Travelling from Yangshuo to Guilin I was expecting the bus to stop at a bus station and was looking out for said bus station when the lady conductor unloaded my suitcase at a random street corner and told me to get off the bus, in that order. OK so I overstayed my welcome but I was in Guilin, right? Heck if I knew.
So I could have been scared but congratulated myself on writing down the telephone no of my hostel before I left. Only to realise moments later that the number was incorrect and I didn't actually know the hostel's name. Note to self next time - take down the hostel name and no correctly before departing, durh! Regardless I found an Internet cafe and it all came together nicely when I called the hostel and passed the phone to my taxi driver so they could discuss where I needed to go! Don't you just love mobiles.
While Guilin was OK there wasn't much to do, in desperation visited Reed Flute Cave. A huge cave with lots of over the top coloured lighting and as I was in China, most of the rock formations had been named, it got to the stage where we tried to find shapes in the rocks before our tour guide pointed them out, be they lions, broccoli, mushrooms, stage curtain, windows etc etc. Between eight of us we got less than 20% right, obviously lacking imagination!
I finally relented and decided to do the almost unforgivable and join an organised day tour of Longsheng. Yes, I know I'm supposed to be an independent traveller and I've only been in the country for a week but I was missing English speaking company. As it was the tour was full of Chinese tourists, serves me just right.
Longsheng is the best example of rice terracing in the whole of China or so the sales blurb says. In reality it was beautiful, and the walk up to the top was tiring. However as I visited out of season, no rice had been planted, had it been I think it would have been stunning.
I would love to upload pictures but I had a blond moment a few days ago and deleted them all. How I managed this I have no idea. Will definitely upload when I have some time as insurance against another blond moment.
Currently in Kunming, Yunnan province.
