Monday 24th August. Tour Day 2: Journey to Yangshuo

We were off today on a long journey to Yangshuo; for me, the journey itself was half the fun of the trip, travelling on local transport, meeting local people, experiencing the joys and frustrations such trips produced. First, we caught the hydrofoil up the Pearl River estuary to Guangzhou at ~10am. You couldn’t sit on the outside of the hydrofoil and the windows looked like they'd never been cleaned so my view of the smog and dirty brown river was spoilt somewhat, what a shame. We arrived in Guangzhou about three hours later, dumped our bags at a hotel near the train station and went for a group Chinese meal. Deng instructed us in Chinese eating etiquette – a little bowl was for putting your food in from a turntable of dishes, rice was eaten at the end of the meal, the plate was for scraps, and pick out of the main dishes using your own chopsticks. I wasn't used to chopsticks yet so had to face the ignominy of asking for a spoon and fork, although within a couple of days, I’d mastered the technique and could even pick up single peas!

I had a beer afterwards in the hotel with Deng while the rest of the group went to KFC. The Chinese meal had obviously moved things along so I thought that I'd pop over to make a deposit at the toilets in KFC. I was aware that Chinese toilets would be a mix of Western sit-down toilets and squat toilets - I hoped KFC would have the former as I didn't feel my squatting-down leg muscles were sufficiently developed so soon into the trip. I did notice there was a soldier with a machine gun just inside the doors to KFC, I'm sure he was just there to stop the chickens escaping. In the gents, there was a queue at the cubicle. However, when it was free, I looked inside and it was in fact a squat-type toilet so decided to give it a miss - I'd just have to press my bum cheeks together a bit harder. Also, when I turned around and happened to look in the bin, it appeared someone couldn't wait until the cubicle was free and with the flies that were circling it, I decided to make a sharp exit from this dirty Chinese toilet. What a disappointment KFC turned out to be, I'd be sticking to McDonald's in the future, you can always be guaranteed of a nice toilet there!

We had to catch an overnight train from Guangzhou to Guilin. This would my first experience of Chinese trains, and an overnight journey to boot. The train station was absolutely chaotic. It was so packed that there were police outside directing queues just to get into the main building. We had been warned that it was Chinese custom to shove and push in everywhere since with so many people in China, they wouldn't get anywhere otherwise. This was completely alien to a well-mannered foreigner, was starting to get me really pissed off and I got close to punching someone! Fortunately, Chinese people are generally pretty small and thin, although some do have a talent for martial arts which may have resulted in serious injury to my person if I did go for one. We had 6 berth sleeper compartments which were open to the corridor, they didn’t look too bad actually (I found out these cost ~220 RMB per person, ~£20, whereas you could get 4 berth plusher private compartments for ~380 RMB). I decided to get some alcohol on the train to help me sleep (although it would also make me snore so it wouldn't really help anyone else to sleep). They only had small cans of warm beer for 6 RMB each. I got two, polished them off, but when I went back for more, was told they only had one box of beer for the whole train and it had run out! Humbug!



Tuesday 25th August. Tour Day 3: Yangshuo and Cormorant Fishing

After my first overnight train trip, I'd started to discover the pros/cons of our sleeping arrangements. I had the bottom bunk, which although good for climbing in and out of, tended to be a place where complete strangers would sit on the end of the bed and have conversations all night, either to each other or into their mobile phones. These seemed to either people who didn't have their own sleeper/seat, or maybe people who didn't want to wake their own companions up. Actually, they tended not to sit on the end of my bed, just other peoples - this might have been due to the fact that I was sleeping without a blanket with my top off and they thought I was a dangerous monkey. I really enjoyed the train trip though - the camaraderie of our group, walking around the train and watching the locals go about their business, chatting with students who were as eager to find out about you as you were about them or just wanted to practice their English. Some parts of the trip were not so good though, like using the toilets - imagine a carriage-full of men whose aim is not so good on dry land using the toilet on a rocking train all night, rubber boots would have been useful.

We arrived in Guilin ~9am, only a few hours delayed which was pretty good we were told. We then got onto a bus for an hour and a half ride to Yangshuo, a hair-raising experience with some crazy overtaking manoeuvres, so par for the course. The scenery along the way was stunning, with green-covered, limestone karsts (likened to dragon's teeth) stretching into the distance as far as the eye could see.

