HUANGSHAN MOUNTAINS

WHERE: HUANGSHAN MOUTAINS ( technically SHAN means mountain so it should just be HUANG. But they’ve started to call the city at the base of the mountains Huangshan as now so technically I’m not sure anymore.)

WHERE (less detailed): slightly northy easterly of central CHINA

DAYS: 83-84

WEATHER IS: cloudy and misty when we arrive in the town delaying our trip up the mountains by a day. But then absolute gorgeous sunshine the day we ascend.

TEMPERATURE IS: 0 - 15 degrees

PEOPLE ARE: exhausted and apparently chained to a tour group and sewn into suits. We climbed countless steps and every second Chinese person was dressed in a full business suit with tie and dress shoes, and copious amounts of  sweat.

FOOD IS: Homemade. Because we were only going to have one day on the mountain we decided to bring a packed-lunch. We finally concede that regardless of how great they taste when fresh, dumplings just don’t work a day old. Luckily this rule doesn’t apply to peanut butter sandwiches which have started to make up an alarming proportion of our weekly meals.

HIGHLIGHTS/LOWLIGHTS: the mountains obviously, although not one of China’s 5 sacred Buddhist mountains the Huangshan or Yellow Mountain range are bloody awesome.... within seconds of stepping off the eastern chairlift Paul declares it his no1 sight.... It’s the classic Chinese mountain picture with the contorted pine tree and the bare grey granite mountainside....certainly not the 90min wait for the cable car to go up. We could have walked but it’s a 4hr hike and unlike almost everyone else we didn’t fancy spending the night in a dorm room at the top....having our packed lunch with the most stunning of views.... the god-awful mapping system.... there are about 70 different peaks and ridges all with cute mysticy sounding names. The problem is there are about 5 different maps going around all with different translations. The result is a bizarre version of the Times Crossword puzzle at 2,000ft. 5 across: clue: Simian Gesturing at Astral Body or Creature once thought to be early man waves limb skywards, answer: Monkey Waves at Sun...

...also no direction arrows at crossroads just a map without a “you are here” sticker....Paul’s Kung Pao chicken t-shirt (written in Chinese) turns out to be a big hit with the locals who laugh and shout “KUNG PAO CHICKEN!” whenever he comes into view, fun for the first 10minutes of the 3hr descent...turns out the simply stunning western descent is pretty dull and probably only looks decent on the way up cos you’re looking for anything to take your mind off the endless steps, cable car down and more time exploring the summits would have been far better, bloody Lonely Planet ... our joy at making it down to the shuttle bus with 30mins to spare is short lived as the bus driver sticks to the Chinese system of “I’m not leaving until every one of these seats is sold”....arriving in time for the last bus back to the city only to find there was no bus...our good fortune that the distinctive red bus receipt we were waving at random coach drivers was spotted by little Chinese student looking for the same bus. Our new best friend called the bus company demanding a bus to take us home...our bad luck that despite assuring us the last bus back was 4pm the driver now says he’s going to wait until 5pm in the hope of selling more seats  - we’re the only passengers... since the 5pm departure time means we’ll miss our 7pm train to Shanghai Rhaani calculates that it would cost us less to offer to buy every spare seat on the bus than having to buy new train tickets....

...thanks to our new pocket friend the driver starts driving us back to hostel....after a few minutes shouting on his phone the driver turns around and starts driving us back towards the mountains....we are ejected from the bus and squashed onto the 3.30pm bus with us forced to sit in the aisles ....everything seems to be going swimmingly until the police stop the bus and give the driver a ticket for having an overcrowded bus (as bad as Indian public transport was had this happened over there the driver would have been given a ticket for not having a full enough bus)....the upshot is the whities and their pocket guide must leave the bus, walk across six lanes of motorway traffic and flag down a passing local bus to try and get back to the hostel.... after a quick stop for street vendor noodles we make our train and relax for another overnighter.

THINGS LOST: nearly Paul’s left hand Black Diamond all terrain climbing glove but luckily he backtracked and found it on the path, one of our two plug converters...so complete lost list:  our really useful wire cable for tying rucksacks together, Rhaani’s pair of Teva all-terrain hiking sandals, plug converter.

THINGS STILL IN LIMBO: our £5 deposit for our hostel in Pingyao which we forgot to collect before we left. So far the hostel has been reluctant to post it to us and are now ignoring our emails.

UP NEXT: China's Mianchi Mines, only joking Shanghai