We stayed in the centre of Guilin at Aroma Tea House, a low key yet comfortable boutique hotel with a great location, just metres away from the shores of the scenic Ronghu Lake, happy days :), and lovely place to spend the night before heading onto our next day cruise adventure.

Our second day in Guilin brought us lovely adventures and superb exciting scenery, which at the same time also required us to make the best out of our imagination. I never knew before the term “karst scenery”, but with this trip, I undoubtedly learned it, I hope you appreciate it also after finish reading this post.

 

LI RIVER CRUISE

Early morning, we journeyed 26 km south the proving to arrive at Mopanshan Pier, where we embarked on unforgettable waterway journey through Li River arriving in Yangshuo town 4 hours later.

Throughout the excursion, we were fascinated by the view and certainly loved playing with our imagination to appreciate the representations described by the local about this spectacular setting.

 

The Boat: 

Our guide told me that there are three types of cruises for this 4-hours waterway journey: These are: 3 stars, 4 stars and 4.5 stars, they all operate daily. The differences between then are mainly its capacity and quality of the meals.

 

We were booked on a 3-star type, with a capacity of 150 people, which I found indeed spacious, comfortable, and spotless. This type of boat service includes a basic lunch box which I found of a decent for a 3-star service (despite struggling to obtain a vegan option!).

The other two types of cruises offer a buffet service with a variety of dishes or more spacious seating layouts.

 

The Experience: 

 

We left Mopanshan pier at 9:30 am and journeyed through Li River for four hours. Straight away we started to enjoy the scenery by travelling around the Jiuma Huashan area. The view from our seats was beyond fantastic, almost as good as the one from the top deck, thanks to the large glass windows.

We passed near the mysterious Crown Cave and Wangfu rock, which apparently represents a woman carrying her baby while waiting for her husband’s return!, I struggled to find such shape, but there you go, this is why I mentioned earlier that we had to use a lot our imagination. It was fun to squeeze our eyes while trying to figure out the shapes!

We slowly passed by wonderful Yangdi Scenery which brought me back enjoyable travel memories from my trip to Vietnam in 2017, in Tam Coc, which offers similar mountain views.

Felipe took the role of a cameraman, and we went to the top deck to shoot a few clips of this delightful 54 km waterway excursion, a truthful natural wonder, where we certainly cherished the gifts of Mother Nature!.

Next, we passed by the Nine-Horse Fresco hill, a large and sharp stone cliff with a five peak mountain background, which from the distance resembles a mural with nine horses in various poses, here again, we had to add thoughtful imagination to see it, but the hill is one of the top attractions within this journey, so I let you judge by the photo below.

 

We also passed by Xingping Town, Yellow clot beach, people say that the surrounding hills around this town resemble a monk and a nun discussing with each other, well again imagination plays a big part here.

Lastly, we left behind Snal Hill before arriving at Yangshuo pier at 1:30pm.

The whole experience took us among remarkable karst scenery, which seemed to be artistically decorated, dotted with rolling hills, cliffs, and endless limestone sculpted peaks that it has been the inspiration of hundreds of Chinese poets, well I am not surprised, it did inspire me too.! So much that it is also featured on their ¥ 20 notes

Yangshuo:

Upon arriving at Yangshuo town we walked around and also visited the West Street market. The whole town opposes the charming scenery that surrounds it: loud, congested and a bit chaotic, full of restaurants and souvenir stalls.

 

 

Super thankful for yet another amazing adventure = 🙂 and grateful that you have read my blog.

 

“As the river surrenders itself to the ocean, what is inside me moves inside you”. Kabir 

Love

❤️

From Jenny