eat drink seth liz

This weekend we flew to the yellow mountains to discover why people say that once you climb Mt. Huangshan, you never want to climb another mountain again.
It turns out that Mt. Huangshan is the single largest stairmaster in the world, if not the universe. From the moment you pay your 230RMB entrance fee to the moment you check into your 4 star mountain top hotel, there is neither the necessity nor the opportunity to leave the steep granite stairway that stretches 10 miles from bottom to top.

The views from the mountain are truly striking and changing all the time as the mist flows through the slender peaks. We kept the trigger on our camera cocked at all times because the perfect photo could be completely swallowed by mist within seconds. We expected to trade the noise of Shanghai for some peaceful time in nature. Unexpectedly, the mountain stairway was packed so full of people we had to sharpen our elbows to push past the crowds like we were forcing our way out of a Shanghai subway car.

We prepared for the hike by packing a full day's worth of provisions, which turned out to be totally unnecessary, because, at predictable 15 minute intervals we would come upon well stocked stands selling water, beer, hot noodles, frozen popsicles and all the tchotchkes you desire. (It's important to note here that everything, including the full-size freezers are hiked up the steep granite stairway. There are no roads whatsoever.) Whoever designed the mountain path had no illusions about respect for nature in China because they stationed stone trashcans every 30 or 40 feet. Even so, many of the hikers could not wait that long to toss their bottles and used cigarette packs. (Smoking on a mountain hike? Yes! And there's even engraved "Smoke Here" signs on the walkways.)

The mountain is shockingly developed. We were surprised that all the food stations are equipped with TVs, radios, and refrigerators, but even more surprised that the highest peaks of the mountain support several hotels and local offices for the police, bank of china, china post, and china telecom. (Again, remember there are no roads or helipads.) How do these establishments get supplies, you may ask? Well, one could conceivably use the cablecars at night to shuttle supplies to the hotels but from what we can tell, everything that goes in or out is carried by a steady stream of laborers with bamboo yokes. Among other things, we saw them carry food and vegetables, used laundry (going down), fresh laundry (going up), bags of cement, steel rebar, floor tiles, tanks of fuel, and crates of water.

More news from the mountain top in our next blog posts. Do you know the difference between a 3-star and 4-star rated public toilet? Answer coming soon!