This morning we took the local bus to Yangshuo, it was less than an hour so was a scenic drive. Once we arrived in the bus station, we just took one of the yellow trucks into the centre. When we arrived, I was pleasantly surprised by this mountain town. We had to find our hostel, which we did and checked into our room. We only took our small bags as we're only here for one night, so didn't make much sense taking our big bags with us. The Green Forest hostel, where we're staying has views of the mountains surrounding us, so it's rather nice. We've been to three Green Forest hostels in China now; Xi'an, Guilin and Yangshou and I would say that they all have the comfiest beds in China. Most have hard beds, but these are the softest, comfiest ones yet.

Once we'd checked in, we got a map and had a look at the tours and what to do around here. There's so much to see and do, I wish we were here for longer than a night. So we've got to make the most out of our time here. You can do bamboo rafting, watch cormorant fisherman fishing, canoeing, rock climbing, cycling, caving, mud baths and much more, including seeing the wonderful surrounding scenery. You're spoiled for choice. We decided we wanted to watch the cormorant fishing later on this evening, so that left the rest of the daytime free.

Cycling around Yangshuo

We hired some bikes in the afternoon so we could go cycling around by the river and through some of the local villages. We had to cycle down a few really busy main roads and that was not a pleasurable experience, just the sheer volume of traffic on the roads and people walking in the roads. We also passed a horrific accident; a man had been run over and was laying unconscious in the road, there was loads of blood and lots of paramedics about. It did shake me up a bit and I didn't really feel like cycling anymore.

We continued cycling, and I was even more cautious now. I just hope the passing traffic was being more vigilant on the road after seeing what happened. Once we got off the main roads, there was less traffic about and the cycle lane was finally free for cyclists. I could at least feel a bit safer on the roads and start to relax and enjoy the passing scenery. When we got out of the built up areas the mountainous scenery was on both sides of the road surrounding us. There were lots of scenic spots to take pictures, but it was still a main road, so you had to be careful where you stop. We passed a field with pretty flowers and were going to go in it, but there were women on the entrance trying to charge 5Y to go in, so we didn't bother out of principle. We also passed more fields with water buffalo, chicken and various animals. It feels like we're more in the countryside now.

Eventually we cycled away from the main roads completely and into the villages, where it's just farmland, rice terraces, mountains and rivers. It's just a beautiful setting around here, so I can understand why it's such a popular destination with both locals and foreigners.