Tiger Leaping Gorge is a World Heritage Site carved into the mountains by the Yangtze River north of Lijiang. Being a WHS, you better recognize it’s worth visiting compared to those anemic “scenic spots” that every county in China has. Many people go on an overnight trek through the trail system, and wind up either on the Lijiang side, or on the northern side and head to Zhongdian (aka fake shangrila.) With the economic meltdown ushering in a time of fiscal restraint among the populace, I decided that instead of an exhausting 2 day trip that would surely necessitate spending more money on rations than otherwise, we would do the trip in one day, thus saving money for far more important things like beer and strippers. We booked through the outdoor travel agency in Lijiang Old Town and it was 元210 per person. This included the return bus fair, entrance to the site and a Chinese guy wearing a fancy tracksuit that we could follow through the trails, so I would say it was a sweet deal.

The ride up to TLG is a trip in itself. It takes a good 2-3 hours to get from the main square of Old Town Lijiang up to the gorge, depending on how suicidal your driver is. Of course we got the guy that longed to be a kamikaze pilot, in fact he reminded me in particular of a scene in one of the nightmare on elm street movies, where the bus driver (who turns out to be Freddy) just drives a bus full of kids right off a cliff straight into hell. Most of the drive is actually chilled out; you could even catch some Z’s if you were tired from the bottles of wine you drank the night before.

The road of no return

Once through the tunnel at the parking lot where I thought the bus would be stopping, it gets a little loco. Instead of letting us out at what looked like an idyllic place for a stroll through the massive gorge, the bus continued to rumble on through an unpaved road that looked like it was once under construction, but they halted it because too many people fell off the ledge. Lucky me, I had the front passenger seat, so not only did I get to see the dead drop off to the right, but I also got to see the hairpin turns that we flew around in advance. We literally came inches away from the left side tire going off the road on more occasions than I’d like to think about. There was also a couple of times the bus would just stall on these pieces of gravel road that looked like they would collapse into the abyss far below.

my awesome view…straight down

By an act of divine mercy, we somehow made it to the drop off point in tact. The actual trek consists of a short maybe 30 minute decent into the gorge. We then stopped at the narrowest point in the gorge, the spot where legend has it, the gorge dusted off it’s pants, and jumped over a tiger to audition for a part in Circle du Soleil. Hence the name: Tiger Leaping Gorge. Sadly, the gorge did not get the part; it went instead to an Austrian midget named Zwerg.

narrowest point of the gorge

Ok so the name really comes from the obvious, a tiger supposedly outran a hunter by jumping over that narrow part of the gorge. Boring you say? Well allow me to put my physics hat on and lets go through the numbers to look at the plausibility of such a scenario. Now this part of the gorge is 25 meters across. Assuming the tiger in question had zero air resistance (if one of you geniuses out there knows the air resistance of a tiger, drop me a line), and knew that jumping at an angle of about 22 degrees would be the best way to maximize speed and distance (45 is best, but there’s no way to do that without heavily compromising running speed, ask an Olympic long jumper), the projectile…uhh I mean tiger would have to be moving at a velocity of about 18.789 M/s, or 67.6 KM/h to be able to clear that gap. Now adult tigers are reported to have top speeds between 49-65 KM/h so, if our striped friend managed to build some extra momentum coming down the side of the gorge, it might have been just enough to clear it, ignoring the resistance issue. Although there are some other points that could skew it in the Tiger’s favor, for example Tigers haven’t roamed in that part of China for a long time, and taking into account erosion, the original gap might have been narrower. So, the myth busters verdict is: plausible.

The climb up is a little tougher than the way down, but there are lots of rusty old cables running along the way for you sissies out there to hang on to. There’s also two very tall metal ladders that you can climb. I would say the hike is definitely not a walk in the park, but should be doable by pretty much anyone who isn’t in a wheelchair. Fortunately on our excursion, only 3 people died, but they were all eaten by crocodiles. The part we did begins and ends not too far from Tina’s guesthouse, which looks like it would be a decent place to stay if your going for the overnighter. Bring your own food and water. There are some huts along the route, but they, of course, are ridiculously overpriced, and the food is nothing but packaged Chinese snacks…aka chemicals shaped into unidentifiable objects. Definitely a must see if you’re in Lijiang, and apart from our group I didn’t see any of the flag following, red hat wearing tour groups that usually spawn at these types of places. I have to say it was awesome…but not nearly as awesome as chilling out in an outpost of tyranny…Dun dun DUNNN…

I don’t mind tall laders, but I do mind climbing rickety old wire ladders, while about 20 other people climb with me:

Filed under: tourist shit