Gorgeous Guilin

  Guilin, Guangxi Zhuang, China
Saturday, August 9, 2008

Being serenaded at dinner in the Sheraton

Friday 8th August
 
Alison: We arrived safely in Guilin and caught a taxi to the Sheraton Hotel. On the way Mike negotiated with a tour company via the taxi driver's mobile to organise a driver and tour guide for the next day, ending up with a great deal of 300 Yuan for a guide and driver for 8 hours which was brilliant.
 
We settled very happily into our lovely room at the Sheraton, had dinner in the restaurant there as we were too exhausted to go out and look elsewhere, and the watched the Opening Ceremony of the Olympics on television. It was really spectacular and impressive, but we had little idea what was happening as it was all in Chinese and no English speaking channel had the right to broadcast any of the Olympics live on the mainland. Thus there were about 5 channels all broadcasting the Ceremony, but all in Chinese! Luckily this really didn't matter as we could still enjoy the spectacle of Zhang Yimou's wonderful direction.
 
Mike and I managed to stay awake until the Aussies finally came out, 3rd to last before China, but by that stage it was almost midnight and the kids were asleep. We couldn't believe how appalling the Australian uniforms looked - we had to wonder who on earth designed them. It was quite embarrassing to contemplate, but at least most viewers would have been asleep and not noticed them! Anyway, after that we turned off the telly, grateful that we had arranged to meet our guide no earlier than 10.30 the next morning. 
 

Beginning the long climb up the peak

Saturday 9th August
 
Alison: I had brekky with the kids and then we met our guide Ada in the foyer, a very nice girl with pretty good English. She first took us to Duxiu Feng - the Peak of Solitary Beauty. The landscape around Guilin is filled with these beautiful limestone karsts and this one is in the centre of the town. After simply climbing 300 steep steps up it one is left with a spectacular view over the town, but the climb itself is very rewarding, although in the sticky heat it was hard work.

and the view from the top over Guilin

 
 

Reed Flute Cave

From there we went to Ludiyan or Reed Flute Cave, an enormous and stunningly beautiful limestone cave, with its incredible formations highlighted by lots of spectacular lighting. It was also blissfully cool in there, which was a relief after the climb.

Crystal Palace of the Dragon King

One of the most spectacular rooms in it was the Crystal Palace of the Dragon King, with the water in its shallow lake stunningly reflecting the ghostly lighting of the stalagmites and stalactites. The cave also had an area where it had a 'thousand year old turtle' which sounded like a slight exaggeration to us, but no doubt the turtles were quite old.

1000 Year Old Turtle (they say)

Mike and the kids paid for the privilege of feeding them, and then had a go at pitching coins on the back of little turtles in a pool, with the idea that if it landed on top of one and stayed there you got a turtle as a prize. Luckily we didn't manage that - I'm sure Customs would have had a word to say if we'd tried to get a turtle into Australia!

Feeding the turtles

 
Next we went to a very expensive restaurant in town, where we got to choose our duck and fish before they cooked them for us.

Choosing our fish at the restaurant

I could just stomach the fishing out the fish from the tank, but when they were about to wring the duck's neck in front of us we quickly ushered the kids back inside to the table and tried not to think about it!
 
After lunch we went on a boat ride along the River Li, admiring the various karsts in the distance, all of which have names based on their appearance, such as Elephant Hill etc.

Elephant Hill

The kids had fun having a steer of the boat and we saw some of the cormorants with ties around their necks on the wooden rafts which the locals use for fishing, although we didn't get to see any of them actually diving for fish. Apparently they let the cormorant eat every 7th fish so they don't give up fishing entirely.
 

Camel Hill at Seven Stars Park

After the boat ride we went to the Seven Stars Park where Bill Clinton a few years back had made a statement about the environment in front of Camel Hill. They had a great museum there with all sorts of fabulous rocks, fossils and gems, and the kids admired the fossilised dinosaur eggs and baby dinosaurs as well as trilobites.

Rachel admiring the trilobites

Michael bought 2 beautiful red jade dragons there and initially tried to tell me we could take them in our luggage (all 16 kilos of them) until I had a hissy fit and he gave in and agreed to post them home.
 

Kids joining the rock elephants

Finally we headed back to the hotel and had Room Service for dinner and watched the Olympics (in Chinese of course, but never mind) and I packed, before going to sleep, ready for an early start the next morning for Yangshuo.