We arrived in Guilin a few hours before the couple we met from Yorkshire (who had decided to stay in the same hostel as us since they couldn't bear to be apart from us) and we waited at the bar for them with some drinks. When they arrived, Bryan had harped on about McDonald's so much that we were all craving it. Fortunately there was one a stones throw from our hostel so we wandered over and it didn't disappoint. Unfortunately McDonald's has been too common an occurrence for us in China just because it's the only place where we knew what we're ordering! Hopefully this will be the last one for a while. Jamie and Hilary only had one night in Guilin before moving onto Yangshou but we had booked two nights here so had an extra day to fill in. We had the morning with them where we spent our time trawling through a huge market full of bookshops looking for a Lonely Planet SE Asia for Jamie and Hilary. The exact same one that we had just spend a fortune sending home a couple of weeks before because we didn't want to carry it around with us! After laughing at Jamie trying to enact travel book to various Chinese people they eventually gave up and caught the bus to Yangshou. Bryan and I then went to find somewhere to eat and spotted a restaurant with a small sticker in English welcoming English tourists. I think we were the only English people ever to have seen that sign because they were so excited to see us and dug out their poorly translated English menus and called their friends over to have a good look at us! But they were very kind and the food was cheap so we were happy for them to laugh at our attempts at using chopsticks.

It turns out there's not too much to do despite Guilin being yet another big city (as pretty much everywhere seems to be in China) but we stumbled upon a temple inside a cave which was quite unique. There was also a hill here with a good view from the top. It was far too hot for me so I stayed at the bottom while Bryan sweated it out climbing to the top. We then walked to a pretty lake with two pagodas in the middle of it called the sun and moon pagodas. There wasn't a lot to do though other than look at them from the side of the lake. We then wanted to go to see the limestone arch into the river that looks like an elephant trunk but for some reason they were charging a fortune to get in so we took a sneaky photo from under a tree and moved on to the supermarket near to our hostel. I'll confess I do get oddly excited going to foreign supermarkets and I know it's bizarre but I can't help it!

The next day we took a boat up the Li River to the town of Yangshou. The cruise took around 4 hours in total and we took in some stunning scenery of the surrounding karst mountains. This is what we had come here to see. In fact it was not unlike Halong Bay in Vietnam just with less rubbish and pollution and obviously we were on a river rather than the sea. Like Vietnam, the Chinese tour guides were keen to point out the different shapes of the rock formations such as "woman and child yearning for husband" which we could hardly ever make out but we just nodded politely. One mountain face there is supposed to disguise the shape of 9 horses, and if you could see them all, it meant that you were going to become the next emperor. Needless to say I won't become emperor anytime soon! We were given the hard sell for another excursion directly after our boat trip which Bryan insisted on doing although I was against it. Apparently we got it for half price so it must have been a bargain! Well it turned out to be more interesting than the cruise. We took a bus to a "typical local village" where we were shown typical village houses and got to feed some scary looking buffalo who were actually very gentle. We were then pushed down the river on bamboo rafts which were not unlike makeshift gondolas in Venice. We even got to go down a little dam waterfall which was fun. From our rafts we got to watch the cormorant bird fishing. This was the main attraction for us. These are the birds from the HSBC advert where they are bonded with their owner from a young age and they dive in the river to fish for their owners. The part they don't show you in the advert is that their throats are tied so they can't swallow the fish. We were told that this isn't as cruel as it sounds because the birds will only fish if they are happy and want to do it and they are fed every 7th fish they catch. Considering we were looking forward to this part the most it actually only lasted 5-10 minutes and the first couple of minutes we didn't even realise it was happening! So we were slightly disappointed it was over so quickly but we were glad we were able to witness it.

That evening we were reunited with our northern friends. Once again we were in the same hostel, despite being able to find cheaper accommodation elsewhere, Bryan couldn't face being under a different roof! We decided to celebrate in style on the rooftop of our hostel with pot noodles and supermarket beers because everywhere else was too expensive. I'm glad to see I'm not the only cheapskate! The views from the rooftop were amazing though and at night they light up the karsts around us in eerie coloured lighting. However, as the evening progressed the tranquility was shattered by the noises of the nearby bars and we realised Yangshou is like Koh Phi Phi party island but with beaches being replaced by mountains. It is the first place in China that we have been to that has been really touristy. There is a street outside our hostel appropriately named West Street which is full of little stalls and shops selling various tourist tat and during the day it is incredibly busy but at night the bars and restaurant wake up and it's heaving!

The next day the 4 of us decided to hire some bikes and cycle around to soak up some more of the gorgeous scenery. We had the option of cheaper one-speed bikes or the more expensive mountain bikes with gears. Well being with 2 northerners and a self-confessed tight arse it was 3 against 1 and we went for the one speed. It sounds stupid given the mountainous scenery but the roads are all pretty flat so apart from my bike having a very enthusiastic bell we made the right choice. By the time we got going is was midday and obviously roasting hot so that probably wasn't one of our better ideas but it was a really enjoyable bike ride. At one point we were trying to work out where we were going on our less than basic map and a friendly Chinese lady pointed us in the right direction. However, she gathered a group of friends who seemed to be following us and we soon realised they were trying to take us on some sort of tour which they would most likely want money for. Since we needed to get back for a show in the evening we told them thanks but no thanks and went back the way we came.

We had bought "VIP" seats for an apparently famous light show on the river called Impressions. It was directed by the Chinese director who also directed the Beijing Olympics opening ceremony. It uses the river as a stage as well as the karsts in the background and more than 600 local villagers perform in it although they were so professional you could never tell. I'm glad we splashed out on the VIP seats because the standard seats had no back to them! It had rained earlier in the afternoon and was threatening to rain again so they handed out ponchos since all the seating is outdoors but fortunately, for once, the rain held out. The show was fantastic and I'm afraid the photos don't do it justice. It was a stylised depiction of local village life and was very inventive with the lighting. I would absolutely recommend it to anyone. What was slightly bizarre is that Chinese don't seem to have a culture of clapping so at the end of each scene you would have a few tourists clapping and it sounded a bit silly. Towards the end of the show most people got up and started heading out before it had even finished which I thought was rude.

On our last day in Yangshou we didn't really do an awful lot because we were both feeling a bit rough with colds (probably caught from Jamie). So yes finally the mighty Bry-man has showed his human side and caught his first ever cold. Or shall I say man-flu! I had to hear about every single symptom he had as if no one had ever had this illness before. To be fair if I hadn't caught it as well I would have been concerned maybe he had malaria or something because we did have high fevers which seems to be a symptom of every tropical disease! We bid farewell to Jamie and Hilary and wished them luck on the rest of their travels. It was a little emotional since we had spent most of our time together for the last 5 days or so and we got on really well. Although I have to say that because they're probably reading this blog! And so off we went to make our way to Hong Kong via Shenzhen.