Kunming is a city of colossal Chinese blocks which scream for a lick of paint. Buses clog the roads, old men smoke bongs on the street, and women sell oranges from wooden carts. Tired of the screeching horns, I decided to head for Shangri La.

The bus station was so big I recruited an employee to show me to my bus — and even she had to ask for directions. It was hard to believe most of the buses would make it out of the station gates. I found myself hoping it would be “this one” or praying it wasn’t “that one.” A little like a blind date — I was excited by what I might meet, but scared it could be broken beyond repair. In the end, my bus fell somewhere between the two.

The metal bunk-beds created a narrow aisle along the centre of the bus. Passengers couldn’t fit if they walked normally, so we shuffled along sideways like crabs. The smell of sweat-soaked feet hung in the air and my stained blanket hummed of socks doused in vinegar. My bunk was about a foot wide and so close to the roof I couldn’t sit up. The storage rack at the foot of the bed halved the length of the mattress. The journey to Shangri La was scheduled to take 11 hours — paradise better be worth it.

The bus had been half empty when we left the station but five minutes into the journey a group of girls hailed it down. Having haggled with the driver over the price, they squeezed into the two large beds at the back. Soon after a pattern quickly emerged. One of them told a story which finished in an avalanche of screams, then a new girl began to talk and the cycle began again. It was like a slumber party back there — and the rest of us took turns shouting at the girls to be quiet — which only made them laugh harder.

A cold wind swept through the window fittings — at first the breeze was welcome but it soon became unbearable. Each time I woke up the temperature had plummeted further — and by 3 a.m. my blanket had lost the fight. Several hours later I began to worry my lips might freeze shut.

At daybreak we arrived in Shangri La. I sat in the hostel lobby and waited for my hands to thaw out. It was so cold I couldn’t even write properly — my penmanship on the check-in slip looked like the work of a 5-year-old who had fallen behind in class.

For breakfast I ate a fried-egg with eggshell garnish. The sorry French toast looked like it had been cooked in a tumble drier. Worse still, it was all cold. It wasn’t the chef’s fault — the food had probably been red hot when it left the kitchen but had relinquished all heat on its journey to my table.

The showers were in a rickety outdoor hut. The shutter doors almost concealed my body but did nothing to trap the heat. I allowed the cold water to wash over me for as long as I could bear. Then I wrapped a towel around my waist and dashed to my room. This done, I emptied my bag onto the bed and dressed in every item of clothing I owned. For the first time since the previous afternoon I felt almost warm.

Many people think Shangri La is a myth, which is understandable because it didn’t exist until 2001. Prior to that it was a fictional place created by the author James Hilton. In his novel, “Lost Horizon,” he described a magical paradise isolated from the outside world. Several towns in India, Pakistan, Tibet and China have claimed to be the inspiration behind Shangri La, but few have taken the next logical step — the town I had arrived in used to be called Zhongdian — but the authorities renamed it to attract tourists.

Shangri La (or Zhongdian) is 3,500 metres above sea level. Against the mountain backdrop, the town’s miniature scale makes it feel like a model village. The narrow streets are full of tourist shops. There’s “Shangri La Cheap Trading Store,” which is wildly overpriced; “Shangri La Cigarette Retail,” which sells alcohol; and “Shangri La Factory Outlet Of Rare Stones,” which sells fruit. The only honest shop-sign is “Shangri La Products Store” — and only because the owner covered all his bases.

On the cobbled streets I ran into some American backpackers — and our conversation followed the standard path. First, the backpacker will discover they’ve been somewhere you haven’t — then they’ll shake their head as if you should re-think your entire existence and remark: “You should go there man.”

“Why? What’s it like?”

“You won’t find it in a guide-book.”

“What did you see there?”

“I’ll tell you what I didn’t see. Hordes of tourists!”

“Where did you stay?”

“There weren’t any hostels so I stayed in a native’s house.”

“What was the family like?”

“They didn’t speak any English.”

“So how did you arrange to stay?”

“I just pointed at my backpack and they got the message.”

“Did you give them any money?”

“They probably didn’t expect anything.”

“So you didn’t offer them a penny?”

“Money cheapens the experience so I gave them a gift — something I knew they couldn’t get there.”

“What did you give them?”

