Napa Lake/Napahai, Shuduhu Lake and Songzanlin Temple
The entire region of northwest Yunnan has beautiful mountains, alpine lakes and grass meadows. In order to protect the local natural resources, several nature reserves have been designated in the region including Napa Lake (Napahai), northwest of Zhongdian. There are lots of wildflowers around this "seasonal" lake in June according to the guide, and we did see some beautiful irises...View image.... A short drive from Zhongdian (only about 7 kms/4 miles)...refreshing after all the long days of driving in Xishuangbanna.
Arriving at Napa Lake/Napahai , we took one look at the flat green pasture surrounded by hills and asked..."Where's the lake?" Ah...that's why it is called a "seasonal lake." The entire pasture turns into a lake during the springtime and was already very dried out. Would you know that? There were some boggy areas but by our standards, definitely not a lake. For birders, Napahai is home to many rare birds including the black-necked crane. We settled for taking a walk around part of the lake and watching Tibetans picking up yak poop to dry and use for fuel.
The next area was Shuduhu Lake inside the Three Rivers Nature Reserve. You can follow along the lake shore through a forest and that's what we did. You can also hire horses to take you all the way around the lake (two hours by horse) or walk it in four hours. We didn't have time for the complete walk.
Songzanlin Monastery is a 300-year old Tibetan monastery complex. The Monastery is set on a hill a short distance out of Zhongdian proper. It was built by the fifth Dalai Lama and is part of the Yellow Hat sect. All the people were very friendly and curious about us throughout the region since we may have been some of the first Westerners they'd ever seen.
There were some vendors selling Tibetan knives (more like letter openers) in front of Songzanlin Monastery and we bought four of them (about $2.00 each), one for each grandson. (Thinking these would be great souvenirs from this very Tibet region.) I briefly considered fluffy yak tails...after all, how many grandparents bring their grandchildren yak tails... Warning: Even though they were packed in a suitcase with a combination lock leaving Lijiang at the end of the trip, the Chinese Government confiscated them. Spotted during the x-raying of suitcases, there was a new Chinese rule that you couldn't take knives in suitcases. Even a locked suitcase. Our guide tried to debate this with the officer but "rules are rules." Good thing this purchase was only $8.00 total. I don't know if the Chinese Government is still holding a hard-line on this but just in case....now you know...
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