The Happy Song Mountain Hike

That's right, my first hike in Asia! And yes, the mountain is called Happy Song Mountain (Ge Le Shan). It was wet and muddy and completely exhausting, but amazingly fun. My friends and I were planning on this hike for the last week and as the rain came down, we opted to make it an adventure in light of the weather. It was a pretty steep hike, and only two rests the entire time left my out-of-shape body gasping for air, air so thick and humid you'd sweat just standing still, even though it was pretty cool outside. The mountain was thick with underbrush, bamboo and pine trees. Very pretty despite the fact that once on top, I could only see ten feet in front of me. Supposedly there's a cable-car type deal somewhere up top that will bring you back down to the bottom, however; we never found that. We spent four and half hours almost continuously walking. Nowhere to sit during rests because it was so muddy and wet. When we came back down the mountain, we were on some roads that were being repaired, so we were constantly dodging busses and motorcycles as we walked through the streets. I was hopeful during the trip to find a wild panda bear, but those are few and far between, especially right next to a city of thirty-something million people. So I will get my Asian animal experience at the city zoo tomorrow with a friend. It rained almost all day, so returning home was a sigh of relief just to have a warm shower, a meal of soup and salad, and then a relaxing night on the couch watching Batman Begins. What a fun day though....bring on the bamboo adventures!