Day 6 - Still in Yanghshuo

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Day 6 - Yangshuo

Day 6 was my first "testing" day. We did a 14 kilometre bike ride through the mountains for Yangshuo. Its is soo pretty but let me tell you...those bike seats are HARD!!!! (in fact it seems everything in China is including the bloody beds - am hanging out for a soft mattress - im sure sleeping on the floor would be an improvement!).

So yeh the ride was tough (for me at least) my asthma kicked in (followed by the ventolin shakes) and after an incident where my chain came off (almost popping my knee cap in the process) and it took Dean and Mike about half an hour to get it back on after it got jammed well and truly and Dean almost losing his fingers I gave up on trying to change gears!!!

We did however have a lovely relaxing trip along part of the river mid way through the morning on bamboo boats - they seat two per raft and a driver/paddler at the back. Everyone will be so proud of Dean - for someonw who doesnt like water I think we have been on about 9 differnet types of boat already (sampans, harbour boat, hydrofoil, boats through caves etc etc) and STILL have the cruise to go! He's taking it like a trooper!

Lunch was at Moon Hill cafe but i really felt as if I could puke it I ate anything so didnt go crazy as nice as the food was. After all the exertion we all decided to go caving as our guide promised us that it would be cool down there (by then my arms were sunburnt - the first sun we've seen in a week and it had to be on the day we wre out in it for hours!), and we were promised mud baths, crystal falls and a waterfall.

Well, we're learning to not quite trust what people say over here as we got down there (an adventure in itself as first we had a 15 minute trip in a mini bus with 9 of us in seats for 6, and when you go in in boats and have to manouver through VERY low hanging rocks bending down etc) we all sweated a few litres - it was SO hot and sticky, and we then found out about 45 minutes in to the cave that the tour we were doing didnt include the crystal pools or waterfall (and suddenly the mudbaths didnt seem so alluring so we all ixnayed that idea). Oh they also never told us about the ten billion stairs down there or slipper muddy rocks (I was vindicated in buying my $230 sneakers as I had a steady grip the whole time where as Dean's old shitty ones saw him *almost* going ring up over and over.

We convinced Jerry to organise transport home for us and the bikes as we were all so beat - a hilarious picture in itself as our bikes were loaded on to the back of a tractor as we headed home in the bus - hahahaha.

That afternoon we all had LOOOOOONG hot showers and consumed MANY drinks before heaidng out to dinner on a roof top restuarant. The chinese food is SENSATIONAL, we've barely had a bad meal yet.

There were two little kittens at the restaurant who qickly figured out that Dean, Kate & I are the cat lovers of the group and they proceeded to curl up next to Dean and later on Kate/my laps 😊

The company of our group is wonderful - we laugh till we cry almost every night. Last night we taught Jerry some pick up lines ("how YOU doing", "your eyes look like spanners..." etc etc all the dorky ones!!!) and we are just loving the british words our english guys say... "bullocks, prat, twat, we are not amused" etc etc etc.

So really as testing as yesterday was....it was fun all the same (now that it's tomorrow!!)


Day 7 - Yangshuo

Today is our last day in Yangshuo. We really love it here, such an awesome feeling around town - Dean wants to live here 6 onths of the year!

We all had a sleep in today, and are mostly playing on the net before we head off at 4:30pm. LOOONG 24 hours ahead, as we catch a bus from here back to Guilin, and then a sleeper train to Wuhan. From there a bus out to the Yangtze before our cruise.

For those who have our itinerary it has slightly changed. We are starting the cruise one day earlier and will make it up with 2 nights in Xian instead when we get there.

Anyway, I think we can edit some photos now so will give it a shot.


S
xxx

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Comments

[Ken]

What???
Dean roded 14 k's???? Must have been all downhill. Yeah that's it.