Day 09 turned out to tbe most physically strenous day so far in this trip: our planned itinerary allocated 1.5 days to Yading Nature Reserve, a Tibetan plateau sanctuary in Sichuan. You know the area itself is huge when it takes 50 minutes shuttle bus from the reserve’s entrance to the first point of interest, and there are further on electric mini-buses that bring visitors to different places within the park. The park is known for its three sacred snow-capped peaks – Chenrezig, Jampayang, Chanadorje – and crystal-clear lakes – particularly Milk Lake, Pearl Lake and the Five-Color Lake. The short version of today’s tour though is that we’re visiting in the wrong season: the lakes were largely frozen over, and the lake we really wanted to see – the Five-Color Lake – was in fact not acccessible even because of dangerous road conditions.
The reserve starts at an altitude of 3,000m, with several spots at 4,000m and higher even. We spent the most time in Luorong Grassland, a alpine meadow with grazing livestock – yaks, cattle, goats, sheep, and even White Eared pheasants. From the grassland, we walked the 2km+ trail to see Gongga Lake – which sadly was also frozen over, but it was at least still accessible. This trail is on wooden boardwalks and is mostly flat with several steps here and there. It would be normally a cakewalk, but keep in mind that Luorong Grassland is at 3,900m elevation. The missus and boy found it particularly challenging, even with supplemental oxygen. The payout when you’ve reached Gongga Lake is a lake cafe that sells snacks, prepacked food (e.g. cup noodles) and drinks: and nothing beats having hot cup noodles after 45 minutes of walking this trail in 2 degree celsius!
Note too: the park’s shuttle bus drive from main entrance to Chonggu Temple drop-off took 50 minutes, and it goes up winding mountain roads with very sharp turns. A couple of guests got sick, and even the wife – who is normally not prone to motion sickness – felt queasy.
Drone flying at this altitude today was a real experience. On one hand, the huge wide expanse of the Lourong Grassland meant that I could get solid RC connections with the DJI Mini 4 Pro and could fly it pretty far. On the other hand, at 3,900 to 4,000m altitude, the drone was obviously working extremely hard just to fly. The high altitude warning messages was going off on the remote controller, alongside recommendations that I do not even attempt flying. Still, I did four flights in all and obtained usable video footage.
By the time we were done with this first day of visiting Yading Nature Reserve, the wife all but waved the white flag at the thought of coming back on Day 10 to visit the other places in the park. So, after discusssions with our the guide of our Sichuan segment, we dropped the revisit to Yading altogther, and decided to just vegetate tomorrow morning, do a very late morning check-out and then make our way to Litang county.
Pictures!
Day 10 tomorrow will be sedate since we’ve dropped the return visit to Yading Nature Reserve, but I’ll still do a post of the day’s activiies. Stay tuned!