Ca tiganul cu cortul :o)

My favourite time used to be cold winter mornings when, still sleepy and half frozen after bringing wood from outside, armed with a couple of coals still alive from the past night, I would start the fire. I still remember the light smell of smoke and the magical sound wood makes when it starts burning .... I used to do it better than everyone else, and that's when they first said I must have kissed a gypsy and got fire bug ... little did they know the travel bug was even stronger :o) !

Like a gypsy with his tent, I feel at home on the road. I've been travelling solo for the past few days making my way through inner China towards Tibet. Got on a random unplanned flight on Thursday afternoon, towards a random city on the Yangtze river, packed in a rush and out the door I was - ahh! - the road. A combination of buses, boats and trains took me across China, from city to city, giving me a wee feel of life on the Yangtze ... China is starting to look more and more like a land of contrasts - beautiful nature, sky scrapers and neighbourhoods falling apart, all coexisting in close proximity. I will return one day, with more than a month to spend exploring ... on that, another time.

So here I am today, in the Traffic hotel in Chengdu, with Mads, my travel companion for the next little while :o). Containing my excitement, I don't know how to say it better than ... hooooly mooooly, we're going to Tibet! It's been my dream since I was very little - the dream land of overpowering nature ... a deep sense of humility and peace.

Happy and at peace.

Cheers!
Veronica