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Published: August 31st 2006
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Balcony views
Waking up to this isn't bad! Before we left Guilin to spend a few days in Yangshuo we needed to buy our train tickets back to Beijing. At the train station there were around 20 counters, half of them open with huge lines of people waiting. One of the closed counters was especially for VIPs, politicians, people who had distinguished themselves in some way, and foreign guests. As it was due to open a few hours later we waited patiently, hoping for someone who could help non-Chinese speakers. When we came back and reached the front of the queue we were however, informed (in Chinese) that there were no more tickets for the day we wanted to travel. Nor for the next day, nor for the next day after that, and so forth. So, with little hope we left to try to seek help with a CITS (Chinese International Travel Service). They, somewhat more courteously, said that they could definitely get us tickets, but we would have to come back in two days to pick them up. Puzzled by this we went to Yangshuo, hoping that there would in fact be tickets waiting for us on our return. We’re not quite sure why they wouldn’t give us
any tickets at the station and suspect that a Chinese speaker might have had more luck...
Yangshuo is a short one-hour bus ride from Guilin and is famed for being a beautiful backpacker’s haven. As we mentioned yesterday, it was a bit too much of a noisy, chaotic haven for us and we were very happy that we had booked a room at a mountain retreat 4km from the centre of town. Yangshuo itself was packed with people just waiting to attack the poor backpackers expecting the calmness and serenity so delightfully detailed in what must be slightly outdated travel books. Despite this, the scenery is totally stunning and we were glad we came.
After spending a good 30 minutes searching for a taxi actually willing to take us that far out of town we found one and 20 minutes later arrived 4km down a gravel road at the loveliest little retreat. The Yangshuo Mountain Retreat was everything we could have wished for. It is set right on the river with the peaks all around and is built out of eco-friendly sustainable materials. We had a lovely room with a big balcony overlooking the river. The staff were
Road to Yangshuo
I tried to catch the rice paddy at the bottom but it didn't come out so well as the bus was racing along! amongst the friendliest and loveliest people we have met on our journey, their English is great, the food is delicious and they can organise all sorts of activities from bike hire to rock climbing and hot air ballooning.
We spent a great evening relaxing and enjoying the peaceful river scenery, followed by a tasty meal (and to Thor’s delight, a real caffe latte) and then fell asleep...... only to be disturbed by the noisy breakdown of the air conditioning unit at 2am! Fortunately this was promptly fixed by the staff and we woke up to another hot and humid day in paradise. We decided to rent bicycles and cycle the 30 minutes back into Yangshuo to look for some of the famous scroll paintings - a ride which was fraught with trying to avoid all kinds of traffic going everywhere and nowhere. After a few hours walking around, being hassled and looking at paintings (and trying our our bartering skills!) we were very happy to cycle back to the retreat for some peace.
We returned hot and bothered and the sparkling river looked a bit too tempting! Along with some other guests Thor decided to take a swim
Crazy vehicles
With little regard for health and safety these trucks had engines on the outside - we dreaded seeing a poor passer by get dragged into the moving parts (Jen stuck to a paddle blaming her eyes!). The retreat rented out inflatable tires big enough to lie in, but getting into the river from the bank safely proved a bit of a challenge. The rocks were extremely slippery as several of the guests found out, to Jenny’s landside amusement. The water provided a cool respite from the 36 degrees and very humid air and was cleaner than we expected, although hardly see-through....That night we tried out a famous local dish - ‘beer fish’ (local Li river fish cooked in Beer with spices) and found it to be delicious.
After sadly having to leave the retreat we arrived back in Guilin and fortunately found that our train tickets to Beijing were waiting for us as promised. We spent a last few hours walking around enjoying the relative calmness of the much larger city compared to the hustling of Yanghuo, before getting on the train to Beijing. It was again the same comfortable train that we had experienced on the way out and very late the following evening we arrived back in Beijing, as Jenny’s doctor had ordered.
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Chris Barclay
non-member comment
Thank you for sharing your experience
Dear Jen, It's a pleasure to read your kind words about the Yangshuo Mountain Retreat! We're always thrilled when we are able to make someone's day (or week) and it's great to see that you enjoyed all that the Mountain Retreat has to offer. We're committed to preserving the environment and culture as well as continuously developing our 14 staff. You can read more at http://www.yangshuomountainretreat.com/aboutus.html Please come and visit us again soon! Chris and the Yangshuo Mountain Retreat family