Raining in Lijiang

Tonight I am sitting at a computer desk with a view over the historic Old Town of Lijiang in the Northern region of the Yunnan province. It's raining like crazy here- I guess that makes sense because it's the rainy season here. Apparently there is a spectacular view of Jade Dragon Snow Mountain from where I sit but I have not seen it yet. The view of the rooftops of the city is very cool though. These buildings are the structures of homes built by the Naxi people- a minority population in China. Hopefully I will be able to post some photos soon. As the evening turns to night I can see hanging red lanterns begin to light up on buildings throughout the city. The entire old town is pedestrian only cobblestone walkways. It is quite easy to get lost because of the windy pathways but not too hard to find your way back to your inn due to signs that are in both chinese characters, pinyin, and english. This is quite the hot tourist destination mostly for Chinese people but we have heard German, Spanish, and various English accents spoken here by other tourists.
We have been getting along fine as vegetarians here thanks to both the fact that this is a touristy location and also to the help of Annelise & Katie in learning how to say "no meat" in Chinese. Annelise even mades some handy note cards with the chinese writing on them in case we had trouble.
Here in Lijiang there's a dish called Baba which they also call the Lijiang Pancake in English. It's a delicious potato pancake that you can get sweet or salty. Fried cheese is also a popular dish here and we had that today. It was okay but a bit rich for my normally vegan diet. As for beverages, I was pleased to discover that the Yunnan province has very good coffee grown here! I have been drinking a fair amount of that and some tea as well of course of which there are a bazillion options. My favorite food so far that I blogged about previously are dumplings and the many ways you can eat dumplings here. I haven't found ones yet in Lijiang but I am sure I will. It's a bit more difficult to find exactly what I want without the translation help of Annelise & Katie.
We are heading off to Tiger Leaping Gorge tomorrow which is supposed to be absolutely spectacular but we are a bit worried that the weather will not cooperate with us since rain is in the forecast for the entire week....and it is raining as I write this blog. Hope the rain has changed to sun in Seattle!