Happy Hotel Yangshuo

... overwhelmed and don't buy! It's pushy in a half hearted way. One man dressed in ethnic costume plays Auld Lang Syne on a flute thing.

The Yangshuo Mountain retreat is everything I had hoped, I am so glad we are not staying in town. It's right beside the Yulong river and surrounded by Karsts. The scenery here is much better than anything we saw on the Li river boat trip which was sublime enough. The hotel has an Eco theme and is built with lovely wood in the rooms ...

... but at Grace's 30-something, it hurts a hell of a lot more and she gets BIG props for literally falling and eating dirt and getting right back up. What a a spry lil gal she is! All I heard was a lil "yelp" and I turned around and she was gone.. fallen down a gully.... I put her in front of me so I could watch her (fall). Then I realized I was helpless to help her and it was to painful to watch her (fall) so I ...

... in the same hostel we had stayed in a few days before. Took a little walk around Guilin last night and one old Chinese man nearly fell off his bicycle when he saw us! He was so funny. Stopped his bike and kept grinning at us. A helpful passer-by explained (through expressive hand gestures!) that it was our big boobs that had got him so excited. Oh dear! We were very embarrassed and got out of there pretty fast!

It's nearly 2pm now so we've another 4 hours to kill before ...

... the Ancient People Totem (park). The prices are fair and the drinks are cold.

This evening we were all set to watch the fireworks at 8 pm but they we found out they were not going until 10pm. Some said because of the events at the park other said because the BIG Beijing stuff was till on TV. So we decided to go to the park and see what was happening there. The Yangshuo Park is a really nice park. It is now free and has lots of paths and things to ...

... showing their private parts…We were sitting on the same rock wall when four five year old looking boys stripped down right in front of us and hopped in the water. After that we went over to Moon hill. Moon hill is a big mountain with a perfect round circle in the middle. This was one of the most interesting/embarrassing moments I have had. I think of myself as a pretty good hiker seeing as I walked up a ...

... juice, sprite, cups, and xiao long bao for my class for breakfast. Most of the teachers had made plans to take their classes outside as well to the park behind the school. We quickly went over the safety part for a few minutes then went outside to stare at the sun.

For the first half hour or so you couldn't see much, the sun was just too bright. We made holes in cards to display the action onto a white piece of paper. It ended up working out pretty well ...

... songs, accompanied by playing old Chinese instruments.
As soon as one passes the girls somebody ushers one into a boat. The boat ride is about 30 minutes and passes by the nearby villages where one can see old woman washing clothes in the river and men catching fish.
There are more girls in pretty clothes waving and singing for the tourists, accompanied by the drumming of drums.
There are ...

... village of grassroof huts and rather large free-roaming grey pigs. Inside the cave, there was a mud bath and mud slide-it was great FUN!!! and hot springs! You get to this cave by boat-a river enters the mtn-its a low-roof cave so you have to duck! We were the last tour group in and time passed so fast. It was night time when we left and the sun was practically gone. We dodged bats on the way out! We got back ...

... s all part of the China experience. After my lunch I took off at the head of the pack for 31 kms of alone time. It was amazing being so totally issolated in such a foreign and wild place. I passed so many people so surprised and often elated to see me. So many people who I couldn't communicate with other than saying Nee How, to which they generally replied "Hello." I always think it's funny how hard we try to accomadate to the language ...