Guilin
Ask any Chinese person where you should visit in China and Guilin will most definitely be one of the first places they list. I first learned of the place when all my Chinese friends I met on my mission in Australia recommended it. It's one of those places in China that has inspired poets and painters for thousands of years. I have always thought traditional Chinese paintings were somewhat fantasized mythical landscapes. After traveling down the Li river on a rainy day where misty clouds covered the karst, I know God has a fantastic imagination and appreciation for beauty.
Bamboo Raft Ride
Janae and I rode on this hand-made bamboo raft with our personal guide. The scenery was simply amazing.
River tour
Guilin is most famous for the unique karst topography, mountains that look more like jagged teeth coming out of the earth. The best place to see this is from the Li river where both sides of the river are lined by karst mountains. The scenery was much better than the people taking us down the river.
Before the day started, Mom felt sick early that morning and was not going to go. Janae was kind enough to accompany her (it wasn't a total loss since she wasn't looking forward to a 4 hour boat ride down a slow river! They ended up having a great time taking a taxi to explore Yangshuo, the small town where our river tour ended). After pretending to speak little Chinese and arguing with the tour guide, who incidentally assumed I was Korean, we ended up paying 20% of mom's ticket for the cancellation. It's funny how regardless of the country you are in, people always speak slower and louder to you if they think you don't understand. It's universal! Speaking louder helps a foreigner understand a language they don't know (or pretend they don't know)! As with ALL things Chinese, negotiation was drawn out and painful but we were more stubborn and got away without paying for Mom's full tour ticket.
The tour boats include lunch which is cooked fresh from the kitchen and full cooking staff at the back of the boat. The base lunch included with the tour is a box of rice with a couple slices of steamed cucumber. The good food costs extra. The 'tourist trap' experience gets better - if you spend a certain limit on lunch - 2/3 the price of the tour, you can have lunch on the upper deck of the boat where you can enjoy 360 degree view - otherwise, you eat lunch on the lower deck that has no balcony. When is lunch served? It's served when the boat passes the most beautiful parts of the tour. To ensure you get the best views, be sure to upgrade your lunch.
As the scenery is beautiful, the tour company is good to ensure you get the best pictures you can. To do this, they have a professional photographer on board who gave us a photo-tour of the river where he gave tips on which angles, zooms, and aperatures to use for each 'must get' shot. While giving this mini-photo course, he would explain objectively how most digital cameras were unable to get the shot because of some limitation. After giving the generous free course, he proceeded to offer to take pictures for anybody who wanted with his Nikon SLR for a price. Half way through the tour, they brought up the photos again and said pitched by saying if you are not satisfied with your camera's pictures at that point to not fret because the professional photographer will take pictures for you on the back half of the tour for half off! I love tourist traps. It's like going to church. It's the same everywhere in the world. I wouldn't expect anything less.
Also true of most tours is meeting wonderful people. We ended up meeting a couple from Shanxi who were just a lot of fun. They were Chinese traveling within China and had their own backpacker's guide which was much better than Lonely Planet. Written in Chinese for Chinese - of course it's better than a Westerner's guide. They were able to give us all the tips on how not to get ripped off while traveling. Advice a couple days late but helpful for the rest of our trip. Both owned businesses and seemed fairly saavy - the girlfriend ran a tattoo parlor. (They're in the cave picture. Part of our river tour included a tour of a cave in a boat!)
Another couple we met from Guandong were essentially on their honeymoon. The guy was a gamer who spends his life online with his friends - one of which has spent over $30,000 renminbi (over $4,000 USD) to upgrade his avatar! He has the time since he has a cushy government bureaucratic type job. Her on the other hand works 7 days a week as an accountant with only a couple days a month off! However, they are required by law to not work more than 8 hours a day. I prefer my weekends.
