When I arrived in Yangshou Wednesday morning at 4:15 am I was greeted by a couple of pesky touts. One wanted to take me to a hostel and the other was offering a cheap taxi ride. A young British woman, living in Yangshou and teaching English, was the only other other person to get off the bus. Together we fended off the touts who became a little less friendly when refused their help. The one offering to take me to the International Hostel would almost certainly have taken me to a so called “better place” place so he could make a commission. I’m not sure what the taxi driver was up to but I sure he had some kind of scam in mind. After a bit of pestering they left us alone as we walked empty silent streets to an area frequented by tourists during the day.
Since everything was shut I decided to wait for sunrise and the nice British woman continued on to the school where she is living. I found a comfortable bench next to a creek by a large river and stayed their until the sun slowly rose over steep and misty karst peaks of limestone decorted with an abundance of foliage. The scenery here is absolutely stunning.
The trip from Hong Kong. went smoothly. It took less than an hour to reach the border. Immigration and customs were a breeze. I found the bus station fairly easily with a little bit of roaming around and departed from Shenzhen on time at 7:30 pm via sleeper bus. The interior was quite clean and your given a plastic bag to put your shoes in when you board. No one is allowed to wear shoes inside. The bus is what I’d consider a regular sized Greyhound type with three long rows of bunks consisting of a lower and upper berth. It’s cozy and comfortable but if your big, wide, or taller than 6 feet then it might not be so great. In the end I didn’t really sleep all that much but I got enough rest to where I felt ok the next day.
With a population of only 310,000 I guess Yangshuo could be considered a village in China. It definitely seems more like a busy town than an actual city. It’s a very popular tourist attraction yet every bit Chinese. The vast mjority of tourist are chinese but there are plenty of westerners and english speaking establishments to make it a very easy place for just about any traveler.
I spent the morning walking all over the place getting oriented and checked out accomdation options. There are loads of places to stay so its just a matter of where do you want to be and how much to you want to pay. I chose to stay a little out of the main touristed area and settled for a quiet back street family run hotel for 60 yuan a night. Less than $10 USD. My room is situated on the top floor. It’s very clean and comfortable with wifi (that works sometimes), air con, and western style toilet.
With an abundadanceo of hiking, biking, climbing, and Chinese culture I could easily spend a week here....
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