Blogs from Yangshuo, Guangxi, China, Asia - page 50

BRIEF ENGLISH INTRO: (Pequeña introducción en inglés para los que no hablan español --después vienen todos los posts en castellano.) Yangshuo, in the Southern Chinese province of Guanxi, is one of those places where you can really feel you belong to something. The natural environment is simply astonishing: great karsts hiding behind the mist as sleeping giants, lovely rivers slowly carving green beautiful valleys, beatifully sparsed villages and rice fields, many little paths to hike or cycle... And the people are so nice! In one hand, I met wonderful Chinese who gave me the warmest welcome, regardless of their English speaking level: Apple, Olivia, Isabella, Joy, Silvia, Cathy, Forrest, Simone, Ocean, Karen, Julia, Hanna, Jacqueline, Destiny, Nancy, Heng Fen, Jane, the 98 bar and the If bar girls, etc. In the other hand, the small expat ... read more

Sadly, our time in China is coming to an end. The past three weeks have been an amazing blend of urban/rural Chinese life and from what we've seen and heard from others, China wouldn't be a bad place to live. At the very least, we've got a list of cities to visit the next time we're in the area. A Different Type of Government The last posting seemed to come across a bit too-harshly on the China's political system and the rapid urbanization of it's cities. After seeing clean, world-class cities built from nothing in less than a decade, it seemed necessary to remind ourselves that there were still problems under the sparkling exterior. However, to be fair, we should also mention some of the things that China seems to be doing better - or just ... read more

(Just to warn you, this entry ended up being incredibly long and may be best read in multiple sittings. I hope it's worth the effort) So just to say it right up front, screw typhoons. They're really starting to mess with my travel plans and are hampering a schedual that's packed fairly full already. The only plus is that they bring a refershing breeze with them that helps to blow away alot of the humidity, and can bring the temperature into the region of bearable. This is nice as I have been sweating like an athiest in church, but it is not enough considering all of the headaches it has caused. The reason for all this complaining is that a typhoon has indeed been wreaking havoc along the south-eastern coast of China for the last week ... read more

Due to extremely bad weather in the first days of my trip to China I don't have pictures here. Don't worry they're coming in the next blog. Friday July 14th I was still in a bad mood from the day before. I woke up late and took time to prepare everything so by the time I was in the ticket office for the bus company that would take me to Guangzhou it was 10:00. I got a ticket for 11:30 at the other side of the border and I took a bus going to the border. I did all the border formalities things which took about 30 minutes, withdrew some RMB and went looking for the bus station. The first thing that caught my eye when I crossed the border was the tour groups and the ... read more

After a late start, today continued along in lazy mode. Brunch was again at Bar 98 (says something about the food I guess), followed by a spot of shopping amongst the throng of tourists on West Street & some exploring along the riverbank. After getting rained out, I returned to Bar 98 for a quiet beer & attempted to catch up on my so far non-existant journal. We checked out late & minivaned it back to Guilin, where we boarded the overnight train to Shenzhen (near Hong Kong).... read more