Shanghai is over – Guangxi here we are!

Guest Blog Entry: Andreas’ first impressions of Shanghai and Hangzhou – and our way to the Chinese countryside (Xingping, Guangxi Province). Click here to find out why watching the 20 Yuan note will bring you a little closer to us right now 😉

Last week I arrived in Shanghai to see David and pay my very first visit to China. After seeing a few sights, markets and Davids university and living environment, we started to enjoy Shanghais night life – for the first time for me and for the last time (at least for while) for David. We’ve been in a lot of different places, that all had their own charme and ranged from cheap to expensive, from first to 87th floor, from cosy to “special interest”.

Little by little we made our way to the chinese countryside. We started in Hangzhou where we met an “old” chinese friend of David and made another very interesting acquaintance at a foot massage place. We gained a little better insight into chinese tea and food ceremonies and mentality again.

Next planned step: Plane to Guilin, Guangxi Province. Next actual step: Staying at Hangzhou Airport Terminal 20 and ruining everything good the massage people did do to our backs by trying to sleep on the benches and waiting for a delayed flight.

Didn’t see that much of Guilin yet for that reason. We basically just made to the just then booked hostel and had a (semi-)good night sleep. The hostel in Guilin gave me the “real” backpacker feeling again (in contrast to the ensuite room in Hangzhou), so we kind of started to talk about South African Provinces and it turned out that David hardly knows any provinces, neither in RSA nor in China. But I guess he just enjoys the places and is not interested in geo-political divisions. Saw some very American Americans and met a nice chinese lady and a british lad who spoke impressingly fluent chinese (Envy!)

And then, finally, we made it to Xingping (via Yangshou, which might not have been the smartest, but a reasonable connection). And here we are. “This old Place” (founded 265 A.D.) has a very impressing landscape! We are just on the balcony and w

ouldn’t it be night we could see the Li River and great formations of single-standing vegetated rocks. If you want to see it, you don’t have to scroll down to our pictures, you can also just have a look at a chinese 20Y note. In

fact this is the very place that is depicted on the note.

Did climb up to small pavillion, that is either called “Bird’s Pavillion” or “Friendship Pavillion”, depending on if you believe travelwiki or the nicely painted picture on one of the towns houses. We were joined by a british-irish couple and a nice American Lady in her best years, who has tought history at a chinese university.

After a very good lunch (always go to places that are well visited (by locals!)) we also did a “bambooo” tour on the Li River. Extremly beautiful scenery, like you can see if we can decide on some pictures 😉

Oh, and I think David would like to add that this whole place is just “leeegendaary”. And I think we both agree that it is a pleasure to enjoy and get to know a small, comparingly remote place in China. There is still much, much more to see, but I have to say I had a really good start!