"Lijiang - A Historic Town" Lijiang by wonga0

"Li" means beautiful, "jiang" means river.

Lijiang is one of China's World Heritage Site, a well preserved and exceptionally clean historic town.....that's why I go.

On the first day, you will be attracted to the cobbled streets, old naxi buildings.., everybody will stroll around and your eyes are busy.

But then, you find that you are in the crowds. High season is still far away but the town is already extremely crowded at noon. What will it be like in July, August..? I don't dare to think about it and slowly .....

I ran away from the crowd, bought some bread and hid in a small cafe called "Prague".

I ordered a coffee and started reading my book quietly, in peace.........

Then I ordered a cup of chinese tea....The cafe is playing some groovy music.....

A guy had been sitting at a corner next to the window, busy with his laptop, with a cigarette and some bread.

Started with talking about the same yummy bread we had, he became my company for the rest of my trip in Lijiang.

I found that we worked in the same company - me from Hong Kong office and he from Shanghai office. But he had just resigned - to get away from office politics. He had been staying in Lijiang for a few weeks and he would add some more weeks before he set out to Tibet.

This was the first story I heard in the old town.

Next was a guy from Mongolia, who had been away from home for a few years, wandered around china. He has been staying in Lijiang for some time....

It is a town full of stories. Tourists come and go. Travellers come and stay........A good place to know about yourself.

the shanghai guy Alex, Xiao Hei the doggie, myself and the guy from mongolia Xiao Meng

This is the Shanghai guy, Alex [the red one in front]. After Lijiang, he went to Zhongdian and here is on his way in Tibet.

Latest news of Alex....
After the Tibet trip, he's back to Shanghai to work in his family's company. Well, it took only a couple of months that he decided to go back to Yunnan. He said the sky was bigger there - yep...he never told me the exact reason but I could feel him from bottom of my heart. I sent him a compass last week [sep 18], hoping he knew the way home - no matter where his home was.

• In a nutshell:tourists come and go' travellers come and stay