Our long train journey finally came to an end when we reach the town of Tongren 铜仁 in Guizhou 贵州 province. Guizhou province is one of the poor provinces of China as it has received much attention from investments that have been flooding the eastern coast. Although, the government as pour tons of money in the form of transport infrastructure is still remains one of the more backward provinces.
Guizhou is a host to a huge number of minority groups and it would take a while to be able to visit all of them. It is also home to Asia’s largest waterfalls, Huangguoshu falls 黄果树. However, these will have to wait some other time to visit. Tongren is just a stepping stone for us to go to our next destination which is in neighboring Hunan province. Actually, I wasn’t really sure whether there is a way to get there. The maps say there is a road going there but the forums and guidebooks never mentioned this route. I thought, since there is a road and now that I see how extensive the road networks in China are, I can take that chance to see if there is a bus going there.
We rested a while at the Tongren train station, we freshened up and did our morning duties. Fortunately, the toilet was the Tongren train station was clean so it was not a problem for us to use them. Looking out from the train station you can easily notice the undulating mountains which are probably limestone mountains since this part of China is particularly rich in this type of rock. On the way out of the train station, I inquired how to get to our destination, the security guard told me to just follow the main road and we will see a bus station.
But first, it was time for some breakfast. There was a row of stores near the train station and we just randomly picked one. I had noodles while my friend had some rice. It was a nice breakfast, but I didn’t know what it was called, nor did I know whether it was a Guizhou specialty. The lady at the store was nice and was truly interesting in meeting us. I guess not too many foreigners end up here. She had a table with ingredients laid our before here ready for the cooking.
Soon we had to leave and we passed by this police outpost and figured we might want to confirm where the bus station was. There was only one policeman manning the outpost and he seemed to be moving to and fro in his tiny outpost. When I finally got to the outpost, I called him out and he promptly saluted me. Startled, I saluted back and asked where the bus station was. He repeated what the other guy said that it was just down the road. I thought the policeman was a strange fellow, and thought maybe here just became a policeman and was very excited about it. He was probably practicing marching inside his outpost, and I guess that would also explain the salute I got.
We walked further down the road and true enough there was another bus station right there. We purchased tickets to our destination and soon enough we were on the bus. It was very tiring and we really want some rest since we have been on the road since the previous night. It will be another long trip, around 3 hours to our next destination. This day will be full of traveling so we will have to make the most of what we have. So we’ll do our best to get some rest while at it.
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