China, June 2-26, 2007

For our "honeymoon," Aaron and I planned a trip to Tibet. However, about a month before our departure, a "Free Tibet" protest by at the Mt. Everest basecamp (a video of the protest is here) prompted a crackdown on foreigners traveling independently in Tibet. The new rules (actually, it was just a stricter adherence to rules already in place, that had apparently been pretty easy to get around in the past) said that foreigners must be part of a tour group to travel into and around Tibet. We did not want to buy a tour package, so with conflicting feelings we headed off to China and ended up staying in the Sichuan and Yunnan provinces in the southwest of the country. There, we were able to travel independently.

At the time we were there, especially towards the end of our trip (end of June 2007), we began to hear reports from other travelers about trying to sneak around the permit/tour requirement, but I don't know how those trips turned out.

Western Sichuan borders Tibet and contains some high mountains in what's called the Trans Himalayas (the biggest is Gongga Shan, 24,790 ft). Our trip centered around climbing three mountains and exploring the towns and villages around them (although that makes it sound like we planned it out that way---in fact, our plans were constantly changing). First we headed to Danba, in the Ganzi Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, to climb Mt. Moerduo (15,800 ft) and to see the beautiful Tibetan villages carved into steep hillsides.

Then we went to Rilong, a town at about 10,000 ft that is situated at the base of four spectacular mountains, known collectively as the Four Girls (Siguniangshan). The highest Girl is 20,505 ft, but we didn't climb it (it's a technical peak and we didn't bring ropes or gear); we climbed the Second Girl, which is 17,309 ft high and was a really fun and beautiful mountain. Lastly, we headed south to Yunnan and the town of Lijiang, and from there we climbed Haba Xue Shan, a mellow seventeener (17,700 ft).

Our home base was Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan; we took the train there from Beijing and from there took buses and flights to the west and south. Here are our pictures from the trip, both mine and Aaron's; they're divided into three pages:

Beijing, Chengdu, Danba	Rilong, Siguniangshan (Four Girls Mountains)	Lijiang, Haba Xue Shan, Chengdu