A flotilla holiday to Yanshuo

We decided to travel between Guilin and Yangshou by boat:

However, so had just about every other tourist in the region:

Actually it was a fine way to see the karst landscape and much better than going by bus!

When we got off the boat we glimpsed a fisherman with his cormorants:

They train them to catch fish for them in these parts. We were told a few days later by a Chinese English teacher that they tie something round their necks to stop them swallowing the catch!

We then had a few days in Yangshuo where we found our hostel was actually a class above most of the other places we had being staying, despite only costing a few pounds more.

On our first full day we hired some bikes and set off up the Yulong river (the small tributary of the bigger Li river on which we arrived the day before). We got lost a few times and cycled up roads, tracks and teeny tiny trails between the rice paddies next to the river until we reached the Dragon bridge:

We then set off back down the other side of the river where we saw the famous moon hill:

Next we headed out towards the local villages on the east side of town. By this point it was getting really rather hot and for the first time in a while the smog didn't seem to be blocking the suns rays. A very determined pedal back to town brought us back in just over 5 hours feeling a little sun kissed to say the least! Good news was our legs felt fine, despite the ever present competition between us meaning the cycle wasn't a slow one! Having showered we headed out for some food and ate a egg bread thing from a street vendor, then headed into one of Yangshuo's many mango cafés for a mango plate to share. It must have taken them 10 minutes to assemble with meticulous attention to detail:

It was a combination of fresh mango, coconut milk, sago and banana wrapped in some kind of sweat bread thing. Fabulous.

The next day having scheduled a run we decided to stay out of the sun and have a rest day. The next few days are a bit of a blur of fever for Sam and boredom for Alistair as they are confined to the (thankfully nice) hostel.

Day four and not wanting to miss all the local activities, we drugged Sam enough to attend a local cooking class. This started with a trip to the local market:

Whilst the photo shows nice vegetables they also had everything from frogs to dogs on sale. These folk really are nose to tail eaters.
A lovely lady called Amy taught us to cook pork egg dumplings, steamed chicken /tofu and mushrooms, fried aubergine, bok choi and garlic, and lotus root and veg.

All this was in a lovely country kitchen where our woks were repeatedly cleaned by some helpful ladies and we got to eat our creations at the end. Yum.

Later that evening we went to the famous Impressions of Sanjie Liu show held at night on the Li River and produced by the chap who did the Beijing Olympics opening ceremony. Despite not really being given much help on how to acquire tickets on arrival, we eventually made it in with some folk from the hostel and some Chinese people we'd picked up on the way.
Whilst it won't do it justice here are a few shots:

Despite being so hot and still it was a little like sitting in a steam room, it's quite impressive from the point of the number of people involved, all of whom are local and farmers, fisherman etc during the day. All in all a lovely way to end our stay in Yangshuo.