She gave us a bag of nectarines, lychee and plums to take on the road with us. In China, nectarines are eaten when they are still hard and a little green. I don’t think I’ll ever eat a soft nectarine again.

We are in Zhoukua and we could get some seriously swelled heads if we stayed here much longer. We went into a local store looking for deoderant and baby-wipes and we were received like celebrities. Every female employee there squealed and pulled out her cell phone, took off her work smock and posed for photos with Doug and I. I went back to the store to give out some of our postcards and stopped for a few more photos. As I was walking out I swear on everything I hold holy, one girl shouted out in English, ” I love you!!!”. I’m not sure who they think we are but I will tell you this; I would never allow myself to be photographed at home looking the way I do right now. Doug went back into the store to get some ice cream and was stopped to pose for some more photos. It was a hoot to have it happen once but I will tell you this; if I ever see a celebrity out in public, I will do them a solid and pretend that I didn’t see them at all. We are only C list celebs here, I can’t imagine what it would be like to be an A-lister.

Today we walked through the least developed, most rural part of China we have seen so far. Towards the end of our 20 mile walk we saw windmill farms and we even passed a power plant. We aren’t sure why the town we are now in has absolutely no electricity. We did however manage to snag two of the coldest beers we have had here so far.
We were hoping to use the hotel’s washing machine but it looks like we will be doing it by hand.
Ciao,
I’m going to enjoy my beer while it’s still cold.

We walked a little over 4 miles from our campsite to the first restaurant we saw. Now we are enjoying a little breakfast while we watch fledgling mud swallows make their first attempts at flight. They are so brave and confident. It takes a lot of nerve and gumption to leave a warm nest and trust that your own wings will keep you aloft. I want to cheer for them. “Hooray, you did it!”
We are looking forward to a hotel tonight. A bed, any kind of a shower, a sink to do laundry in. Good news! There’s allegedly a hotel 17 miles down the road. Even better news! Doug says we are now 1/4 finished with our walk. Hooray, we did it! Now we just need to do it 3 more times. I trust that our wings will keep us aloft.

Today we passed through a place called Stone Forrest. It’s basically a bunch of limestone rocks that stick up out of the ground. It was pretty and on our way so we walked in one end, took a few pictures and walked out the other end.
It’s not really near any town so bus loads of tourists roll I’m and basically do what we did. Break out the selfie-stick, snap a fee and jump back on the bus.

We did 17 and 1/2 miles today and since we are still a good 8 or 9 miles from a town with a hotel we are camping again. We found a spot on a little tree filled hill between two different routes. We hear road noises on either side of us but I don’t think anybody even knows we are up here.

Yesterday morning, Doug and I were watching the news and we saw a video of a woman walking down the sidewalk somewhere in China. She stepped on a manhole cover, it collapsed and she fell in. Not more than 6 hours later we watched a young man try it lift a manhole cover, slip on some gravel and manage to fall part way inside (one leg in and one leg out) and then drop the manhole cover on himself. I yelled, Doug ran to help but by the time he got there, the trapped man’s friend had already lifted the cover off of him. He didn’t seem to be hurt which was a relief to us all.
Not too long after that we saw a scooter accident. Luckily nobody was hurt. The majority of people here don’t wear helmets and it’s very common to see a family of 5 going by on a single scooter and not one of them in a helmet.

We are in Tangchi Town enjoying a magnificent thunder and lightening storm the likes of which we never get to see in coastal southern California. We are staying at a hotel that sits on the shore of a lake. The lake is directly in front of us and a hillside full of trees and dotted with a few homes is on the opposite shore. It’s all so Walden Pond until you crane your neck to the left and see the nuclear power plant on the north eastern shore.

We only got 11 and 1/4 road miles in today even though we actually walked closer to 13. We left Kunming and started walking along the 324. It was a traffic jam of such proportions that the firemen in the firetruck that we passed eventually got out of their big red fire engine, grabbed their gear and fire extinguishers and walked to whatever emergency they were attending to. Doug and I are now having a little dinner and enjoying our new favorite beer. It’s our favorite because 2 nights ago when Doug bought a bottle, the message in the cap said he’d won a free one. I wish I knew where those firemen are now because they deserve a cold one too (even though the beer here is always warm).
PS: Now we love this beer even more. We just showed our bottle caps to the restsaurant owners and one of our caps was a winner. THREE FREE BEERS!

Before I became an interpreter I had met exactly 2 Deaf people in my life. Something very interesting has happened since then. I literally cannot leave the country without meeting Deaf people. It has happened in every country I have visited. I ceased to be surprised by this phenomena a long time ago. I am however immensely pleased every time it does happen. It happened again today. Doug and I took a short-cut on a city street and squeezed through some bushes and there they were sitting on the other side. Doug noticed them first and told that they were deaf because he had seen them signing. I turned around and asked the woman, YOU DEAF? and she answered yes and then asked me if I was Deaf and I told her that I was hearing and an interpreter. Doug got out his phone and typed “interpreter for deaf” into Google translate and showed it to her. She was so excited by this. We shared a big warm hug and then she took a picture of Doug and I and then we took a group shot with Doug’s phone. Here we all are.