the space in front of you making it impossible to go forward, whilst at the same time an army of pushy chinese tourists ensured that you were not able to stand still.
Thanks to a combination of gravity and brute force we managed to reach the bottom without too many bruises, to gape at the spectacle in front of us. Not the worlds largest giant Buddah, nah these are ten a penny, I am in fact referring to the mass of local girls who seemed intent on being the first person to have their picture taken with Tyler.
Not once did I see any of them look up or take a picture of the Buddah, which is ashame as my camera started to die as soon as we got there and I could really have used a few good shots!
Tylers was even accosted by a couple of the girls and positioned at various scenic spots along the way for yet more photographs! I am hoping that none of them had a school assignment associated with this as I have a terrible feeling their teachers will not be amused.
Once they had received their fix of photos they presented Tyler with a ready to eat chickens foot for all of his hard work, so that made it all worth while!
The three Swedish girls that accompanied us also seemed to be getting their fair share of attention, even Pauline got asked a couple fo times for a photo and yet for some reason not one person approached me. I can only put this down to them being in awe of my new hair cut and not wanting to get too near incase my super quiff managed to damage their camera lens.
Just as we had began to recover from the craziness of climbing down to the viewing platform, we had the daunting prospect of climbing back up to the top through a similar maze of steps, old ladies and other obstacles designed to ensure that you really got your moneys worth.
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