A long day ends perfectly with sitting outside a local restaurant and enjoying a good local beer.
The minority group of the region call themselves tu jia (土家), which roughly translates into earth familiy. Looking at the menu, the locals prefer meat-based foods with lots of preserved and wild mountain vegetables. Also lots of spice, and as our (mediocre) dinner proved that night, very salty.
My favorite part of any trip is the chance to get chummy with the locals. Which is why it’s nice to travel with Barrett, who is just so good at making friends with them. I suppose it’s his “Arab” good looks or perhaps his “exceptional business skills” or his “amazing Chinese”, all of which were presumed that evening.
Don’t think we were getting wasted over the cluster of beers on the table, either– each of those light and tasty local beers were 2.5% ABV (alcohol by volume) per bottle.
