Rygsækrejsen 2015-2016: Hiking from Htansant village to Hsipaw

5:11 AM and the local rooster decided it was time to wake up the village. And then stay quiet for another half hour. Maybe it also sensed that it was a little too early for sun rise. It tried again this time getting a reply from another rooster in the village, which of course justified another reply and so on. And then the dogs started to bark. The locals here seem to care a bit more about their early morning sleep than in other places we have been so "early dogs" usually get a good beating if they are too noisy. That is what it sound like. And it keeps the dogs quiet.

At 7:30 we were ready for breakfast and it brought back memories to South- and Central America. Rice, fried eggs, some kind of local beans and some warm chilli to put on top. Wonderful.

After a few showers in the morning it had stopped raining but the sky was still covered in clouds. The temperature being 16 C meant that the first part of the hike this morning would be cool, so we put on extra clothing, got our stuff together and headed back the same way we came last night.

There was an option of trying to hike to a local waterfall but it started to rain again, and five minutes into the hike the first person asked whether it was possible to be picked up by some kind of transportation - on the mountain. Our guide politely said "no" and we continued in pouring rain for the next 20 minutes, reaching a small village and agreeing not to try the steep and presumably slippery path to the waterfall.

Instead we walked around the new village, met people, sat down for tea and enjoyed the sun we it managed to break through the clouds. Then we hiked down the road for another four hours, meeting lots of groups of tourists heading uphill. It's busy on the hills. We had plenty of time today to enjoy the hills and the scenery and chat to the others. Once in the valley we were picked up and taken back to Hsipaw for a late lunch with local rice noodles. Good food and we were starving a bit.

Then it was back to the hotel for a much needed shower, some clean clothes and down to "Mr Shake", the guy on the main road that has a blender and does shakes. We sat there for about an hour, got a couple of shakes, and enjoyed the busy and very noisy traffic in Hsipaw. The idea of being in a quiet village in the countryside is somehow spoiled by all the two-stroke vehicles that are going back and forth, the big trucks heading to and from the Chinese border and the old construction vehicles that are the result of a booming tourist industry that is very likely to change this place in couple of years.

We tried our luck going to a restaurant and asked for pancakes but the closest we could get was "bruschetta" which was served after some 30 minutes of waiting. Lots of fresh tomato and garlic but we doubt that it would be considered bruschetta in Italy. Anyway. Back to our room and relax. According to our guide we did almost 23 kilometres of hiking in the past two days. Tired legs tonight.