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Hong Kong in the Night
Lots of lights, very tall buildings So I last left you in Auckland taking the flight to HongKong.
I arrived to hongkong after a flight that was really nice and passed fast, I reached the city pretty easily and descended from the bus to the station where I got a recommendation for a cheap place to sleep. Right when I come off the station I see the area is like the tachana merkazit in israel, just with huge skyscrappers. Straight away a chinese guy jumps on me to offer me a place to sleep, since it's in the same place where I got a recommendation I followed him, he led me to miridor mansion, which is a huge building full of foreign workers and backpackers looking for cheap place to stay, we went to the 13 floor and he showed me the room for 60HK dollars I get a dump, with 8 other people sleeping in the office with dirty sheets and dirty everything, I said no thank you and went down to the 12 floor where the guest house i was recommended could be found. But since it was already 21:00 it was full, so I had to go back and sleep in that dump.
The
Yaniv and Omer
First Night in HongKong together positive thing was that I met a swedish and dutch guy who talked to me a lot about china.
The next day I moved to the better place, which is still very very small(that's what you get in hongkong for cheap price) but at least it was clean. I booked a bed for yaniv too and went to roam the city with the swedish guy.
Hong kong is a nice city except everywhere you go there are indian people trying to sell you a rolex or a suit or just a lunch, and they never leave you alone.
Anyways Yaniv came on the afternoon, we met and then went to do the visa to china.
We travelled another day in Hongkong and then we set off to china.
When passing the border to china we were really scared, I mean we heard a lot of bad stuff about china and how to get along, but the beginning was easy enough, we successfully bought a train ticket to guilin, the first place we wanted to get to, which is a 16 hours train!!!.
We got a sleeper seat, and after getting on the train we found out the train is clean
5 Star hotel in Hongkong
The penninsula hotel, very nice one, it was where we were staying ;) and comfrtable and it was really easy to sleep, the 16 hours past really fast. We arrived at guilin and took a bus to yangshou straight since it's a city known to be very beautifull and full of backpackers. On the train we met a guy from hongkong who speaks english and is going to yangshou so we just followed him, all was very easy. Arriving at yangshou we found a guesthouse pretty quick and everything was smooth.
Ofcourse there were alot of little stories with chinese people trying to rip you off but if you are not too dumb they don't manage to do it.
Yangshou was a great place, many westerners and chinese mixing together, it surrounded by mountains/hills which look like they just come out of the ground.
In yangshou we met 2 israeli couples and another israeli traveller(shlomi), we had dinner together and shlomi decided to join us for a trip the next morning.
So the next day took a bicycle and went to a famous hill called the moonhill which has a hole in the middle of it, after that we decided to go back through the villages instead of on the highway, this was
Sleeper Train in China
Yaniv enjoying his bed for the night.
16 hours and waiting. a wonderfull experience, we got lost 20 times, spent 4 hours to get back while it took us 40 to get there, but we got into a lot of tiny villages, with rice terraces, we almost circled a river, it was a wonderfull day and we had a lot of fun.
I stayed there till my birthday the 16 of may and we celebrated there with a nice dinner, I even got a birthday cake, it was a lot of fun.
After 3 days in yangshou we decided to move to a really tiny village called pingan, which is located on top of a mountain, the special thing is that the mountain is full or rice terraces, those crazy chinese just built rice terraces all over the mountain, it is a very relaxed village and we wanted to spend there 2 days before taking a train to kunming, the capital of yuunan.
Well to get to the village we had to take 3 buses, and then climb 30 minutes uphill with ALL of our gear. But it was worth it, we got a room with a wonderfull view, had a nice dinner, met an israeli couple we saw in yangshou
A Hill in Yangshou
A very common view in yangshou city in china, hills out of nowhere and toured around before it was dark.
The next morning we decided to do a daytrip to the near village, through all the rice terraces, the other israeli couple took a local guide and we followed them. Well they thought it will be an easy 3 hours walk so they brought all their gear, in the end it took 5 hours, and they were still 1 hour away from the bus station they needed to go to at this day. Me and yaniv wanted to back alone but after 30 minutes of getting completely lost, and seeing the hour was almost 16:00, we understood we have to get back with the bus together with the guide.
So we ran as fast as we can to the bus station and luckily we found them.
Now we found out there was an avalanche on the road, and that there is no bus, you have to walk another 1 hour to the avalanche, pass it and then you can get to the bus. so we walked another hour, which turned into 2 hours, and me and yaniv already took the gear of the couple who was really tired. We reached the avalance which
ViewPoint in Yangshou
Like in NewZealand I just have to climb mountains completely blocked the road, had to climb it and then go down with the help of ropes. At 18:00 we arrived at the bus, we said goodbye to the israeli couple who went to another village and came back with the guide to our hotel. That was quite an adventure, and luckily it ended well, it was really exciting, and it shows you in china you can never be sure of anything, there were many other details and encounters we had with people, like some chinese bikers who told us there was no bus just so we would use their service, but it will be too long to tell every little thing.
From pingan we took a train to kunming, another sleeping train, 19 hours this time.
The train was less good then the last one, but it was still very nice and the time passed pretty fast, we slept for 11 hours!!!.
When reaching kunming we went to the guesthouse which was recommended, found out there is not too much to do in the city, so the next day we just toured around, went to a budhist temple and to a chinese park where we had a lot of
Great food
Some of the local chinese food, looks very good, and yes it's what you think it is, they eat EVERYTHING. fun seeing chinese people perform, dance, since and just have a nice sunday.
The next morning we took a hard sitter train to Dali, an ancient city in china. Now hard sitter is completely different then hard sleeper, you get a bench and sit around with tons of chinese, who eat, spit, curse, yell, and fall asleep over you. But it was very funny and actually it wasn't that bad, we thought it will be much worse, the only problem is you don't have a lot of room to sit down.
When reaching dali we met shlomi again and some other israelis we met in kunming, we all had dinner together and it was great, we also went cycling this morning.
So now I am in dali and it is such a great place I think I will spend here a few more days, it's an old city built in chinese style, full of little markets and restaurants, and it's very relaxed, you have a wonderfull view of a lake and mountains and a lot of temples around, plenty to do.
Okay so that's it, it's a very short version, a lot more stuff happenned, china just has so many
Moon Hill
More great view from yangshou little things I can't describe it.
But even with me trying to be as short as possible I know only few of you actually got up to here😉.
So yea we are having a great time, and already starting to plan our visit to japan which will be next.
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Mom
non-member comment
I see your freinds got tiered and they dont coment. I think that now that your hair is realy long it suites you ok, not less then the very short. in the middle is not nice but now it is fine.