Langmusi, another little place we added at the last minute. Only a 3 hour bus ride away from Xiahe. Langmusi is a sleepy border town, between the Gansu and Sichuan provinces. Its actually much quieter than Xiahe; less cars, less traffic, less people. How refreshing for China. Believe us when we say we barely saw this in China. I would actually as far as saying this was the smallest 'town' we encountered altogether in China. Everywhere here is within walking distance. The restaurants, hostels and shop wooden fronts look like they've recently been revamped but still hold that small town vibe. A lot of development is going on here at the moment which may bring a lot of change to the town. We just hope its not for the worse as we loved the slow pace ... read more

Dunhuang was never on our original itinerary, infact we had never even heard of it before arriving in China. We only heard or rather seen pictures of it from our Korean dorm mate back in Xingping. As he swiped through pictures of this desert - A desert. In China!! - clear blue skies, standing on a mountain of sand with what looked like an oasis in the background. We were in awe, China's diverse scenery never fails to amaze. We said to ourselves "maybe we could squeeze this in our itinerary somehow" We couldn't believe our luck, looking at the map of China it actually seemed possible. A reroute here, take a day off there, we were going to the desert. Roll on the 23 hour train ride. Side note: 23 hours on a train is ... read more

When carrying out our research on China, we stumbled across a place called Zhangjiajie (pronounced Jang-Jyaar-Jyeh but said quickly). We were lucky to have came across it as many westerners do not really come here (call it luck or maybe it was down to our excitement in researching every last corner of China). Across this whole site you are therefore unlikely to see another western face. When you realise this, it can be very rewarding in knowing that you are one of the few that take a plunge and succeed in doing so. Having watched some youtube videos just to whet our appetite a little before we came out, we were sold. We didn't care how long it took us, we were going. We had to witness this amazing scenery with our own eyes. To give ... read more

Xingping: The quieter and more quainter version of the commercialised Yangshuo, with less tourists and more of an authentic town feel. Made up of quaint narrow streets, with brick and wooden shop exteriors all lined together in long terraced rows, it almost looked untouched from a distant past. If that was not enough reason to visit, the small town was beautifully built at the foot of huge karst mountains overlooking the Li River. On our arrival (via 40min bus from Yangshuo) we walked through the small streets in search of our hostel. Passing under cloth canopies strung between shops and illuminated lanterns, we heard the faint sound of traditional music being played. As we got closer there was a small group of locals; some smoking, some playing instruments whilst others played cards. Then out of nowhere ... read more

One thing that immediately caught our attention in Hong Kong was where we were staying. We mentioned that we were staying in a budget hotel (with that ignorant man) but this hotel was actually located on the 16th floor in the 2nd block of the building. There were 5 blocks altogether. The place we refer to is the notorious Chungking Mansions. When reading reviews on the place we had booked, we stumbled across a comment that said the whole building was overrun by Indians and Africans and was "unsafe". We thought such comment was judgemental in the "over-run" bit but also unquantified by the "unsafe" part as they failed to justify this. One thing they were right about was the mix of races and nationalities here and it had us fascinated. Its true there were many ... read more