The forth town was unlike the previous town, there was no tourism in the area. We were the first white people that some of the locals had ever seen. There was nothing in the town that was written in English and hardly anyone spoke any English and if they did it was usually only a few words. The first day there we were approached by a few police officers and asked for our passports. Also after our first night in our hotel we were told that we would no longer be able to stay there. So we packed up to change to another hotel that we had rented for the night, but as we were leaving the first hotel they told us that they wanted us to stay. Since we had already paid for the other hotel we spent a night there before returning to the first hotel for the rest of our stay. This city we were able to really connect with some of the locals which I will tell you more about later.
Since we had stayed in all of the cities we were suppose to except for the one that we had trouble finding a hotel for we decided to try and find a hotel there again. This time when we got off of the bus we were instantly greeted by a Tibetan man that spoke perfect English. He led us to the hotel that he was staying at and as we were trying to rent a room a police cruiser pulled up in front of the hotel. The officers stepped out and asked us for our passports and then proceeded to question us through our English speaking friend. We were told that we couldn’t stay at that hotel but there was one hotel that would allow foreigners to stay. So we were able to find a hotel that would be able to take us for the four days we had planned to stay. While there we had dinner with a college student who was in town to take a test. We also befriended a group of 15 and 16 year old kids that invited us to a party.
After this last town we returned to Lanzhou for a night and then I left for Beijing. I spent 4 nights in Beijing, working for most of the first two days and then having a more relaxed time for our last two days. Touring the city on one day and then touring the Great Wall on the other. After our time in Beijing we took a plane to Hong Kong and then eventually to South Africa.
