Alex Goes To China

Jo and I are back in Beijing for the next few days. The flight from Guilin airport was a a quick 3 hours and now we are enjoying our favourite Chinese city before heading to Hong Kong for a 9 hour stop over on Monday and then back to Melbourne on Tuesday.

We are quite tired from our adventurous cycling, rafting and swimming around and in the lakes of Yangshuo. So we are resting, eating and doing a bit of last minute shopping before we return. Today I bought a pair of high powered binoculars that are about 50cm long. They will make an excellent tool for my amateur astronomy.

Jo seems to have some hayfever, but its nothing rest wont fix. Its been such an amazing trip. Everything has gone according to plan, well almost. And the things that didn’t have been amazing too.

China has so much to offer a ‘foreigner’. It is new and old. Politically rich with a vibrant community of ethnic groups and diverse agendas. It is also politically difficult, with its communist regime still all powerful.

If you ever get a chance to visit China, make sure you visit Beijing and Yangshuo, they for me are the best places I know of. I have alot of pictures from Yangshuo, I will upload some of them when I have time.

Arriving in Yangshuo by bamboo raft, overcrowded bus and finally electric powered tricycle is an experience in itself, but once you are here you can see why the local travel guides (who should be avoided like the plague) carry business cards that state: “Guilin is a beautiful place in China. But Yangshuo is better.”

Our guesthouse sits next to a small canal in the middle of the village sized town and a view of a 200 million year old rock formation in the background. Yangshuo is very touristy, the term ‘global village’ has been used by tourist maps (I wonder if they have read Marshal McLuhan) but it is really beautiful and you can understand why a lot of people would want to come.

Jo and I took a tandem bicycle out of Yangshuo yesterday and rode it to the next village; Fu Li. This was much more authentic, without the hustle of people trying to sell you $5 Rolex watches. We sat at a corner store on tiny little stools and drank two cokes and offered cigarettes to a group of older men that were looking at us  from a few metres away. They then came over and sat with us and talked to Jo in Chinese. They asked where we are from and when we said ‘Ao-da-li-ya’, which is Chiense for ‘Australia’, they looked confused. It was obvious that they had never heard of it. Jo explained that it is south of China. Then we moved on, talking about a map of the local area we had brought, which they were fascinated by. Later they asked if we were Americans. We said “no” and left it at that.

We have now caught up with Jimi Barlow, a friend from Australia, and are sharing a room with him at the Magnolia. We are planning a 20km bicycle ride today, but this time without a tandem – they suck, especially when you are being overtaken by a 20ton Russian tip truck in a narrow tunnel.