Danba is considered to be one of Sichuan’s gateways into the Tibetan regions but for us it marks the end of our time in this magical area of the world. We had a long walk with our backpacks through Danba to our hostel which was very rustic. I felt like we were backpacking in 2009 again. It was in a tall building set beside the roaring Dajin River which had carved a dramatic gorge through the area. We arrived fairly early so opted to do some sightseeing and the main draw for this area is visiting the Tibetan villages and towers built high up above the valleys. We hopped in a taxi to take us to the base of Suopo where we could hike up to the village and see the 84-175 towers according to articles we read online. The road climbed up and up, passing traditional white stone houses along the way. All of these Tibetan homes were built in the same manner, structured like a castle with turreted sections on the flat roofs and colourful paintwork on the window frames and doors. We came across three old towers but that was all we could find. We continued uphill a bit but the village all seemed to fade out so we gave up. We were left wondering where the other 100 plus towers were hiding, did we misunderstand and there was once that many but they’ve since crumbled to the ground or did we not actually make it to Suopo village? We’ll never know because we gave up the search. As we descended down the hill, leaving the village we made sure to keep looking back just incase we spotted the cluster or towers but in the end we only ever saw a maximum of 8 towers so it all remains a bit of a mystery. The road we followed back to town had severe damage from a rock slide. Van-size boulders had plummeted down the mountain and obliterated the road, it was wild to see! And kind of ironic as we walked over the old rock pile and a sign was jabbed in the rubble warning of rock slides.

Back in town we met lots of local Jiarong Tibetans selling fruit and vegetables. They looked very different to the Khampa Tibetans we’d met in other regions. The men didn’t seem to dress up but the women all had headpieces which consisted of a sort of black velvet square covered in colourful embroidery. The most prominent featured was a thick plate of black hair that was wrapped across their head like a big hair-band. We also came across an area filled with groups of elderly people playing card games which was very entertaining to witness.

There’s basically three main villages in this area which people visit, Jiaju is the most popular one, said to not only to be the prettiest in China but also home to the most beautiful ladies, Suopo is famous for the towers (or not as the case was for us) and Zhonglu where we were heading today is supposed to have similar features to both villages but lacking the tourists and a much better location to just stroll around.

We paid a taxi £9 to drive us up to Zhonglu and it was quite a journey! The road climbed up and up gaining about 700m elevation until we arrived at a viewing platform where the taxi driver dropped us off and said goodbye because we only paid for a one way trip. The view was already impressive with low lying cloud swooping through the valley and glimpses of a snowy peak in the distance. The village was spread out below the mountains on a sort of cultivated plateau. After admiring the view we began strolling through the village past all the humongous houses. It was a lovely and peaceful place with stone steps leading to different areas of the village and lots of plants growing in these areas, in fact the lush green bushes and purple flowers reminded us of spring in England. The lower level seemed to have more properties clustered together but each one had a lot of space with a garden and an area to grow crops.

Suddenly a little dog crawled under a fence and ran over to us. It was an adorable little thing displaying a proud underbite with teeth that resembled sweetcorn. She stuck by us for an hour or so, patiently sitting while we had our lunch on a rocky wall and lapping up the crisps we donated to her. We ended up spending a few hours walking around the village and we really enjoyed it, I can’t imagine Jiaju offering much more than what we saw but who knows ay?

Now that we’d finished exploring we had to figure out how to leave the village. We decided we would take a random path heading downhill and aim for the road where we could try and flag down a taxi or hitch a ride. The first path we took ended up coming to a sort of canyon so we made a wise choice to head back and find another route which took us to the exact place we needed to be and once we reached the road the first car to pass us really slowed down so they could wave at us tourists. They were going slow enough for me to sort of suggest a ride and luckily it paid off and the lady let us hop in. It was a Chinese lady taking her in-laws on holiday which apparently is rather normal here but would be considered quite unusual in England. They were all very sweet and the lady driving actually spoke English so we were able to have a conversation. We were sat in the back with the cute granny who gave us handpicked cherries. They dropped us at the main road – almost crashing into a passing car on the way, I must admit Chinese people can be quite oblivious drivers and tend to just move before looking. But we were very grateful for the ride and bid them farewell before setting off on the final 4km walk back to Danba town.