In the morning the group ate a Western breakfast at the hostel. Enjoying the outdoors we were serenaded by a trumpet echoing through he river valley. By "serenaded" I mean it sounded like a 7th grader practicing his scales by blasting them in long succession. This went on for over half an hour. I was greatly amused though to think of what Booz's and John's reaction would have been. I can just hear them shouting "You suck," "O god please shut up," and "your out of tune" being yelled down the river. The breakfast itself contained three slices of toast, an egg, two pieces of bacon, some jam, and a glass of orange juice, just fyi.
Once we cleaned our plates we headed to the bus station to go to the Li River. I think every bicycle driver in Guilin asked if we wanted a ride. There will be some things I don't miss about China.
At the station we were claimed by one of the tour guides and ushered to the right bus. The ride itself was rather uneventful. Though there was this ridiculously awesome Chinese movie from the 80s on. Complete with kung fu, bicycles with backward launching missiles, and way too drawn out gun fights.
We then made another stop at a bus station where we had to switch buses. At this point another guide stepped up and tried to claim us, and the heavens and the earth could hear their thunder. The verbal battering must have last for at least 5min.
Dispute settled we were once again off. But our challenges were far from over. Clement was savvy enough to ask some Chinese girls we were traveling with how much the bus fare was. This was a good idea because low and behold the bus ticket person tried to skim off us an extra ticket. Our refusal to accept his "foreigner price" brought a knowing smile and a thumbs-up from a Chinese business man on the bus.
It should be noted that there is a general equation for sightseeing in China.
Chinese Tourist – White Tourist = Goodness
This equation has held true for the majority of our trip and there wasn't a single white person on the bus, so far so good.
An hour or so later, we finally arrived at the dock, a long cement one with about 30-40 bamboo boats tied along it. Before we went Sandra smartly decided to go to the restroom. So our guide showed her to a local house's outdoor toilet. And of course in the interest of safety I followed. Once she was in, it wasn't but 10 sec and suddenly she poked her head out and told me I had t come see. It was pretty much awesome, the typical squat toilet but adorned with a nice fat maggot and a dead mouse. Mmmmm
After some haggling we agreed to be taken on a two hour boat ride for 100RMB each. About what our hostel receptionist said we could expect.
Our guide was a middle aged man who looked like he had seen better days, though not many. Yet he was kind and over the course of the journey would always run up and tell us what mountain peaks we were looking at. With a push of his pole, and a rev from the motors we set off on to the wide Yi River.
The view was breath taking. The air was cool, but not cold. The fog lightly held the mountains in a fragile embrace without the slightest hint of rain in the air. It was perfect.
Midway through our journey our guide stopped us at a small building that ended up being a restaurant. We didn't really want to eat anything because you never know with the sanitation, but we went ahead and enjoyed the tea and peanuts. Clement even ordered an omelet with scallions which was pretty good.
Our driver took care of his business and soon we were off once more. As we went various other boats would pass and I really enjoyed waving at everyone but Clement and Sandra became disenchanted with the notion of waving at everyone we passed. No worries, I waved enough for the both of them. Maybe that's just the Texan in me.
Two hours were over sooner than I would have liked, I probably could have stayed on that boat for the rest of the day. Our final destination was a small village off the river called Xinping.
Along the path there we met up with some students from Guilin University that were on some sort of class outing. They were really nice and we enjoyed taking pictures together.
The town itself was interesting, a little touristy but not to bad. Chickens dotted the road, and a few dogs ran free. The buildings were old but tourism was propping them up which was made obvious by the English signs everywhere.
We were soon through seeing this tourist trap, so we grabbed a bus at the local station and headed to one of the "must see villages" in Guilin Province, Yangshuo. There we encountered an even bigger tourist trap. White people were EVERYWHERE. So we walked for a few hours but soon were quickly bored. At least it's hard to screw up awesome mountains.
Soon we were bus ridden again and eventually found ourselves back in Guilin. Searching for a more authentic experience then the touristy area we had just left we found a local hotpot restaurant. I left for just a few moments to make a sauce and I return to find Clement and Sandra, especially Sandra, being enthusiastically made to drink by two very drunk Chinese business men. So of course I joined in to help encourage the situation.
They had bottles of iced wine, a strict French no-no, and were happily trying to get Sandra as drunk as possible, but Sandra was holding her ground and would only drink 2/3rds of it. I on the other hand gladly accepted the drink they poured me, which they generously overfilled, spilling a good deal into our hot pot, and had a couple of drinks just laughing and laughing. It was really funny to me that one of the guys kept trying to get me to salute, a little strange I'll admit.
Anyways fun was had but soon they lost their amusement for me, and I don't deal well with drunks on the best of circumstances. Eventually they got the hint and went back to their table. But by that time they had drawn the focus of the entire restaurant and obvious humor of the staff. O well all in good fun, though the two girls these guys were with didn't seem "impressed."
Back in our rooms we were pretty exhausted and went quickly to sleep. Not before starting a running joke though about questioning Clement about when he's going to take a shower (had to be there), and a small pillow fight as a nice "winding down" activity.
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