Three Weeks With My Brother(s): Part 6 (Guilin)

January 21, 2016

Up at 5:10 a.m. to check out, grab a quick breakfast, and take the long drive to the airport.  We said good-bye to Sally and the driver, and made our way to the gate for our China Southern flight to Guilin.  A bus carried us from the gate to the plane.

The quick flight, under two hours, was a bit bumpy, but we arrived in one piece.  We stopped to use the restrooms, and when we finally arrived at baggage check, we were amused to see just five bags on the no-longer-moving carousel - ours.

Our third guide, Tony, met us just outside baggage claim.  On the drive from the airport, he told us that the name of the city, Guilin (pronounced "gway-LEEN"), means "forest of **** trees."  I couldn't understand exactly what he said, so he spelled "O-T-H-A-M-A-S-U-S."  I'd not heard of these trees before, but he pointed some out along the way.  (Later I figured out it must have been "Osmanthus.")  Guilin is a city of just 700,000 people, by far the smallest city we'd visited.  The main ethnic minority here is Zhuang (sounded like "Han,") with Miao, Yao and Dong in much smaller numbers.  Guilin is located in Guangxi, one of five autonomous regions in China, referring to a minority entity which has a higher population of a particular minority ethnic group.  Tibet and Inner Mongolia are probably the most well-known.  The particular minorities are granted certain rights in these areas, and they have a second official language.

After a lunch stop at "McFound," (wonder who their target clientele is!), we were driven to our first point of interest, the Reed Flute Cave.  The area is beautifully hilly, and we had to climb several steps up to the entrance.  We were told we could wait in the souvenir shop while Tony bought our tickets, and the sellers there were quite aggressive.  I innocently asked if they sold postcard stamps, and they persisted in trying to sell us everything else.  It also looked like they were doing off-season renovations, and we walked right through an active construction sight.

I've always loved caves, but this one was sadly a bit spoiled by the "dressing up" for tourists.  It is a huge limestone cave with many "rooms," an area the local farmers used in ancient times to hide from invading forces.  Nearly forgotten for over a thousand years, it was "rediscovered" in the 1940s by refugees fleeing from the Japanese.

Beautiful stalactites and stalagmites fill every corner - the white ones were the "babies," growing at a comparatively rapid rate; the yellow were "middle-aged," growing more slowly, and the black ones were no longer growing.  Colored lights illuminated each area, giving it the feel of a coral reef.  Various formations were given names, such as Snowman, Dragon Pagoda, and Flower and Fruit Mountain.  Each time our guide pointed out such formations, he would say, "Chinese Imagination."  The biggest "room," called the Crystal Palace, could hold a thousand people.  

"The Morning Sunrise Over the Lion Jungle"

Snowman

"Crystal Palace"

The walk through the cave was easy, with smooth walkways.  Tour groups with loudspeakers disrupted the serenity of the place, but it must be much worse during tourist season.  Tourism is the number one source of income here, and the city of Guilin has 20,000 tour guides!

Upon exiting, more hawkers tried to sell us stuff; we were amused when they spoke to us in German - "Hallo, büche?"  Must have a lot of German tourists here.

Next stop was Elephant Trunk Hill.  This rock formation at the confluence of two rivers is the symbol of Guilin, so named because it looks like an elephant with it's trunk in the water.  It's a pretty little park, with some nice views of the cliffs(?), and some cute statuary.  Across a little bridge, we entered Lover's Island, a kitschy park with kitschy depictions of couples that light up at night.  It did have a cool dragon wrapped around a tree.

Another "elephant" on the other side of the river

A relaxed stroll through the park brought us to an outdoor stage that seemed to have nonstop entertainment.  When we arrived, some young women were doing a dance routine with drums.  Later, a magician/clown came out, and embarrassed a young man from the audience who wanted to win the cool balloon hat the guy was wearing.  The clown shot an arrow through a balloon the young man was holding between is legs - yikes.

After the park, we stopped at a hotel where Tony bought our tickets for the river cruise the next day.  Then, finally, we were taken to our hotel - the Grand Link Hotel.  It is a huge hotel with lots of wings, and a very cold lobby!  Tony was kind enough to walk me to a nearby shop to buy some laundry soap.  I was very happy he came with me, because the laundry soap looked like a bar of bath soap, and I'm sure I wouldn't have communicated well enough to figure that out.  The shop was no bigger than a storage unit, and had just seven or eight shelves of items;  reminded me of some shops in Thailand.  Tony then kindly walked me back to the hotel and helped me find my room.

After a little down time, we went in search of refreshment.  The hotel bar was in the cold lobby, so we had drinks with our coats and gloves on.  Tony had pointed out earlier that a wedding would be taking place in the hotel.  We saw some activity near the entrance, and I managed to get a couple of blurry shots of the bridal party.  We later saw a woman in a traditional, western-style, white wedding gown.  Not sure if the same woman had changed clothes, or if two weddings were happening simultaneously.

 
The hotel had a Thai restaurant on the second floor, where we enjoyed some green papaya salad and chicken satay.  Communication was again a challenge, and when it came time to settle the bill, several staff members got involved to figure out how to split our bill.  Needy Americans!