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Hiking trip
8 november 2006
Hi! Hope all is well! This past weekend Tomas and I went with our Chinese friend, Ren laoshi, and Thad and Michelle from the Peace Corps, plus some students that seemed to have prepared ahead of time to tag along!, for a VERY long day hiking trip to the highest mountain around Chengxian. We left in the morning at about 9:30 and we returned at 5 PM. We walked up the hill for about 3 hours, and there is no real trail to speak of, just kind of a muddy path and lots of rocks. Then we walked around up on the top for a while, because all of a sudden before reaching the highest peak of the top, there is an old Buddhist temple spread out all over the area. The temple itself was not that spectacular, but as is often the case here, the rooftops were amazing to see, especially set against the gorgeous views as the backdrop. Then Michelle and I became very tired, so we sat and rested for a while, while Tomas, Thad, and Ren continued up to the VERY top. Chengxian is at about 700 meters, and the peak we hiked is 1900 meters, so, for us anyway, it was quite a day. Going down took about 2 hours, mostly because it was such an uneven trail with all the rocks and slippery mud. Happily, nobody got hurt at all, and we all really enjoyed the views--and of course, the gorgeous weather we had that day! The sun was out and it was a great fall temperature for hiking. In the sun it was nice and warm but it was not too warm. Please see the attached photos. Also,we have updated our web page with more pics and videos, and we will soon be updating it with more pics. Today at 4:30 Tomas has another soccer game. It is so funny--the team thinks they will win it all because Tomas is on the team! (two wins so far) take care and write back if you can!
love
Rachel and Tomas  | | Temple view |
 | | Temple while hiking |
 | | Man walking into sun |
 | | Man with cow plowing |
 | | Us hiking |
 | | Top of temple |
 | | Hills and fields |
 | | Michelle and I resting |
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