Somewhere down the lazy river

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October 28th 2008

Published: October 29th 2008

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Travelwash

1st Bridge

Yu Long River (abridged)

Let us not forget we also have free time and Sue and I went out for a bike ride on Saturday 25th.
It cost 5 rmb to hire a bike for the day (school teachers rate about .50p) and we headed out into the countryside to find the Yu Long river and see the sights.
After about 30 minutes the tarmac finished and we were on mud track and we had acquired a pink lady. She asked if we were going to “Dragon bridge, very beautiful” because it was only about 1 hour away, we said maybe and cycled on.
However the pink lady was dogged and pursued us through villages and across fields and we were pleased she was there one time to put us on the right track when we went wrong.

We saw an opportunity to escapes when we found a sign pointing away from the road indicating a restaurant 300m away (yes it was in English and Chinese). We turned off and found the restaurant with 2 round tables under a pergola seating a young couple from England who asked us to join them for lunch.

Farmhouse

The pink lady followed us past the French barn?

We were telling them about how we had given the pink lady the slip when she appeared again and wandered into the restaurant...only to appear again 10 minutes later bearing our meals!
Was this a countryside conspiracy are they all related?
The restaurant owner spoke some English and interpreted explaining that the pink lady's husband had a bamboo raft and he was waiting at Dragon bridge to take us for a trip. We said maybe and together with our new friends continued towards Dragon bridge.
I had been there the week before and knew it was close to the main road back to Yangshuou so we had an exit route if we needed it.

We were truly in the countryside now riding past people living their daily lives and either being ignored or greeted with Hello! Nee How! We cycled along tracks between rice paddies and vegetable plots, with the river occasionally visible on our left, over and across streams and irrigation ditches and always with the constantly changing vista of the towering velvet covered hills. They are a vibrant green etched with off-white vertical scars close up and fading to dark green, olive

Tributary

Bridge of sights

and watercoloured mauve and misty grey with distance.
We arrived at Dragon bridge in time for me to witness an inpromptu cock fight and haggle with the pnk lady for a bamboo raft trip back down river towards Yangshuou.
I managed to get from 200rmb down to 170rmb for 2 hours on a raft including transporting our bikes. Our lunch companions took advantage of the deal on offer and we set off in tandem, us in the capable hands of Mr pink lady and them being steered by pink lady and, we assumed, her sister!
Maybe I could have got a better deal elsewhere but in retrospect I would have gladly paid 200 or more because we experienced a magical and serene 2 hours on the water that we wll never forget. “Press the pause button” is the expression we use to remind ourselves to savour the moment and we enjoyed several on that trip. Sue said she wanted to paint some of the scenes we recorded but the reality is so awesome it would be impossible to convey without being seen as fictional.

Out into the countryside

Rice harvested and ready to harvest

We met up later in the evening wth our fellow rafters for a drink in a rooftop bar and played pool on a pale and pitted table. We got talking to 2 American and Canadian couples and had an eight way conversation for a while but sloped off on our own after a time.
We went to a bar we'd found away from the tourist streets which had a nice atmosphere and ate noodles and dumplings washed down with local beer at half the price of tourist bars.
There we met a couple from Yorkshire who taught us a new card game called slammer while swapping travel stories.

When you are travelling like this you sometimes bump into people with whom you share moments of your life and who have an effect on you but for some reason or another you don't get around to swapping names or addresses but if you don't record the moment they might be lost in your memory forever, like