Time now to leave Nanning and head off to Guilin, which used to be the capital of Guangxi province before Nanning took over this position. Travelled on an inter-city coach, which was pretty comfortable even though the journey was over four hours long. I decided not to linger in Guilin for too long, even though it apparently boasts a mini version of the Forbidden City, and was soon on another bus heading off to Yangshuo., a nearby town on the river Li than links it to Guilin. The scenery on this sector of the trip was quite spectacular, featuring numerous rocky outcrops of Karst limestone hills jutting vertically out of an otherwise flat landscape of rice paddies and sugar cane fields. Yangshuo itself is surrounded by these Karst hills and looks nothing like what I would call a typical Chinese city. It features a pedestrianised street that used to be the centre of the town when it was a simple fishing village on the Li River. This has become the centre of the local tourist industry, but they have managed to do it in a reasonably tasteful way, with a mix of low cost guest houses, gift shops selling mainly genuine local crafts, and several restaurants and bars. This all adds up to a very lively atmosphere, particularly in the evenings when the bars get going . The only disappointment from my point of view is that most of the bars catered mainly for young Chinese, with an off-putting mix of overloud music and eye burning laser lighting. The best bars seem to be the ones catering for the climbing community, which uses Yangshou as a base to explore the local mountains. Overall, I can see why Yangshuo is on most tourist must-see lists when visiting China.
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