Yangshuo is a great place - so unexpected and unlike anywhere else I visited in China. It is distinctly geared towards tourists but not in a bad way - it has a small town centre heaving with cafes, restaurants, bars, clubs, souvenir shops and tourist agencies eager to book visitors in to the many activities that are available in the beautiful surrounding countryside.

Unfortunately I was sick and stuck in bed for most of my time there - I kept trying to go out because there so much to see and do and I didn't want to miss it but the weather was unbearably hot and sticky (even the locals were struggling!) which just made me feel worse so I was confined to my air-conditioned room

A group of us signed up for a Chinese cookery class. First they took us to the farmers' market - in addition to the usual (and unusual) fruit, veg and spices there were lots of cages of live chickens, geese, ducks, rabbits, etc. plus lots of fish, shellfish, eels, snails, frogs, turtles and suchlike - there was a even dead dog strung up but I was feeling too fragile to even look at it!

The cookery class was in a cool barn-like building out in the countryside. I got as far as chopping up my vegetables before I had to leave and go back to the hotel because the heat and the smell was making me feel worse - I was so disappointed, I desperately wanted to stick it out - anyways, I have the recipe sheet so I'll have to have a go at the dishes when I get home.

One night we went to see the cormorant fishing, which is one of the strangest activities I've ever seen in my life - when it gets dark a couple of fishermen head out in a motorboat with about twenty cormorant birds, they throw the birds in the water, wait for the birds to duck under and catch some fish, then they yank them out of the water and empty the fish out of the bird's mouth into their baskets (they have some sort of cord round the bird's neck to prevent them swallowing the fish).

When I was feeling a bit better, I joined the girls (and Brad!) for a pampering session - there was a beauty salon in town and treatments were so inexpensive that we all got a bit carried away! I had a manicure, pedicure and foot massage

On our last morning in Yangshuo, Catherine and I got up at the ungodly hour of 5:20am to go hot air ballooning - it was well worth it, a brilliant experience and a great opportunity to see the countryside (I'd missed out on the bike ride that the rest of the group went on the previous day). I was surprised by how hot the flames are - I was crouching down to try to keep away from them but I couldn't move very far in the little basket! At one point the balloon hovered in the air for several minutes in silence and the view was spectacular