We had to meet our tour for the Li River cruise at 8am we took all of our stuff as we were hoping to stay in Yangshou over night and return in time for the sleeper bus.We were on the Panda tour so we had to wear little panda badges, we were driven for about 30 minutes to the souvenir quayside where boarded the boat as it was too shallow in Guilin.The scenery was fantastic all the way along the river and it was a really clear day.The riverbank and hillsides were b...

We flew in to Guilin from Xi'an this was cheaper and easier than getting the train.We got the airport shuttle bus and then we had to jump in a taxi to get to the hostel we were booked into.We walked the wrong way at first then had to double back on our self, eventually we checked in to the dorm.We took the only empty two bunks Wayne in the top one and me in the bottom (I couldn't climb up to the top one!).We decided to have a walk along the river, where there wer...

We arrived in the centre of Xi'an on the airport shuttle bus in the pouring rain.We got dropped off outside a hotel where there were tour operators trying to sell us trips straight away we declined their offer as it was getting late and we wanted to get checked into the hostel.The hostel was only a 5 minute walk from the bus stop right by the famous Xi'an Bell tower.We checked in and got a nice room an en-suite double with a balcony overlooking the Bell Tower all...

We arrived in China after I night on the train from Ulaanbaatar, which was a pleasant journey through the Gobi desert. The sceenry was pretty sparse but a great experience, lots of small towns along the railway line and then nothng else for miles and miles except desert.We had to stop on the Chinese border for visa, customs control and to have the bogies (wheels) changed for our onward jouney into China. We were here 5 hours! We arrived in Beijng (8/7/07) - and ...