I'm condensing the last week into one entry to shorten the catching up I need to do! Here's a quick overview on the rest of that trip;
After my adventures in Changsha I headed down by bus to Guilin, a picturesque city surrounded by limestone peaks which rise from the flat ground giving the landscape a dreamlike quality. I stayed for a couple of days in which I walked around the city and travelled out to have a go on a dry luge run on the side of a small mountain with a British fella and a Swedish girl I’d met in the hostel. We careered down the run, trying to ignore the angry stewards who blew their whistles if you attempted to go over 5 miles per hour, I think the translation on their jackets may have actually read ‘fun police’.
The next day I was feasting on a stir-fry awaiting my bus to Yangshuo when an Australian lad approached me and mentioned he was going my way. We headed for the bus together and found that, despite there being a bus every half hour, the elderly lady insisted we bust a gut to catch the one pulling away from the station. After a 200 metre chase Usain Bolt would’ve struggled to beat we were shoved on to the bus which had stopped in the middle of the main street and sat on the last two seats available at opposite ends of the vehicle. I wiled away the journey with a college kid who looked about 12 and complained there were too many Chinese (despite being Chinese himself) and that all us westerners look the same. Upon arrival in Yangshuo we found a hostel recommended by the Lonely Planet and found there were no beds at the main building but they could accommodate us at their overspill building. We exchanged worried glances as we were led down a back alley and across a building site and prepared our excuses for going elsewhere when we were led into a beautifully refurbished room with solid wooden beds and a fully equipped ensuite bathroom with a standalone wooden bathtub and a rainfall shower head. We happily settled ourselves in before heading out for food and a couple of beers. That night I got to know Michael, an unfeasibly nice lad from Whittlesea, just north of Melbourne. It turned out, as it often does travelling, that we had very similar views on a lot of things and got on very well. At the end of the night we strolled back to the room and let ourselves into the room when we were confronted by a wailing banshee sitting up from her bed and exclaiming ‘OHMYGODAMIINTHEWRONGFECKINGROOM?!’. We calmed her down and met Cate, a pretty yet formidable farmer’s daughter from Ireland who would be sharing with us for the next few days.
Our time in Yangshuo was spent cycling around, appreciating the stunning scenery and spending evenings getting drunk in an atmospheric bar run by a Spanish couple who had excellent taste in music. Particular highlights were eating a fish killed in front of our very eyes by Cate at a local restaurant (she actually requested that she be allowed to do it!), cycling in nothing but shorts and a t-shirt through a narrow tunnel inches from fast moving lorries who most certainly weren’t going to give you extra space for being on a bike, and swimming in a deserted area of the river under a waterfall alongside local ducks and cattle. Before leaving Yangshuo I exchanged details with Michael and agreed to meet up when he returned to Melbourne around Christmas time.
After that it was on to Hong Kong for me. It was a long journey via Guilin and Guangzhou but I eventually arrived at a humid, sweaty city chock full of people. I walked straight to ‘Chungking Mansions’, a crumbling enormous block containing an indoor market and tens of hostels within its many floors. I went for a name that appealed to my tastes and found that the ‘Payless Hostel’ was surprisingly nice and my single room with ensuite may have been the size of a broom cupboard but was clean and had an air conditioning unit. Later on it was time to meet up with one of my favouritest people in the whole world, Sarah Prior, who had gone from being one of my sister’s friends to a family friend and Christmas fixture at the Cornforth’s years previously. The next few days were a whirlwind tour of Hong Kong’s markets and restaurants with Sarah’s irreverent commentary on the Chinese, the expats and many other subjects besides. An hilarious few days were capped off by Sarah sucking pure vinegar through a straw for a dare by her friends Sal and Dags and nearly vomiting across the restaurant. So then it was on to Australia, and the next stage of my adventure…