Yunnan (雲南) is one of the remote provinces in southwestern China. It connects Qinghai-Tibet Plateau at north and Vietnam, Laos and Burma at south. The geographic pattern creates Yunnan steep from northwestern gorgeous snow mountains to southeastern plain, with numerous steep valleries in between. This geographic separation also provides grounds to cultivate different ethnic groups with their own civilizations. According to the statistics, there are 52 groups, out of 56 found in China, living in Yunnan and 26 of them have population over 5000. The ethnicity makes Yunnan colorful and outstanding among other provinces. Actually, I have bought a big 300-page pictoral book only for the clothes and ornaments of 26 Yunnan Ethnic groups!

In this trip, I visited 4 cities of Yunnan: Kunming (昆明), Lijiang (麗江), Dali (大理) and Zhongdian (中甸/香格里拉). Please click the thumbnail below to reach each respective gallery.