Yangshuo - Part 2

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Hi All,
We've had a great few days in Yangshuo. It is a very picturesque and atmospheric small town. After getting here very early in the morning we chilled out for most of the day and then went to cooking school in the evening. We were taken around the Chinese markets by our guides and that in itself was an experience. We had the stomach to take photos of the dried rats but none of the group could bear to go to the dog meat section!! Most of the meat and fish is purchased alive and then taken home!! We saw a lot of live fish, turtles and frogs. There were baskets full of chickens, pigeons and even rabbits! Trays of barbecued pig - and we mean every imaginable part of the pig. Hopefully, the pictures do some justice as to what it was like.

We went on from there (after buying tomatoes and Spring onions!!) to the cooking school. We made - Stuffed vegetables, Yangshuo style aubergine, chicken with cashew nuts, beer fish (which is a local speciality) and stif fried greens. We then had the pleasure of consuming our cooking washed down with some cold beer. It was great fun. The teacher shows you how it's done and then everyone makes their own - because you have to cook Chinese food so quickly there were a few moments of 'What do you do next?' and 'is it supposed to look like that'. I think all in all we did pretty well and the proof of the pudding was in the eating and our plates were clean!

The next day we took a bamboo raft ride down the Li River. It is literally a few bits of bamboo tied together and two seat atop that which is propelled down the river by a Chinese rafter with a big stick. It was a great way to see the country side and going over the ridges in the river was fun too as we had to hold our feet up high to stop them getting wet. Not quite white water rafting but heaps of fun. In the evening we went to a 'Light Show' a performance put on by 800 performers on a lake. It was awesome. Beautifully choreographed and worth getting a numb bum from sitting on little plastic seats in the cold. We suspect that the opening ceremony of the 2008 Olympics is going to be something special!!

We leave Yangshou later today to catch a bus and then an overnight train to Hong Kong to begin the last part of our holiday. China has been an incredible experience and it will be interesting to contrast this with Hong Kong and Macau, which did not live through the communist period.

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