Li River

One of the highlights of the trip was our boat ride on the Li River. The river runs through Guilin and Yangshuo and many other little villages that are between them. We knew all along that we wanted to go by boat from Guilin to Yangshuo where we would spend the remainder of our vacation but we did not exactly know how that was going to happen. It was a holiday so everything was very expensive. Thankfully, we ran into a man who offered to take us for a pretty good deal. He kept introducing himself by different names so we are unsure if his name is Smiley or Jerry. Anyway, he convinced us to start our journey at 5 AM so that we could be on the river when the sun rose. The only problem with that plan is that we did not realize how cold it can get at 5 AM when you are on a river in a boat. It can get a medium to extra large amount of cold and none of us brought jackets or even decent pants. Smiley/ Jerry picked us up in a van and took us about 45 minutes along the river to where we got into the boat. It was the bumpiest and craziest ride I have ever been in. We then got into a bamboo boat that was actually made of enormous PVC pipe. Normally it would have bothered me that the hour and half boat ride that we paid for was only fifty minutes but I was so cold that if I would have been on that boat one minute longer I may have expired right there. The boat ride was gorgeous though. I loved weaving around the big limestone formations. After the boat ride we drove through some little towns and got to see where the picture on the 20 Yuan Bill Note is taken from. I am definitely glad that we went to Yangshuo by boat. In my opinion, there is no other way to go.