Blogs from Guizhou, China, Asia - page 3

A six hours hike through the terraced rice fields, to the mountain pass, to the Miao village on the other valley. Without map, crossing just few chinese-only speaking people. With a picnic underway and a beer in the other village. A nice adventure, for the sights and for the human contacts despite the poor conversations.... read more

A long journey, full of surprises. Unfortunately, the seats in the bullet trains from Guangzhou to Guiyang were all booked. I should have booked earlier, a lesson learned. Few places for the 12:00 train, without seat, were still available. So I had to wait for 2.5 hours, and had to stand in the train for nearly half the time of the 5h30 journey. Next, the bus between Guiyang North station and Guiyang Central station took nearly one hour instead of the announced 20 minutes. Finally I had to take the 21:00 train to Kaili, arriving there at 23:30. Surprise, when showing the hotel address to the taxi drivers. Discussing thanks to Google translate tool on my tablet (fortunately with the language kits Chinese, English, Dutch and French downloaded from home, as none of the Google stuff ... read more

Sister Meal Festival in Shidong Province in Southern China 1 – 4 May 2015 So after 3 nights in the Trade Point Hotel in Guiyang, and seeing, in and around the region, we were met by our new guide Jonathan who was to take us to see the Miao and Dong people who are 2 of the minority groups in southern China. The reason we came to China at this time of the year was to attend the Sister Meal Festival in Shidong, over 200kms due east of Guiyang. The region is called the Qiandongnan Miao & Dong Autonomous Prefecture. This is a festival where young men select a new bride. If the girl is not interested in the man she will give him multi coloured rice and chillies and brown chop sticks. If she is ... read more

One night here in Guiyang before flying for a quick overnight back in Wuhan for my flight back to SFO. Stopped here for a night on my way to Zhenyuan as well. Had tried to avoid returning to this gritty, crowded city that provides little reason for a tourist to stop save for the fact that it is the capital of Guizhou province and, thus, the transportation hub. Had a flight booked from Guiyang to Wuhan, but considered taking a train directly from Kaili, a short bus ride from Xijiang, to Wuhan instead just to avoid Guiyang. Unfortunately, sleepers were already sold out by the time I thought about this option and a sleeper was the only option in view of the minimum 14-hour trip. Ending up in this city again is wearing on me, especially ... read more

Arriving here in Xijiang is like arriving at Disneyland. There's a 100 rmb ($16) admission fee to enter the town. There are little buses from the main admission gate to the Northern City Gate. There are souvenir shops and small eateries lining the streets. And there are crowds. China has discovered the economic value of tourism and is capitalizing on it in a big way. I understand that just 5 years ago this was a quiet, picturesque village where visitors would sometimes be greeted by Miao women dressed in their native costumes doing welcoming dances in the main square. Now, there are busloads of tourists, there's an outdoor theater with scheduled shows and a nighttime gala complete with a light show and fireworks, and there is one shop after another selling pretty much the same thing. ... read more