OverlandSphere
Overland Travel, Expedition & Adventure Information for 4x4, motorcycle and truck overlanders
After the smokey haze of the lowlands we were glad to be climbing into the mountains. These were the eastern reaches of the Himalayas, and we were headed to Juigaihou (or as we called it, GI Joe). A world heritage park, this national park was a series of waterfalls and beautiful azure blue pools cascading down from the mountains. But…
Location: 26° 52′ 22″ North, 100° 14′ 06″ East (Lijiang, Yunnan Province, China) Distance from Sydney: 8,646km China. The Middle Kingdom. Home to the Giant Panda, the noodle, and about 1.3 billion people. It is impossible to approach China without pre-concieved perceptions; many words and ideas come to mind. Awakening super power, industrial power house, communism, proud dynastic history, environmental…
CHINA - The name along evokes a myriad of emotions and images; the worlds largest population, communism, take out food, Chairman Mao, tai chi, the Great Wall, and tea. The country is all this and more. The enormity of the country is as intimidating as it’s history and we feel the three weeks we spent there in 2000 barely scratched…
Na ons vertrek uit Kunming zijn we naar het “Stone Forrest” gereden, een UNESCO werelderfgoed site waar een aantal vreemde rotsformaties staan (het lijkt een greet stenen bos, vandaar de naam). Toen we daar aankwamen waren er volop werkzaamheden, ze zijn het park aan het uitbereiden. Wij vroegen ons af waarom, want de formaties lagen alleen in het stukje wat…
Langaam aan dalen we van het Tibetaans plateau en gaan we verder naar zuid oost China. Het hooggebergte maakt plaats voor groene bossen en rijstvelden. De temperatuur begint ook aangenaam te worden en kunnen alweer zonder alle lagen Goretex. De eerste echte Chinese stad die we aandoen is Lijang in de provincie Yunnan, waar we net buiten het oude centrum…
By Leigh. When people ask how we felt when we broke the world record, we give the usual ‘it was amazing’, ‘brilliant’ and ‘a great personal achievement’ but when we crossed the line in Qinghai province I felt a sense of anticlimax. We had been working to this moment for three years but when we reached this magic mileage there…
By Johno Following a bone-shaking all-dayer to Mount Everest Base Camp the team pushed further into Tibet to face the horror of the Chinese driving test.~ Capitalist Communism We had heard mixed things about the Chinese driving test, ranging from, “Don’t bother with it, just bribe your way out of any document checks” to “It’s a two-hour written test with…