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Day 43
After finding a place to stay and having a very welcome shower we set out to see some of the sights of Guilin. The city is set within almost a complete circle of sharp, steep peaks of limestone so once you get away from the traffic it is very picturesque.
We went first to the Reed Flute Cave, an amazing place filled with stalagmites and stalagtites all lit with coloured lights making it seem very otherworldly. In one place a curtain of rock had formed from the ceiling of the cave and was so thin you could see light shining through it.
Making our way back into town we walked down the river to Fubo Hill where you can climb up to the top of one of the limestone peaks and get a superb view of the city beneath. It was a very hot day but it was well worth the climb for the views at the top.
We spent the rest of the day walking around the two pretty lakes in the city centre, before watching a man making our noodles for tea.
Day 44
One of the reasons we came
to Guilin was to go out to Longsheng to visit the rice terraces. Most of the time we do our sightseeing independently as it works out cheaper and one of the only "benefits" of taking a tour is a guide (who normally only speaks Chinese), we're also not overly fond of being herded from place to place. We had worked out, however, that it would actually be cheaper to take a tour to Longsheng so we opted for this and were lucky enough to get an English speaking guide who gave us the background on the bus and then left us to explore once we arrived - perfect!
We climbed up through the hills passing through the village of Pingan which almost looked like an alpine village with wooden buildings on a steep hilside. The ladies in the town traditionally only have their hair cut once in their lifetime around the ages of 16-18, so we saw lots of ladies in traditional clothes with their manes of hair wrapped around their heads. A lot of the traditional villages have only been kept going through tourism, so a lot of these women were working as hawkers or wanting paying for
you to take their pictures - bit of a shame really but it was aloowing them to keep some of their traditions going.
The viewpoints over the rice terraces gave an amazing sense of the work that must have gone in to creating them and some amazing scenes that we'll never forget. Reaching the very top we had our picnic lunch - what a spot!
On the way back down we became a tourist attraction ourselves. It's common for local people to be intrigued with foreigners and we have grown used to being stared at, being videoed, havng people taking surruptitious (or not so surruptitious) photos of us etc. but nothing quite like this where a whole tour group first wanted their pictures taken with us in turn and then as a whole group - they all came running. Honestly - we got a picture to prove it! We felt famous for about 5 minutes!
Having had a great and memorable day we returned back to Guilin on the bus and packed our bags for the next days departure.
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