Relaxing in Yangshuo

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Yangshuo was a very laid back tourist town! We saw more Western tourists there then anywhere else that we had visited in the previous month and absolutely hordes of Chinese tourists as well. It was very busy, particularly after dark when it was cooler. The weather was very humid and constantly fogged up our sunglasses and camera lens. Our hotel was very comfortable and we immediately negotiated a room rate for the extra few days we wished to spend in Yangshuo after we had left the Intrepid tour. They were all going on an overnight train to Hong Kong but we decided we didn’t wish to have the added cost and time needed to return to mainland China. Also we had decided to visit the Dragon Back rice terraces which were north of Yangshuo.

My first priority was to find a doctor as my cough had not gone despite 2 packets of antibiotics. I figured that as it was a tourist town there would be an English speaking doctor somewhere there. I was given directions but had a lot of trouble finding him initially. The directions had taken me to the outdoor fruit and vegetable market which was very busy. Eventually I found him in a tiny room behind a butcher’s stand hung with slabs of meat and lumps of fat. He was very old, thin and dressed in very worn shabby Tshirt. He listened to my chest, told me I had a cough (!) and gave me 2 days supply of another antibiotic plus some packets of a powder to mix with water to drink. Two days later I ended up at the hospital as my cough had worsened. The doctors there could only speak very basic English, the hospital was very shabby and not overly clean. They were very interested though and took me to their lunch room and started prodding and poking at me. Eventually the started to fill out forms and told me that I must stay at the hospital for a few days so they could do blood tests etc. I had no intention of going to that hospital as an inpatient so told them I was going to Hong Kong and would go to hospital there. Then I escaped! I waited for them to run after me but they didn’t thankfully.

I ended up going to a Chinese traditional doctor and masseur who gave me a great massage and 2 litres of a vile brown liquid to drink. Meanwhile I had been on the internet yet again trying to find the name of a different antibiotic that I could purchase at the local chemist. You can buy antibiotics in China as if they are lollies - they are sold everywhere for virtually nothing. Though most Chinese have them in a drip form I like to swallow mine. We’ve seen some really dirty doctor’s surgeries with rows of people attached to drips hanging from wooden stands. Anyway either the nasty brown tea or the third dose of antibiotics worked as within 3 days my cough had disappeared.

The first day in Yangshuo we all spent wandering around and exploring. It was a pretty town with two main pedestrian streets lined with cafes and shops. One of the streets led down to the river, the bank of which was also lined with souvenir stalls. We enjoyed some great meals the few days we spent there. Food was cheap and delicious and it was great to find a lot of Western menus. A lot of the cafes and bars in the area are owned by Westerners, mostly men who have married Chinese nationals. The cafes really buzzed in the evenings with laughter and loud music. The shops carried the best array of souvenirs we had seen and though you had to bargain hard to get a reasonable price there was no pressure put on you to buy if you weren’t interested. Jerry and I bought a few things but didn’t go overboard as we still had 5 weeks of traveling ahead of us and a limited amount of cash with no real idea of how much money day to day traveling was going to cost. We booked a flight to Kunming from Guilin (the large city one hour north). We booked our flight for one week later and were lucky enough to get a 40% discount as we were teachers. Next day Jerry and I had a quiet morning and in the afternoon Jerry and Harriet went on a kayaking trip on the river which they thoroughly enjoyed. Whilst they were away I explored the shops, rested and visited the hospital. That evening we spent an hour on the river watching a fisherman go cormorant fishing. It was fascinating to watch. The fisherman balances on a narrow bamboo raft which has a bright lamp hanging from it to attract the fish. He throws his birds into the water where they dive under, emerging with beaks full of tiny fish. They cannot swallow them as they have their necks tied. Every fourth dive the neck tie is loosened allowing them to swallow those fish. It is a very traditional way of fishing which is still used though not as much as previously. The photos I took are not great as I can’t seem to get the hang of night time photography.

Next day we were up early and out on the streets checking out the bicycle hire shops as we had a day of cycling ahead of us. We rode 20 kilometres through the rice fields that day in incredibly hot weather. Everybody on the tour was very interested in watching the farmers plant rice in the fields but it wasn’t a novelty to us as we see the peasants in the fields at work from our kitchen window in Guangshui most days. We were to visit and climb Moon Hill later in the morning. It is a limestone pinnacle with a moon shaped hole, plus 1,251 steps to the top! Everybody else in the group headed up the hillside in intensive hut I used my cough as a excuse and stayed in the cool of the cafe at the base. Jerry said that it was a very hard hot climb and not really worth it for the view from the top so I was very pleased I hadn’t made the effort. Lunch was eaten in a farmers house nearby before we all climbed back onto our bikes again. The pathways we followed were very rough at times as the locals had put a lot of small rocks on them to allow them to use them in the wet weather. The jolts didn’t do much good to the bikes which weren’t brilliantly maintained anyway. That evening we were to sleep in a guesthouse in a small village north of Yangshuo. It was a very welcome sight at the end of the day as we were all dusty, hot and sore. The guesthouse was nothing like the one we stayed at in Langmusi - it was really a small hotel owned by a Dutch man. He had put a lot of thought into the decor and it was very pretty and each room had an ensuite which was a pleasant surprise. He usually only catered to Dutch tour groups (he was an ex tour leader) but Intrepid knew about it as it was next door to a popular cooking school run and owned by an Ausralian who was an ex Intrepid tour guide! Some of our group had gone to her cooking school and really enjoyed the few hours they spent there. I would have loved to have gone as well but couldn’t because of that cough!

Harriet and I headed of into the rice fields for a walk - it was very pretty and early evening so the fields were busy. Most farmers work early morning or late afternoon when it is so much cooler. That evening we played cards till late. Next morning another bike ride (this time along the bitumen road - not as bumpy or as peaceful) took us back to Yangshuo where the rest of the group spent their last few hours in the shops buying souvenirs .Late that afternoon we waved goodbye to the rest of the tour group - thankful that we didn’t have a 14 hour train trip ahead of us. We had really enjoyed the tour - it was the first organized tour we had ever been on but we weren’t sorry that it had finished. It is great to have no time restrictions whwhen you travel. We could have visited everywhere independently but were very pleased that we did meet Druja (our Tibetan guide) as he took us to many memorable places which most tourists don’t get to visit. It had been worth being part of the tour just for that week alone. However I doubt Jerry and I shall go on another organized tour for a long time. We now had another month or so of adventures ahead of us!

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Photos

Lunch in a village during our bike ride.
In the background can be seen Moon Hill.

Frogs for lunch?
I have never seen frogs for sale in Guangshui but we regularly see them in the supermarket in Wuhan. They are sold alive and by the bag.

The live bird market.
These markets are one of the ways that the bird flu virus will spread so easily.