I'm TK Chang. The short version of what I do is that I'm a photographer, and I drive. Western Sichuan is where I live and where I work: the passes above 4,000 m, the valley villages, the grasslands where the weather turns in twenty minutes. I photograph these roads all year, in every month the season pages describe, and the people I end up working with are mostly photographers, artists, travel bloggers and film crews — people who care what the light is doing for the same reason I do.
The short version
- Base
- Western Sichuan, on the eastern edge of the Tibetan Plateau
- Work
- Photographer & driver-guide, the year round
- Who I drive
- Mainly photographers, artists, travel bloggers and creators
- Languages
- English & Mandarin; trips run in English
- Off duty
- Sichuan Blue Sky Rescue volunteer — water & rope rescue
- Also on
- Real-time POV driving films from these roads, on YouTube
What I actually do
Two things, which are really the same thing seen from either side. I photograph these roads the year round — which is why I can tell you what the light is doing on a given ridge in a given month — and I drive and guide the people who come here to shoot them. One car, the roads I already know, and the hours chosen for the picture rather than the itinerary.
On the road that means: pacing the days so the altitude doesn't ambush you, timing the stops to the hour the light actually works, and handling the small ground problems — payments, tickets, ordering food — in a language you may not speak.
One thing worth saying plainly
Guests sometimes ask whether I'll photograph their trip. The honest answer: the useful thing I bring isn't a second camera, it's knowing where the good shots are. If you shoot — or just want your phone photos to finally look like the place — I'll put you in the right spot at the right hour. If you'd rather watch the mountains go by, that works too.
The part that isn't photography
When I'm not on the road I volunteer with Sichuan Blue Sky Rescue — the Sichuan branch of Blue Sky Rescue, China's largest volunteer rescue organisation. I trained as a first responder, and I do water rescue and rope rescue. I can drive a car; I can also drive a boat. It's unpaid, it happens on weekends and whenever the phone rings, and it is the reason I can tell you exactly how fast mountain weather turns and what a river does to a road.
It also changes what happens if something goes wrong on a trip. A car in a ditch, a guest altitude-sick at three in the morning, a washed-out section where the map insists there's a road — I've trained for all of it far more times than I've needed it, which is exactly the ratio you want.
Off the road
The rest of it, quickly. I'm an outdoor person: camping, caving, rock climbing, ice climbing, hiking — the mountains in this region were my hobby before they were my job, and CrossFit is what keeps me upright the rest of the year.
I'm a committed foodie. Currently on a diet, which in this province is its own form of suffering — but the nose still works. I know where the good food is on every road I drive, and it is almost never the place the blogs list first.
I love museums, which is where a good part of the history on this site comes from. And my family is Buddhist, so the monasteries of Western Sichuan aren't sights to me: I grew up around the practices, I know the etiquette without thinking about it, and when I explain what you're looking at, it's because I actually know it — not because a guidebook told me.
Why this notebook exists
Most of what's written about this region in English is written by people who came once. The light here is seasonal in a way that's hard to guess: the same valley is a different photograph in May and in October, and a stop that looks like nothing at noon is the whole reason to be there at seven in the evening.
Everything on this site comes from journeys I've driven and photographs I've taken myself. Where I'm not sure of something — a gate, a season, a road — the page says so instead of filling the gap.
What guests have said
I'd rather not describe myself, so here are two people who write for a living and travelled these roads with me:
"…by the end of the tour, we had a feeling that T.K. was more a friend than just our driver. If you want to have the same experience like us, ask for T.K."
— Magda Sawyer · Baba goes China, the travel blog recommended in the Lonely Planet China 2025 edition
"Today's visit was extraordinary, the exclusive plan and the material I brought. TK VERY GOOD too."
— Isaac Martín · Chavetas.es, one of Spain's best-known family travel blogs
Two more guests wrote in their own words, without any prompting from me, that they would ask for me again — Stefano and Giulia. Their notes are on the guest words section of the notebook.
Write to me
Questions about a route, a month, a specific photo spot, or a correction when something here is out of date — send them over. I read everything and I answer everything myself.
[email protected] — and Instagram and YouTube are on the notebook's contact section.
If you're here because you're thinking about travelling together, that lives on the Travel with me page. This page stays about who I am.