Well, we do seem to have our fair share of experiences and the journey from Hanoi on the sleeper train to Nanning in south China was no exception. First class sleepers contain four beds rather than the two beds that are common on the trains we took in Thailand. Our room-mates were a mother and teenage daughter from Mongolia who were on their way to Beijing. They came on board with four giant suitcases and proceeded to take up all the luggage space under the lower beds, where it is best to stow luggage for convenience and security as it is out of sight. There are luggage spaces in a small overhead area also but we felt that we should share the lower luggage area and that they should put the 'excess' baggage overhead. Trying to explain this proved difficult and they were adamant that we leave their luggage where it was, even though we had tickets for the lower beds and hence the lower luggage space 'belonged' to us. As you can imagine, we were not content to leave things as they were!! When the woman tried to offer us a bribe to keep things as they were, pleading with us to leave the luggage where it was we started to wonder if there was more to this than met the eye. Our persistence paid off and eventually we reached a compromise whereby we would share. Things suddenly became clearer when she proceeded to empty one of the suitcases. It was packed with large parcels tightly wrapped in black bin liners and covered in sellotape - the scene would not have looked out of place in an LA drug bust! At the bottom of the suitcase were the flat packed boxes of hundreds of different types of prescription and over the counter drugs - she and her daughter were smuggling them illegally across the border into Mongolia for a profit, which of course was illegal. They kept trying to tell us not to worry as they would bribe the border guards if there was any problem with a search! We protested vehemently when she started to hide the packages throughout the carriage, under pillows and even around our rucksacks. We decided that all this had the potential for big trouble if there was a search by the Chinese customs - we could see the finger being clearly pointed at us and being dragged off by the Chinese police as corrupt westerners. A big row ensued where, with the use of sign language, we tried to tell them to put it back into their luggage or that we would call the train guard before we got to the Chinese border. Eventually they began to co-operate but we still felt uncomfortable at the prospect of a 'set-up' if they got found out. Therefore, we had to put plan B into operation. Next door were another English couple who were happy for us to come into their carriage after hearing our story. So we began negotiations with the chinese couple in their carriage to do a swap and eventually it worked. We swapped carriages and things were much happier! In the event, there didn't seem to be any problems next door but who knows whether the little Chinese couple got carted off in the night by the border guards!! After another six hours by bus, we arrived at our destination of Yangshou. The scale of China's economic assendency soon hit us, as the town was full of new immaculate buildings and centres of commerce - banks, company offices and brand new infrastructure. The journey between Nanning and Yangshou was almost entirely by new motorway. Our first impressions confirmed our previously held belief that China will become the world largest economy within 10-20 years, with all the attendent problems that could present. Yangshou is a medium sized town of 300,000 people set in spectacular scenery. The main cobbled streets of the town are surrounded by 1,000ft high limestome karsts (essentially mini mountains), the bases of which almost meet the main street. It certainly is a nice introduction to China as the town is a little more open to western ways, having a many great restaurants, cafes and bars serving excellent local and western food. It seems to be a place where the Chinese come to holiday as well and the main street is an eclectic mix of Chinese and a few westerners. English is only sparsely spoken so we have decided that we will try to learn a little Mandarin to help us get by. On the bus to Yangshou we met a Chinese bloke who spoke good english and was able to teach us some words such as Hello, Thank You, Menu, Bill etc so if we can get our repetoire up to about 50 words, it will be helpful. The other thing that is different in China is that using fingers to represent numbers is not the same. To denote a number between one and five is still done by holding up the relevant number of fingers on one hand but for six to ten, gesturing becomes all the more complex so we have had to learn this too. Since we crossed the border it has been persistently raining and not the sort of grey drizzle we get at home - torrential downpours are the order of the day. There has been a lot of flooding in the south of China during the last month or so and a few hundred lives lost but thankfully the areas we plan to travel in don't seem to have been hit so hard. We took a stroll to have a look at the river and were anxious to find it very high and fast flowing, with many a tree making its way to the open sea. The waters were close to spilling over the walls and with a few more days rain forecast that could be a problem. However, before we head out to our next destination we decided that we had to at least try and climb one of the karsts from the local park. We waited for a break in the rain to make the ascent, particularly as you are warned that there is no rescue service for westerners should you get in trouble. On the climb up we met a group of Chinese tourists who were making the trip to Yangshou for the first time, who were very eager to practice their English and were happy to impart a few Chinese words in return. We eventually reached the top to a small Chinese pagoda at the top where we were able to rest and take in the spectacular view across the town and river beyond - well worth the climb. Now we are flying over to Chengdu in the west for a spell of Panda spotting!