We started the day off with a relaxing breakfast by the river, the closest we have tasted to a breakfast from home (they even had proper tea)! We then ventured in to the town of Yangshuo to visit the shops and markets in West street, where some of the locals in the shops helped improve our limited Chinese. The stalls were mostly the same, offering an array of hats, fans, "Ralph Lauren" shirts, "Kippling" handbags, oriental gifts, and more fans. We finally found a...

Today I write this from my bed looking at the view of a mountain and the sound of the river in an air conditioned room at the lovely temperature of 17 degrees. After an early morning we woke to another interesting breakfast in the Guilin Bravo Hotel (see previous blog) as per usual I stuck to my trusty toast and New Zealand anchor butter. I may sound like a philistine but Chinese really do not do breakfast well from what we have seen! After checking out we met ...

The day started with breakfast at the hotel, they had tried to offer a selection of western options. Grilled sausage (Cut up Frankfurt), Continental breakfast (included plastic cheese!) and a bakery section (Coconut roll, marble cake). We then met our tour guide for the trip to the Dragon's back rice terraces. Despite the long hot car journey and the 'toilet' stop which had a communal water bowl in order to 'flush' the toilet, the trip was worth it. The stunning...

This evening we arrived in Guilin and were met by our tour guide Summer who transfered us to our hotel. On the drive we saw the tall limestone mountains which were very pretty, but our attention was drawn to the large number of moped drivers. They would weave in and out of the cars and nudge their way out at junctions, some even had passengers as young as 18 months sat by their feet. We thought Hong Kong was strange but we stand corrected, we have an all day tou...