We were picked up at 8am by the taxi to take us to the tour bus in the centre of Guilin where we were met by a coach and several other tourists waiting for a little adventure. Our tour guide was a lovely camp chap who was very sweet indeed often repeating the delights of Yangshou “the most beautiful town in the province and the one of the most beautiful towns in all of China!”. We were promptly told that we would be in his team and our instruction was to follow the panda flag. So far we’ve managed to escape the tour groups led by flags so this was our first encounter of this, and we wondered whether we had chosen to do the right thing at 380 RMB each this better be good!!

We met a Dutch couple on holiday in China and exchanged travel tales as the boat set off. We shared the slow boat with a few other tour groups and every so often we would get called up onto the top deck for the best views in all of China. Unfortunately the weather didn’t really help in assisting it’s beauty but on a misty day it was still very beautiful indeed. The light was pretty flat for the most part but we hope the photos give you an idea of what we encountered. We were able to take our bags on board so we could carry on from Yangshou at the other end rather than making it a return journey to Guilin. The boat journey was around 4 hours and we had 4 main sights, although there are sights all the way and either on a bamboo raft or the slow boat you’ll get some amazing views on a clear day. There are various peaks names along the way such as Half-moon peak and 11 horse cliff, but the most memorable and probably famous is the one of that is pictured on a 20 Yuan note. The picture is a sketched out version of the Li River with several karst peaks jutting out of the landscape and a lonely man on a bamboo raft. Many moons ago this image would have been a reality but now there are so many tour boats and bamboo rafts on the river it’s pretty hard to enjoy the original views. Still it’s worth seeing and we were laughing at the count down to the view…5 more seconds and you will see the image on the 20 yuan note, 3 more seconds, 2 more seconds, 1 more second and so it went on. We saw the view, no bamboo raft but it was fun all the same.

We were provided with a buffet style lunch which was very fortunately served up just as we were exploring the downstairs part of the boat, this mean’t we were at the front of the queue and the food was hot. It wasn’t a bad lunch actually, you can pay more for the local dishes but there isn’t any point if you plan to go to Yangshou as you can eat there very cheaply. There were a few amusing tourists on board that captured our eye for a while until the boat got in to Yangshou at around 1pm.

We promptly said our goodbye’s and left the tour group to find our hotel/Inn; The Bamboo Inn. When we arrived they said we could move to their quieter hotel, The Bamboo Hotel down from the street if we wanted to go and have a look, we asked the see the room with balcony but there was a big gap in the door and as it was pretty chilly so we went to see the other hotel to compare. We were a little miffed about this as you have to wonder why are they taking us to their sister hotel and not showing us other rooms at the one we CHOSE to book? The room at the other hotel was fine and a little more modern but it’s still an odd one why they do this! The price was still the same though at 80yuan per night and we had only planned to stay 2 nights in the town itself before moving to a recommended hostel 15 minutes walk away in a quieter village out of town.

We walked around Yangshou’s busy streets that afternoon and bumped into Will again from TUL (The Unemployed Life) he was rounding up people for the Monkey Jane’s NYE party along with a few others. We had already heard about the infamous Monkey Jane’s hostel from other travelers along the way and knew this was where the party would be if any were going on in town for New Years. We dropped by to pick up our tickets and free t-shirt after meandering the streets of Yangshou it was pretty busy, we’d been told on our tour that Yangshou attracts around 15 million Chinese visitors each year…we were just glad we weren’t visiting during peak season as it was busy enough for us.

We enjoyed a quiet night and opted to do a bike ride the following day.

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f2.0 & Olympus PEN, 17mm f2.8 & 100mm f2.8, processed in Lightroom 3)

31 today!! Eek!! A far cry from last years fancy dress vintage themed party with all my best mates at Holyrood!! Still being in Beijing was pretty special and we made the effort to go and see some sights for the day. Dave bought me a lovely notebook from the Frank Gehry exhibition shop, I’m always jotting and sketching down thoughts, plans and ideas so it was very warmly received! A Porridge and banana special for breakfast and we were on our way.

We set out for the Beijing Botanical Gardens, inspired by the success of our bus journey a few days ago we attempted to tube and bus it to the site. The lonely Planet were not entirely accurate in providing information as to which bus to get so we ended up on the wrong path. A quick turn around for a taxi and we arrived at our destination. It isn’t perhaps the best time of year to visit the Botanical Gardens as not much is in flower, but we did find some lovely paths out towards a temple and icey lakes to throw stones on. There was a fair amount of ice on the lake and some gorgeous frosty views. Its well out of the city so you do feel far away from the business of central Beijing.

The tropical greenhouse (much larger than your average garden greenhouse!) was a nice place to get warm and enjoy some cactus growing plants alongside more brides and grooms to be having their pre-wedding photographs taken amongst the orchid garden.

On our way back we stopped off for a quick birthday bite at Japanese fast food chain Yoshinoya. A place that didn’t really entice us whilst we were in Japan but is definitely projected as being a more upmarket food chain over in China, interesting! They even had vegetables on the menu! We went back to the apartment and decided to get ready for our night out.

We had very good intentions of going for a massage at Dragonfly, our favourite and slightly self-indulgent massage parlour in Beijing! What stopped us in our tracks however was an hour delay at Xinjeikou metro station, this was so far our favourite stop as there were never as many people using it and it was well located! So we changed plans and head straight for Gouladjie which was only a few stops away, there was a Malaysian restaurant recommended to us around that way that we wanted to go to. We found Cafe Sambal on the left hand side a couple of streets down from the tube stop set in a Hutong area. It’s a little hidden away behind some wooden doors but inside was a very nicely lit ambient bar and restaurant which was packed to the ceiling with locals and westerners…good so far! At the bar we waited for a table and drank mojitos. We love it that you can buy mojitos over here for around £3, I’m pretty sure we’ve had one for as low as £2! The food was very good, although they could do with upping their portions a little! The room was a little chilly where we sat, but having said that the atmosphere was lovely and as far as birthday settings go this was again pretty frickin’ sweet!

After dinner we went for a walk along the street and came across a very cosy little desert cafe. This was enough to entice us in and we sat with our ginger teas, apple cake and chocolate truffles whilst watching the world go by.

Thank you Dave for a lovely day! I think the 30 year plus grumps came across me when I realised I am now past the tender year of 30, which has been a blooming marvellous year so far!

All my love and thanks for all the birthday messages on Facebook.

Helen x

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f2.0 & Olympus PEN, 17mm f2.8 & 100mm f2.8, processed in Lightroom 3)