We arrived in Yangshuo about 11am, sweaty and tired, and made our way to our digs, the “Hotel Explorer”. The rooms weren’t ready so we dumped our bags in the hotel and Deng took us down the road to the nearby Bank of China to change some money. I had a short walk around Yangshuo - it was very much a backpackers town, full of hostels, restaurants, souvenir shops, etc, albeit one set amongst some beautiful scenery. There was even a McDonalds, I wasn't sure if that was a sign of progress or not? The rooms were ready by early afternoon and after settling in, we had the rest of the afternoon free.





In the early evening, we had a boat trip to view cormorant fishing, a traditional fishing method which was now used mainly to entertain tourists. The fisherman used cormorants with their necks crimped which caught the fish underwater. When they’d caught a few, the fisherman reeled them in and plucked out the fishes.

We had an evening meal at a local restaurant. It was Stephen’s birthday so Deng brought out a "surprise" cake for him. Afterwards, some of us found a local Oz bar which had a pool table and I managed to actually get pissed on the weak Chinese lager which was served, this was only achieved by continuous drinking. I was so pissed in fact that the next morning, I couldn't remember how I got back to my hotel room, although I did remember stumbling around the room in the middle of the night trying to find the bathroom door!

Wednesday 26th August. Tour Day 4: Moon Hill, Yangshuo

This morning, there was an hour and a half bike ride to Moon Hill. Not being a great cyclist, I’d decided the previous day that I’d be getting a taxi and was even more pleased with this decision after I woke up with a really bag hangover. After not getting on a bike for about 20 years, I'd had a bit of practice round a mates house before the trip and was absolutely knackered after about 10 minutes; I also had a bit of difficulty keeping the bike straight, there must have been something wrong with the steering I think. A couple of others also decided they’d share the taxi with me. The taxi was dirt cheap and stopped wherever we wanted for photos. The scenery was stunning, limestone karsts, green fields, clump of trees, farmers working in the field. It was much more fun arriving at Moon Hill, having a cold drink, and watching the rest of the group turn up on their bikes caked in sweat.

At Moon Hill, some of the group decided to go on a hike up to the top. I asked how long it would take and how steep it was, and then decided to give it a miss! Also, I was going to do an early morning hot air balloon trip tomorrow morning to see the scenery anyway. After the trek, the cyclists got back on their bikes for the return journey to town while we caught a public bus back.

In the afternoon, it was too hot for me to venture out so I just pottered about in the hotel, in my air-conditioned room. In the evening, some of us went for a meal at a restaurant called Cloud 9, which was recommended in one of the guidebooks, and it turned out to be a very good choice, apart from a party of very loud and very drunk Chinese on the next table. There would be an early start tomorrow so I had an early night.

Thursday 27th August. Tour Day 5: Hot Air Balloon, Yangshuo

This morning, some of us set off at 5.30am for a hot air balloon ride over the limestone karsts of Yangshuo. Arriving at the launch site and watching the balloons being inflated, it was slightly disconcerting to notice that the stitching of some of the balloon panels was coming apart. Obviously, health and safety had passed by this particular Chinese hot air balloon company. Still, I'd paid my money and wasn't going to let this small fact put me off! We spent about an hour in the air, the scenery was stunning, with limestone karsts as far as the eye could see shrouded in mist, colourful hot air balloons rising up into the air around us, and eventually, the sunrise too. During the ride, we noticed one balloon hovering near the top of one of the karsts whilst another one dropped down to view the same karst – they missed each other by what seemed to be only a matter of metres!

In the afternoon, we had free time so I wandered round the streets looking through the souvenir stalls and posted some of the tourist tat I'd bought in Hong Kong back to the UK. Later that morning, we had a cruise on the Li River through some beautiful scenery. We travelled on motorised rafts made of bamboo poles fixed together and painted. There were plenty of tourist boats on the river, including large commercial boats, and many of the smaller boats had groups of young Chinese firing large water cannons at each other.

In the evening at about 11pm, we caught a bus back to Guilin for an overnight train to Wuhan.