“Ticket stubs from the London metro.”

“Useful. What was the town like?”

“It was mainly old factory buildings. But get this! No one hassled me to buy anything the whole time I was there!”

“So what did you do?”

“I walked around for a while. Then it got dark. There weren’t any street lights. No restaurants either. So I went to bed at 7 p.m.”

“Where did you go after that?”

“There weren’t any buses. So I waited at the highway for six hours. Eventually I hitched a lift with some guy transporting wood.”

“What was he like?”

“He didn’t speak English.”

“How long did the journey take?”

“Thirty-three hours. I had to sit on the wood. Look at these splinters!”

“Sounds like it was worth it.”

“Yeah! You should go there!”

“Maybe. What do you think of Shangri La?”

His eyes drift past the mountains and settle on a happy foreign couple holding hands. “It’s full of fucking tourists.”

*********

In the afternoon, while I checked my email on the hostel computer, a monk in yellow robes appeared at my side. I nodded “Hello” and he replied with a Tai chi move. From the back of the room a female voice confirmed: “He is a monk. He wants to make friends with you.” I shook the monk’s hand. Then he talked at me in Mandarin. “He is a very famous monk,” his friend said. “He is an artist.” She asked if I wanted to see his paintings. I expected to go to his studio,  instead he typed something into the web address bar and his face appeared alongside some paintings on the screen. “Each painting takes him seven days to complete,” the woman said. “This is the modern world,” I thought to myself as I scrolled through the images. “A world where a Tibetan monk has his own webpage.”

In the evening a headache that had started as a dull throb grew unbearable. Some say altitude sickness is like a hangover. I don’t know what they drink. This felt like I’d spent six months in a jail cell, only glimpsing light when the guard slapped more paint on the walls and forced me to sniff glue. I retreated to bed and turned on the electric blanket. I shivered until the blanket warmed up — and then began to sweat. The dormitory light clicked on and the monk from earlier loomed over me. He cocked his head as if trying to see through my eyes and into my soul. Then he began to talk. I considered rolling over but I didn’t want to be rude. Also, I’m no authority on Buddhist scripture — but I’m pretty sure turning your back on a monk earns you negative karma. He rifled through his bag for a tin mug and then mimed how he intended to drink from it. I responded to the performance with all the enthusiasm I could muster — an underwhelming nod.

Over the next 24 hours, the sickness became more manageable, and on the third day I dragged myself out of bed to visit Songzanlin monastery. The bus to the monastery was packed with monks. They talked in whispers or stared thoughtfully ahead. I wondered what they were thinking about. All I was thinking was, “I’m definitely on the right bus.”

Thirty minutes later we pulled up at a large lake. The hills behind the lake were decorated with colourful houses. I walked past them through the arched entrance of the monastery. Once inside, I climbed the long set of stone steps that led to the temples.

I reached the top to find a stone platform scattered with small temples. Their golden spires pierced the clear blue sky. On the horizon, the Tibetan mountains boasted brilliant blue rocks and clean white snow — it was the picture-perfect vision of Shangri La. I think that’s what I said to the two monks who were standing next to me — I can’t remember exactly. But they definitely informed me there were more than 700 monks at the monastery and they lived in the houses on the hills. One of them made beeline for a “Yak butter tea” shop. He returned holding a large mug in one hand and a bowl heaped with tsampa in the other.

With a smile he poured the tsampa into the yak butter tea and handed it to me. I remembered how the monk at the hostel had mimed drinking. Had it been a prophecy? The drink I held looked unappetising — but was it dangerous? The monk’s eyes bore into me as I took a tentative sip. The odour hit my mouth before the liquid itself — it smelt like a zoo. The drink was also tepid — as if it had been squeezed from the yak’s udders into the mug. Once I’d downed it the monks refused to let me pay. So I said goodbye, turned a corner and threw up into a bush.

Spewing into dusty leaves isn’t what comes to mind when I think of paradise. Neither are long bus rides, cold showers, annoying backpackers, monks who refuse to let you sleep or altitude sickness. Then again, perhaps I’d been approaching things the wrong way. Maybe paradise isn’t a location but something you have to cultivate in your mind — and in their own unique way, perhaps that’s what the monks had been trying to teach me.