Well, so much for drifting quietly to Yangshuo… after spending an hour in the car to get to the boat. We got onto it and left the shore with a rattling engine noise. As this wouldn’t be annozing enough, we were escorted by dozens of other boat and whole armadas of boat came from the other direction also producing waves which soaked the bottom of our bags on the boat. So that was not that pleasant.
To top it, we were dropped of at some random place about an hour later, altough thez told us it would take 2 to 3 hours to get to Yangshuo. Thus we obvioulsy were not there and not even in Xing Ping, the next town from whre you usually get to Yangshuo. Thus after getting a transportation in some kind of an open air cab we got to Xing Ping, whre we were supposed to get the Bus for something like 6 RMB (1 CHF ~ 7 RMB) or so. However, hundreds of local were waiting for the bus and when one arrived they rushed to it, pushing themselves in and getting in through the windows. I guess that how it is during Golden Week, whre all China is on holidays.
So we ended up renting a whole private bus for the ‘caucasian’ tourists. For 400 RMB the bus was ours, spliting it amonst all on board resulting in 13 RMB each, a resaonable price, specially considering that you could actually breath in it and were not suffocating in a completely overcrowded bus. Finally in Yangshuo, we realized where this all came from. The streets of that town were packed with tons of people, where you could hardly find your way through. But somehow funny and interesting. From there it just got better. Seriously.
The same day we went walking around one of these hills, which are typical for the region. The next day we rented some bike to get around the country side of Yangshuo. That where you come to realize the magic of the place. The landscape is surreal and most impressive. We cruised around on our bikes enjoying the tranquility and the beauty of the scenery.
After a couple of hours we ended up at Bai Sha Town. The next bigger place north of Yangshuo. There we went to see the market. A big market also with a covered part where for once we seemed to be the absolutely only tourists, as the stares and the big smiles were way more frequent than usual.
After strolling around and powering up on a noodle soup, we started our way back to Yangshuo. As we came closer to the destination the landscape was immersed into dusk, which was wonderful.
Back at the hostel we had a delicious dinner at Cloud 9 Restaurant followed by a great time at the roof top bar, having a good laugh and getting to know a lot of interesting people.
Cheers