Yangshuo
Trip Start
Nov 21, 2007
1
84
158
Trip End
Oct 01, 2008
Yangshuo,
Guangxi Zhuang,
China
Tuesday, May 27, 2008
Yangshuo is an amazing place! It is an area that is very difficult to capture by photos. The scenery is just mesmerizing with lush foliage and limestone karst or pinnacles shooting out of the farmland, very similar to Halong Bay in Vietnam just not on the ocean. The Li river also cuts through which adds to the beauty. We read that there are 20,000 pinnacles in the area. It is also a VERY tourist friendly area, actually one of the first areas the government opened up to foreigners for tourism, and lots of places have English menus with western and Chinese food. We learned quickly it was just easier to go with Chinese though because the western food usually did not meet or come close to meeting expectations
Moon Hill BE CAREFUL
! Since the area has SO many visitors, many young students are sent to Yangshuo for English school so lots of them would come up and want to practice their oral skills with you. Jana had two different groups approach her one evening! Another thing that makes this area special is that Terry, our guide, is from a village close to Yangshuo! His family has been farmers in a village his whole life AND we get to meet someone from this great place!
A bit groggy from the train ride, we visited a cave called the Water cave on the first day we arrived. This was a day of waiting but still fun. We counted that we had 7 different people "lead" us around that day: driver of van to place where we paid, guide at the place where we paid (James) who told us what we were going to do, driver of van to caves, lady who put us in slippers and hats, non-English speaking leader, another non-English speaking leader for the rest of the trip, different driver back to place where we paid, same driver to hotel. PHEW! Yes, it was a bit confusing to us too! We had fun though. We played in a mud bath for a few minutes which made for some fun photos that you will see below
L&J at the top
. Also, our van ride to the caves was interesting. We had a van type vehicle with no passenger seat but rather the ENGINE! Then, on the way back from the cave, we had 11 people in a van that should have held 7 people at the most! NUTS. What memories, right?The next day, we were supposed to go for a bike tour, but we we woke to buckets of rain. Terry told us to meet back at 11 am to see if the rain cleared...of course, it was still just pouring buckets of rain! So, we said to wait until tomorrow for the bike ride and do other things. Layton and I went on a boat ride up the Li River which was amazing. To be honest, the bus ride up to Xingping was just as beautiful, if not more beautiful than the boat ride. Again, we did not have a "guide" with us, but somehow people knew on the public bus and when we arrived in Xingping where we needed to be and that we had already paid. Very interesting. We were lucky because the rain stayed away for our journey too. OH! One thing that was cool. We stopped at the location where the limestone formations look like what is printed on the 20 Yuan Note! You will see those pics too.
The rain held off for us the next day so we got to take a nice bike ride through the country side
view from villiage from the top
. We left about 9 am and got back to the hotel about 2 pm. Jana's bike was "Alice" and Layton had a cool mountain bike for the tour. The first part of the day was through the rice fields where we saw people living their normal lives. Then, we found ourselves at Moon Hill which is a hill with a hole in the top that can look like a half moon to a crescent of a moon depending on where you are looking from. The hill is nice to climb up for a nice vantage point of the area. However, it is even nicer because a woman from the village near Moon Hill attaches herself to EACH person going up the hill to fan them, offer them water, take photos and teach Mandrin Chinese! Jana had Foam (or at least that is what we understood) who was 40 and the mother of a son (16) and daughter (18). She literally fanned Jana the entire hour round trip! She teased about "my husband" and offered us drinks. She taught Jana to say "how much is that?", "very hot", and "rainy." Yes, we did buy two VERY expensive drinks from her for 20 Yuan ($2.50). The company was more than worth the investment. Also, we were excited because Terry's mom was at Moon Hill too! She actually came down the hill with part of our group! You will see a picture of her with grey hair and a fabulous smile. She and Terry were SO embarrassed but happy.The day did not end there...we went to Terry's actual village and home
our water and fan lady
. We got to meet his daughter who was 111 days old. Isn't that funny? When we asked Terry how old she was he had to think...and it was because he was figuring out the exact day! She was just precious and well mannered as we even woke her from a nap. You will see pictures of the coins (good luck) and dog bone (to ward off evil) around her wrists. "Julie", Terry's wife, was also at home when we came. Seeing their 3 story home was just amazing. Terry told us it took 6 months to build and about $11,000 dollars! CRAZY! They just built it 3 years ago. He then took us to an old farm house where they served us a traditional meal that was fantastic! We had about 9 different dishes to choose from and all of them were very, very fresh. This was just a great experience all the way around. The last night we were there. Terry took us to a restaurant out in another village that he used to work close to. Again, it was a banquet style where we grabbed any and everything we wanted to eat! Supposedly, you are not supposed to clean the dishes of food because then the host will think that you have not had enough...we have never been left hungry after one of these meals that is FOR sure!
RANDOM FACTS:
Terry told us to bargain HARD
this guy wore out his water lady
. He said we should pay 20% of the price that someone gives us! GAME ON! The Shaffners secretly LOVE the game of bargaining...We bought a table cloth for 60 when the given price was 250. Layton thought 24% was pretty good. Jana got two fake designer bags for 120 (60 each)! Nice work team!Laundry was 8-10 Yuan for 1 kg of clothes.
We had awesome veggie dumplings at Lulu's cafe next to our hotel.
Baked goods in China are a gamble. It is about a 50/50 gamble if something is going to be good or not!
We had a school next to our hotel. They used a remix of "We Will Rock You" by Queen as their "bell". So each hour or so, you would hear "we will, we will...rock you"....funny stuff.
In Chinese homes, the oldest boy ALWAYS takes the first story room on the left (if you were facing the entrance door from the inside). You could tell from Terry that this was VERY important to the culture.
