Following my visit to Danxiashan I ventured to Guilin to see the famous Li river section of the South China Karst. Already in Guilin itself you see plenty of rocks rising up and driving to the embarkment of my cruise I noticed even more. The scenery is spectacular and well worth the visit.

On my way back to Guilin we also travelled along the mountains, but this time on the other side. And this is where the site's shortcomings become clear. This isn't a huge fenced off National Park, but a scenic stretch along the river. On the other side of the mountains you are back in civilization with cars, highways and plenty of concrete buildings.

Getting There

I visited the Li river (Li Jiang / 漓江) part of the site from Guilin by cruise. Guilin is a less than 3h trip from Guangzhou South. See my comments on the Guangzhou train station in the China Danxia post.

The Li river cruises leave only in the morning; there are no noon or afternoon cruises. Which is a pity as you won't get the sunrise or sunset shot of the scenery.

It's next to impossible to get to Guilin from Guangzhou in time for the pickup (before 8 a.m.). So I stayed overnight in Guilin with the added benefit that hotels are way cheaper in Guilin than in Guangzhou (140 CNY vs 340 CNY).

In Guilin the train station for nearly all bullet trains is North of the town center and you will likely have to get a cab to get to your hotel. Plenty of cabbies will contact you in the arrival hall, but there is also an official taxi stand (follow the signs) with police present. I went for that and paid 25 CNY for my cab to the city center.

If you really want to do this as a day trip (and seeing this is part of the Guangzhou Hotspot) there are a few daily bullet trains to Yangshou. The town of Yangshou is part of the inscribed area. It also offers plenty of options to explore the surrounding area. The bullet train station is some 25km away, but cabs are cheap and there are also busses.

In any case, disregarding if you travel to Guilin or Yangshou and stay overnight or do a day trip, you need to reserve your train tickets in advance (weeks). For Yangshou all tickets were already sold out when I tried to reserve a few weeks prior. And even with Guilin I did not have my free choice of train.

Getting In

There are two options from Guilin to visit the site: by cruise or by bamboo raft. Originally I had planned to go by bamboo raft, a shorter trip but supposedly a bit more intimate experience than the large cruiser boats. But when my hotel concerige explained to me the rather short itinerary (1.5h by bamboo raft vs 4h by cruise boat) I changed my plans.

Looking back I think it was the right call as it was really nice to take in the full river and scenery from start to end. I booked the cruise including English guide for around 350 CNY in my hotel. If I understood it correctly, all cruises are operated by the Guilin Tourist Corporation, the only difference being the category of the cruise ship. I went with a 3 star cruise and it was fine.

Disregarding what option you choose the operators will pick you up near your hotel and take you to the embarkment. For the cruise it was a bit more than an hour to get there. At the embarkment you will need your passport as you go through security and checkin.

All trips end in Yangshou in the early afternoon. There you have some time to explore the city on your own, i.e. shop for souvernirs. Or you can join yet another tour to explore the surrounding native villages and scenery. Arrangements can be made on the cruise boat and prices are reasonable.

In my case in yet another case of underestimating transfer times in China, I urgently needed to get back to Guilin to catch my train at 17:55h. We arrived at 14:00h and I took a ride to the bus from the pier (20 CNY). Not sure if this was the proper bus station. Supposedly, there are half hourly direct express busses to the old Guilin Central Station. The bus I took (30 CNY) stopped along the way and did not go to Guilin central, but to a bus stop on the outskirts of town (1.15h). From there I hopped into a cab (65 CNY) and made it to the station at 16:15h. I don't think you can be much faster and taking the time at the station into account I would recommend to plan at least 3h for the trip.

While You Are There

I think Guilin and Yangshou deserve way more time than I awarded them. I would have loved to visit the Longji Rice Terraces and explore the surrounding area and landscape a bit more.

Trivia

The Chinese 20 CNY bill is decorated by a rock formation along the Lii River. It follows that all Chinese aboard our cruise ship pulled out their 20 CNY bills and took selfies with the rock formation as background.

Our guides spent plenty of time of telling the story of each rock formation. Still, doing my utmost best I could neither make out serpents, horses nor apples, but the rock formations are nice to look at it nonetheless.

Our guides also spent plenty of time selling "local" products such as perfumes and liquors. Unfortunately, they were equipped with a megaphone and spoke English so I had to endure this for a bit.