After my near scalping experience in Chengdu it was off to the Yunnan provence, Lijiang, Tiger Leaping Gorge and a welcome return to the Himalayan foot-hills.

Perhaps the most pleasant thing about being back in the mountains was that it gave us a welcome break from the crushing humidity of central China. This meant that the journey to Lijiang became progressively more pleasant as we got closer - traversing as we did some of the most beautiful country that we have seen in China outside of Tibet. The road, which is often in bone-crushing condition (from the perspective of riding in the back of a truck with only rudimentary suspension), takes you through a series of high (circa 3000m), cold mountain passes that are covered in beautiful pine forest and low terraced agricultural valleys.

Entering this country also meant that the rough camping became pleasant again, it was lucky therefore that we picked this part of the journey for our wine-tasting and fancy dress evening (in honour of Dee's and Beth's simultaneous birthdays). A scream of an evening was had by all with costumes ranging from the ludicrous to the down right obscene (Ant) and wine that even when thoroughly diluted with, er, more wine would not have been out of place on the shelves of the paint section at B&Q. Wine production, it would seem, is not currently one of China's more successful industries.

And so it was that after three very pleasant days of camping we arrived in Lijiang.