China- Travel Day, Day 6

Travel Day- After a direct bus to Guilin airport we got on a flight... traveled north east to the town of Huangshan.  We took an hour long tax ride to the base of the yellow mountains.  We stayed at an amazing hotel with "Andy" as our manager.  5 star rating for him and his hotel.

The hotel was so nice and even with separate beds I loved it.  Its cool to see how the shower, toilet and sink are right there.... All the hotels in China are this same way.  Very small they have everything.  Darren kept joking how "you can take a dump and wash your hair at the same time"

The food in China hadn't been awesome yet. But the restaurant in the hotel was THE best.  We were so happy to just eat!  This was a mushroom dish.  But we just got lots of food and put it on the lazy susan and spun and ate!  We did drink more coke on this trip then normal.  The liquid options were tea, water or coke usually.  

We hung out at the hotel playing games and joking around.  It was nice to slow down before the next three crazy days.  We did have to go out into the town and buy a bunch of food.  Food on the mountain was going to be very expensive so we didn't want to spend tons.  I was so happy when I found a guy eating some yummy looking bread. I offered to buy his dinner from him.  He said he would meet me at 7:00 AM the next morning with more.  I was so happy.  I just wanted BREAD!

China- Yangshuo, 10 mile Gallery- Day 5

This was the most relaxing day of the trip.  We had pushed every day to sight see but today was leisurely!  No cars are allowed on the 10 mile gallery so our scooters were awesome.  Darren had originally planned to rent bikes to bike it but scooters were so much more fun!  The 10 mile Gallery has tons of things to see but we found that most of them are overly touristy and we wanted to avoid that.  So we only went to the Big Banyan Tree and Moon Hill. It was all along the Yulong River so it was beautiful.  As we were cruising along we saw some rock climbing going on.  All the wonderful rocks we had been seeing had been eating at me so it was such a great thing to go climb and get it out of my system.  The rock was sharp for sure.  Limestone.  I did a 10D which is hard in the gym!

We hiked up Moon Hill which was amazing.  Most people just hike to the arch but we found a cool trail to the top of the arch and hung out on top.  What a view.

I adore trees.  I love roots.  This tree was amazing.  So old.  So cool to see how the the tree sent down roots from the branches to help stabilize the tree.  Brittany made us girls dress up in some traditional dress and take photos.  It wasn't too bad.  

We cruised around at a leisurely pass all day and as evening set in we had to hit up on more place... Shangrala.  Its totally touristy and we didn't want to pay 25$/per person to get in but they let us in for 15 minutes since they were closing.  It was beautiful because it was empty and the sun was setting.  I do need to find out why they have red lanterns all over China.  

Then we seriously floored it to get back to Yangshuo in time to drop off the scooters.  It is such a beautiful town.  The night life is lovely.  We hiked up a hill by our hostel to see the sunset and check out the view. You can see the drone over our heads with Darren and I sitting up on a tower.  This place was the highlight of the trip for sure.  

China- Yangshuo- XingPing Day 4

We had a good night sleep in our hostel.  Then headed out to rent scooters.  Wow.  What an adventure driving on the road in China.  So grateful for modern technology that allows us to have good map.  We cruised around the country side and loved every minute of it.  We drove to XingPing.  In 10 years this town will be huge but for now it was amazing and small.

Darren planned  a hike up Laozhai Hill, a 30 minutes intense climb.  Stairs straight up.  It was great.  We went to the top of a very tall mnt.  What a view.  We had it all to ourselves.  Kevin flew the drone and got some beautiful pictures.  After the hike we ate at a nice restaurant.  Everyone seemed pretty brave but me... I ate rice and noodles a lot!

This is the spot where the 20 yen was taken.  We jumped back on out scooters and headed out.  We had to cross the river on a little boat.  But it held us and 4 scooters.  Then the highlight... cruising through little towns and seeing the orchards.  Going on back roads covered in mud.  Following the GPS map down little alleys. 

We found a beautiful little bridge with bikes on it.  and went to an old famous bridge. And some signs were worse then others. ... this one was not yummy... show me a picture of a chicken and duck then show me a picture of them cooked and they are still looking at me!