Yangshuo

The weekend before last I visited Yangshuo for the first time.

Part of the reason was to meet up with a couple of people I used to work with when I taught English in Kunming. One is still living in KM, but soon to return to the US, the other is just in China for the summer. None of us had been to Guilin or Yangshuo, it's not too far from where I'm working, and all of us wanted to visit it.

I took an overnight sleeper train from Pingxiang to Guilin. I usually enjoy travelling by train in China. I always go for a an overnight train and get a bed for journeys like this (around 10 hours) and it's really not too bad. I had a bottom bunk in a 'hard sleeper' carriage. This means sections of six bunks, opening directly onto the corridor. You can also choose 'soft sleeper', which is more expensive, but there are only four beds in a compartment and there is a door to give you some privacy. Other people just get a seat. Again, there are two kinds: 'hard' and 'soft'. Finally, there are people who buy a ticket and have to stand unless they are lucky enough to find an empty seat or a kind person who is willing to share their seat. A lot of my students have to do this when they are travelling.

After arriving in Guilin early Saturday morning, I took a bus to Yangshuo. I wasn't sure whether Yangshuo was the final destination or not as some random had steered me on to the bus(!) But the ticket price was right, so I wasn't too worried. I'd read on the internet about some kind of scam where they drop foreigners off at a petrol station on the outskirts of Yangshuo and then locals charge them to take them to right part of the town. Sure enough, we got to a petrol station and they shouted 'Yangshuo'. No-one else was getting off and I was a bit dubious, but decided that as I had a map I could find my way and it didn't really matter. Maybe I should have stood my ground and demanded to be taken to the bus station... who knows?

I got off the bus and a man asked me I had any luggage [I didn't]. He then proceeded to follow me and try and 'help' me. Took me ages to shake him off. Finally I found a nice lady who directed me to one of the local electric buses that ferry tourists around and I took that to the bus station (which wasn't very far away in the end). Phew!

Anyway, here are some photos and I'll write about the rest of my trip in another post.