Guilin - Li River Cruise

Most of this day was doing yet another river cruise along the Li River viewing the karst hills around the area. Unfortunately we had a bit of a misty day so it wasn’t exactly great photography weather. The cruise lasted around 6 hours due to the low water levels. Some people got bored with the hills and scenery after an hour, so they stayed in the cabin and played cards or slept for most of the next few hours, this included many of the VIPs that had the room on the top deck. While most of us just stayed up top and enjoyed the amazing scenery that flowed past. Our guide mentioned that if we were to come back after the wet season (May-April), the weather is better for sightseeing and the hills will often have waterfalls and streams.

There appears to be a 2-3 of ways to see the area from the river, the two level river cruise ship, which we did, a smaller cruise ship without a top deck, or small 5-6 person ships. Like many tourist places in the China, the Li River was packed, this time packed with boats. Most of the time you could see 10-12 boats in front and behind. Thankfully, the boat captains aren’t as crazy as the drivers on the city streets!

At the end of the Li River cruise is a small town called Yangshou, which is stop for a large number of back-packers. We didn’t have much time to explore this little village due to the river cruise taking a little longer than expected and the bus ride back to Guilin takes around 90 minutes.

When we got back to Guilin, we headed up Mount Diecei (a little over 200m) to get an overview of the city of Guilin. Due to the length of the Li River cruise, we didn’t have a lot of time here, we only managed to get 5-10 minutes of light when we reached the top. On our way back down, it got quite dark and there are no lights on the path. Defiantly something to come back and do another day if I am to back to Guilin I think.

For the past week or so, my facial hair has started to annoy me. Our guide mentioned that every time he comes to Guilin, he gets his head shaved. Of course, I figured I will join him in that tonight. Just around the corner from our hotel is “hairdresser street” where there is probably over 20 small hairdresser salons. My head shave and facial hair clipped off cost me a massive 5 Yuan (not even $AUD1), I felt so bad that it cost so little, I gave my hairdresser 10 Yuan.

After dinner Judith, our guide and me went off for a Chinese massage around the corner from the hotel. I think our masseuse were a little shocked to see two white folk in the room getting ready for part 1 of the massage - a foot massage and shoulder rub. Having carrying a fairly heavy day pack for the past 2 weeks, I guess my back and shoulders are bit stiff as my masseuse gave my back a good old thumping. Before my masseuse got into the foot massage, apparently my toe nails were a bit long so I got my first ever pedicure. Side note: our masseuse wanted to know the relationship between my sister and myself, the next question was who was the oldest. So we got them to guess who was the youngest.... of course they said I was! This upset poor Judith a little as it was her birthday the next day and she is two years younger than me! Part two of the massage was being taken into another room where we got more of a traditional massage, until our guide asked if it was okay for our masseuse’s walk on our backs. Whilst in China, do as the Chinese do I guess. Cost for a 90 minute massage and herbs in the foot bath, 65 Yuan (a little over $AUD10).

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Part of trip: Classic China

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