Day 56

25/08/2009

The last full day in China and a fairly short drive to Mengla which is about 50km from the Laos border. As we had a fair bit of time available,
Beth chose to visit the tropical botanical gardens at Menglun which I think it would be fair to say was not everybodies first choice of a stopping point. Sometimes you have to go with a minority decision.

The gardens covered an area of about 633 hectares - pretty big by any standard, so a ticket for the bus was a necessity (but only cost £1.80) There really was loads to see and I didn't hear any complaints at the end of the 2 hours that the time had been wasted.

We arrived in Mengla a little before 4pm and after a false start on the hotel selection (hole in the floor toilets) Tracy was able to go to the customs hall and make sure that everything was in place for a smooth exit tomorrow.

For those of you with good memories, you will recall that this trip originally had 4 vehicles on it. There was also another Baja Beetle driven by Fiona and Rica. The reason for no mention of Fiona and Rica is that Fiona was successful in obtaining an Iranian visa and was insistant that she was going to stick to the original Iran, Pakistan, India and Nepal route to China, even though Rica, as an American citizen could not get an Iranian visa.

They left the UK about 4 days behind us and after initial problems with a starter motor in Belgium and a bit of friction between the two of them, they made good progress all the way to Turkey where Rica flew ahead to India and Fiona drove the bug on her own across Iran and Pakistan.  Fiona did suffer from food poisoning during this time requiring a couple of days in hospital.  At some point between India and Nepal they started to experience problems with the car which required some major engine work including replacement of piston rings.

They arrived at the China border 8 days later than planned and after a compromise was reached over the additional cost incurred by the guide who had been waiting for them, they set off into Tibet.  The car was clearly not well and struggled to exceed 30kmph so a 12 to 14 day tour from entry to exit was not going to be possible.  Having arrived late, they were also going to run out of visa time travelling at this speed.

They reached Lhasa yesterday and one viable option was to put the bug on the back of a lorry and carry it to the Laos border but the £700 cost seems to be beyond their means and still may mean arriving at the Laos border after their visas have expired.

An alternative may be to abandon the bug in Lhasa and get an official document saying it has been scrapped to allow them to leave the country and NAVO (the Chinese tour organisers) to reclaim the deposit they lodged with the customs on Fiona's behalf.  Not a nice situation for them to be in.

We had our final meal with Tracy, Shun and Tao (no idea how you really spell the names of Tom's driver and girlfriend). Two weeks ago Simon had floated the idea of a "come as you are caught" party where each person takes a photo of a particular other person, hopefully in some less than flattering attire and they had to turn up tonight dressed in exactly that way.

Well, in short, everybody didn't, which meant those who had taken the photos were able to select a forfeit for them. To make it extra confusing, some people hadn't taken a picture of their victim either, so some smart Alec's like Beth and I were able to choose forfeits for two people.  You really need to see the pictures to see how funny this ended up.

Tomorrow we leave China and head into Laos.  My sister found this to be a very laid back country when she was here 5 years or so ago.  I hope this extends to their border official, but that they have sufficient momentum to get us cleared within the day.
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Lat 21 28.99 N
Long 101 33.81 E
Town Mengla

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