Yangshuo

I got on an overnight train out of Shenzhen bound for Guilin and arrived Thursday morning. Took an hour long bus to Yangshuo and walked to my room. Guilin is a famous city in China for its pretty scenery, which consist of small rivers running through karst topography. Its hard to describe so look at the picture I've posted.



I'm staying at this hotel which is really just 5 rooms, its owned by this Chinese girl who owns a cafe and a climbing company, called Karst Hotel, Karst Cafe, and Karst Climbers respectively. I'm paying about $3 USD for the room. I might be able to find one for $2.

The town is sort of big but it is a small town. All of the tourism is concentrated to one street with bars and restaurants catering towards tourists. There are a lot of tourists, and since I'm back in China now there are Chinese tourists, whereas I never saw any Thai tourists in Thailand. There are also a lot of English teaching schools here. So there are a lot of Chinese folks here for the English schools and all the tourists so they can talk to them. I met these 5 high school aged Chinese girls who approached me on the street and asked if they could talk with me. So I went and played ping pong with them. They are full of questions, and sometimes they are weird but funny, like "could you please describe your lifestyle to me?". All of these girls are from Hunnan province to the north and they live here at the school and learn English. They speak well, overcoming their shyness was the biggest hurdle.

So I've been here 3 days and gone rock climbing 3 days. Its been fun, my hands and forearms are sore again. Sunday I will rest. Today was especially fun, 2 other people (besides the guides) came along as well. It was raining off and on but we went to this cliff that angled out over us so the ground was completely dry and it was cool to be out of the rain but outdoors.

So I'm just chilling here in Yangshuo, I plan on climbing some more, a friend that I met playing ultimate in Thailand who is traveling as well will come through here in a few days and wants to do some climbing.