Bridges and tunnels….

Todays drive started out looking placid and mundane as it was to be 500 kilometres on the Jingkun Expressway.  What a surprise it turned out to be.

Most times when we enter an expressway the toll lady can’t make the decision whether Penny should be allowed on the expressway, so there is a phone call to the office and after some delay we are given the ticket. Today’s delay was a little longer as the console operator asked the police to come and check all our paperwork.  After about ten minutes of paper checking, we were thankfully on our merry way north.

On crossing the Yangtze for the last time this trip we headed up the valley of one of the rivers feeding it. This valley was narrow and the freeway seemed to be just all bridges and tunnels. Although the drive was freeway, the scenery was spectacular with all the farming coming right up to the edge of the road in places and mountains lining the valleys.

After the lunch stop for road side food we entered a part of the drive everyone was amazed at. For 45 kilometres of the drive was just bridges and tunnels.  The valley was so narrow in places that the freeway was elevated over the stream below. The most interesting part was that twice we did almost complete circles actually inside the mountain!!! – to emerge from the tunnel to be under the bridge that we entered the tunnel on but 100 meters lower down the mountain!! That piece of road was the greatest piece of design and engineering a lot of us have ever seen. For the day we most likely drove about 70km in tunnels; with the longest being 10km and many in the 2 – 3 km length.

As the day progressed and we approached Yaan for the night which is the area were Pandas were first discovered in the wild. We drove through mountain sides of their favourite bamboo..and hope to see some Pandas in the next couple of days.

Tomorrow is Panda day and the start of the climb to the high country.