Guilin

On arrival in Guilin I immediately found two things: amazing scenery like I’d never seen before and con-artist taxi drivers. From the dozens of taxis I had the option of, I chose one which, as I later found out, decided to charge me three times the amount it would have cost me if he had the meter running. Having said this being charged about £3 as opposed to £1 isn’t going to bankrupt me.

I only planned one night in Guilin as the following day I would travel to the smaller and more spectacular surroundings of Yangshuo just 68km away. The Backpackers Hostel was fairly standard: 6 bedded dorm, internet, good location and friendly Chinese staff, but the best part was for just £2 I could hire a bike to take me round the town for the day. Even better was I found they actually had a very good bike with working brakes, a comfortable seat and even gears for me to use. It was just a shame the handlebars weren’t connected to rest of it. In the end I opted for a safer bike with no gears, hit-or-miss brakes and one and a half pedals.

Having left the hostel and ridden along the side of the river next to it, I came to Solitary Beauty Peak which is a 152 meter high and almost vertical hill. I’m sure there is a better description that a hill, so just take a look at the photo below.

Solitary Beauty Peak from 152m below the temple at the top

My guide book had told me I’d be paying a mere £1.50 which seemed good value until I found out that in fact the 260-step climb would cost me almost £8. I reluctantly paid and entered fully intent on seeing every aspect of the attraction to warrant the money I’d handed over. After a combination of wandering around various rooms of the palace in the surrounding gardens and running away from tourist groups, I began the ascent to find that the view from the top was amazing. So far I haven’t justified my claim early on in this blog that Guilin has scenery like I’d never seen before, but it was up the peak that I really saw it for the first time. The town is in the middle of karst formation mountains which are green peaks which raises out of the ground incredibly steeply and in close proximity to each other. The affect is quite incredible when paired with the mist that surrounds them.

Guilin and the karst mountains surrounding it viewed from the
top of Solitary Beauty Peak

Having left the peak I remounted my bike and headed north in the direction of the North Gate which is the only remaining part of the now crumpled city walls. Through a combination of not paying attention and naivety, I cycled a good couple if kilometres beyond the gates having never seen them continually telling myself that they must be coming up soon. Eventually I gave up and even on my return journey didn’t see them. However on the way back I did spot a very scenic palace and gardens down by the river which looked both amazing and tourist-free. Once again the guide book let me down by saying id be paying about 20% of what they actually wanted from me at the ticket office. This time I pulled out and cycled on.

My final sights to see were the Twin Pagodas in the centre of town, which quickly became my favourite pagodas. This is quite a statement as the only thing I haven’t seen more of, except Chinese gardens, are pagodas. To reach them I could either take the main car filled road or a very pleasant pedestrianised street running along the lake. It wasn’t until the end of the lakeside street that I realised bikes were banned and I could have been quite heavily fined. The twin pagodas stand in the middle of the lake I had illegally cycled round and are painted to represent the sun and the moon. I started to question how old the pagodas were when I found out to travel between them you have to take the underwater tunnel, but my suspicions were confirmed when I found the Sun pagoda contains a lift. The lift however did go some way to making it a stand-out pagoda as I had easily had enough of stairs by this point. The view of the town and Solitary Beauty Peak were great and it was just a shame I had to listen to another microphone-wearing tour guide while I enjoyed it. I am normally not surprised to hear them, however when you’re on the eighth floor of a pagoda and you can hear them from the ground floor of the next pagoda it can be different.

The Sun (left) and Moon (right) pagodas in the middle of the lake

I returned to the hostel to book by transportation to Yangshuo the following morning which could either be done by bus along the main road or my bamboo raft down the Li River. Easiest decision ever. The next day I was picked up in a rather swanky black saloon which would take me to a small fishing village to board the raft. I was accompanied by an elderly American couple and an English lad from Windsor who was also 3 weeks into a six month trip who had arrived in Beijing on the same day as me. I was sitting in the front and this, coupled with the fact I was last to be picked up, meant it was quite hard for me to get involved with the conversation. However the Americans had just asked the Englishman if he was excited about the royal wedding and I took this as an opportunity to get involved. Before continuing with this story I need to explain some of the background. A couple of days earlier I was reading on the BBC news website about the tragedies in Japan when I noticed, under the title “Most Read News Stories” a headline reading “Prince William and Kate Split” which I chose to read without noticing that the story was in fact from 2007. So when the topic of the royal wedding arose I took my chance by spinning round and confidently announced that it was off as they had broken up. At which point the Americans were quite stunned and almost heartbroken and continued to question me on it for quite a while. So my plan of getting involved with the conversation worked at least, shame it was based on a horrendous lie.

Our bamboo raft with our friendly captain

It turned out our bamboo raft had been updated from the original ones that used to motor up and down the Li River as it was now made from plastic imitation bamboo, but it still looked awesome and, for just £12, was easily my favourite mode of transport to a new town. The Li River is simply spectacular as its clear water weaves through incredible karst mountains for mile after mile. I also had to option of one of many cruises down the river to Yangshuo but as I saw the occasional huge and packed cruise ship pass our much lesser raft I was so pleased I didn’t choose one of them.

One of many photos I took riding down the Li River

Although the scenery was mind blowing the highlight was when our raft captain pulled up on the side of the river to show us his tiny village and take us inside his home. I get the feeling he doesn’t do this for every group he takes down the river but just ours as the American woman spoke Chinese and they got on quite well. His wife seemed very happy to see us and offered us various fruits and a glass of boiling water to drink as well as a tour of the house which didn’t take long given the size of it, but was quite humbling.

Our captain and his Mrs.

After this we continued down the river and passed more breathtaking scenic spots such as the mountains used as the image on the back of a 20 Yuan banknote. Five hours after setting off we reached the end of our two hour trip which culminated in a “bus” ride which seemed closer to a tuk tuk ride that James may have been more used to in India, which was highly entertaining. As we bounced along in our three-wheeled bus we all discussed our plans in Yangshuo and where we were all heading next, although this was of course when I wasn’t being pressed for more details about the royal split.