Dazhai

I had heard about this place from the little research I did before leaving the UK. The pictures I had seen were amazing and I knew I had to visit this place. What's amazing about this place is that the view will change depending on the seasons.

When I had arrived I found out that the harvest starts in October and this place does not look at it's prettiest once all the rice has been chopped out. The girl at reception was adamant that the harvest had literally just started so I needed to go now because within a few days it'd all be gone.

I decided to join a tour instead of making my own way in the interest of time and convenience. Also I wanted to meet some new people. So I was told to wait at the end of the busy crossroads for the bus where I met a couple from Bradford who were also waiting for the bus to the terraces. The bus was late, we didn't know what we were looking for or where exactly the bus would be stopping. This is where it's nice to travel in a group, when shit goes wrong, safety in numbers. Eventually this huge bus turns up and we hop on board. We realise we're on a Chinese tour of the terraces. Great.

So the Chinese your leader gave us foreigners a brief summary of the tour. From this talk we found out we were going to a different part of the terraces than we all initially thought. I already had a plan to hike from the bottom and do my own thing but now that plan was over. He said we'd have to get a cable car to the top which I was not in favour of but he said there wasn't enough time to get to the top. This is why I don't do tours, I like doing things the way I want, in my own time and for less money. So I coughed up the cash for the cable car, not a happy bunny.

The ride up to the terraces was terrifying. We had seen a few overturned trucks on the side of the road and our bus driver was zooming around the corners.

We made it in one piece and headed straight to the restaurant for food. Being the only foreigners we had no idea what was happening but again I was with the other English couple so we helped each other out.

After being fed we got the cable car up to the top. The views here were amazing! Harvesting had literally just started so the terraces were still a field of gold. They reminded me of giant beehives sprouting out of the ground. The story behind this were some minority Chinese people were kicked out back in the day and they setup their new lives in the hills. They had an ingenious way to grow rice in the sides of the hills but creating this terraced structure to capture water and grow rice crops. It was huge!

At the top it was full of tourists, mainly Chinese, so getting good pictures was difficult. I found some steps leading down the terrace so I went off piste and started climbing down the terrace away from the crowd and noise. The pictures were so much better from here and without the noise I could appreciate and enjoy the enormity and beauty of this place.

It was roasting outside and I can't believe within a week this would have all been harvested. Talk about hard labour.

The next part of the trip was to walk down to the bottom. In fairness to the guy on the bus, he was right, this part of the terrace was much steeper and higher and would have taken a whole day to climb up and down. This guys English was very limited so it was quite funny when he tried getting us to do things as it came across very direct, as in, "you get in cable car now!". We knew he wasn't being rude and understood it's because he knew little English so wasn't told how to say things politely. It just came across funny being ordered about.

The walk down was OK but my pictures and experience of going off piste was so much better.

I was pretty beat after walking around all day in the intense heat. I just wanted to chill on the ride home but the tour leader decided to chat on the microphone the whole way back. It was all in Chinese so I had no idea what he was saying but he later walked up and down the bus spraying perfume and trying to flog the thing. I recorded a minute of this guy talking which I'll upload later. Now imagine that for a whole hour!Read more