The Beautiful Yangshuo

Sorry I didn't post for a while, our internet has been spotty. But it seems to be fixed and working much better now. 

Two weekends ago my group had the opportunity to go on a 4 day vacation. It was incredible in so many ways! 

If you have never heard of Yangshuo, China you should definitely put it on your bucket list. It is seriously the most amazingly beautiful place! China is definitely not how I pictured it! At least not here in the southern part. It's basically like California but with a lot of humidity and a lot of palm trees. In Yangshuo they have mountains that are referred to as the Dr. Seuss mountains because of how they are formed. This is just a glimpse of the lush beauty!!

This is the Li River. It's murky and brown but the scenery is absolutely stunning.

However, if you get the chance to come here, raft down the Yulong river on a real bamboo raft. I wish we would have done that but our trip down the river was still fun.  

As we were rafting we saw water buffalo along the side of the river. They were so big. Also the 20 Yuan (The Chinese 20 dollar bill) has these same mountains on it. It's really cool! 

We stayed at the No Kidd Inn (a hostel) and they helped us arrange all of our activities that we did. It was very helpful and decently priced. 

The second day we were there we rented bikes and biked out to Gold Water Caves. Driving in China is crazy! Everybody that drives is so aggressive!! I'm amazed there aren't more accidents! They follow really close, cut people off very sharply, block traffic when they try to turn one way or another. It's madness. So imagine riding a bike alongside that! I was afraid for my life! Ok, not really, but I was slightly nervous at times. The Gold Water Caves are so cool! They have different colored lights to light the caves and make it look so pretty. Towards the end of the cave there was a mud pool that we swam in! It was so gross feeling, but cool at the same time. If you sat down in the water and then lifted up your hand and legs you would float there, you're bum not touching the ground and your head staying completely above water. It was so strange and cool! Everyone who did it freaked out about it! It was fun. I would post a picture but my computer is being weird about letting me get pictures from my phone. :/ So that's unfortunate. 

After the mud caves we went white water rafting down the Lingjong River! That was by far the greatest thing I have ever done! When I think of rafting I think of Snake River in Wyoming which is huge and you're sitting in a big 10-15 person tube. Well this definitely wasn't that! It was a small two person raft and the river was narrow and probably not extremely deep but deep enough that we were still able to raft. It was so pretty too! Just like everything else in China it was lush and green and jungly! SO amazing! I took the GoPro down the river with me! Definitely a few gems on there! haha. I'm so glad I had that! Thanks for letting me borrow it Merik! I am extremely surprised the raft didn't pop. Those things were very durable because there were some rocks we went over that felt like they should have popped the tube. I would have gladly rafted that river every day we were in Yangshuo! It was SO MUCH FUN!!!! 

Our group before we went down

We were looking very sporty in our awesome life jackets, helmets and "safety shoes". 

I love my group. There are 16 of us and sometimes it can be quite a chore trying to keep us all together but we make it work. 

We're so excited!

My raft buddy Kaitlyn!

L-R: Ian, Ellen, Me, Josie, Tristan

 Going down the river with Kaitlyn was so much fun! She laughs at everything! Multiple times during the ride she said, "We're gonna die!" Haha. We were both screaming a ton and having a blast. Almost every time we went over a drop or a fall we were sideways! It was so scary because it felt like the tube was going to flip!
Still so much fun!

Right before the first drop! 

Loving life!

  Most definitely a high light of my life! 

The next day was a little more relaxed. We rented mopeds and drove around the city. We drove to a place called Moon Hill and hiked up it.

Moon Hill! We made it!

Funny story: As we pulled up to Moon Hill and were parking our mopeds these older Chinese women came up to us and told us they could get us in for 15 Yuan for 2 people, whereas at the gate it's 15 Yuan for one person. So we said okay and decided to follow them. They take us around this back entrance, though we didn't know that at the time, and the lady guiding us tells us to be quiet. Suddenly she runs over to the brick wall and jumps over it expecting us to follow. WHAT!?! So we all followed suit, jumped over the wall and she led us on this unpaved path to the real path. 

She snuck us in to Moon Hill!!! It was so funny! We were all dying because of the situation. 

The view from the top was really pretty! Hiking up there was so humid and hot! Not only that but the incline was pretty steep too, and a lot of stairs. It was kind of ridiculous! Dripping sweat by the time I got up. But the view on top was definitely worth it! 

After Moon Hill we decided to ride around a bit, and then we got caught in a rainstorm. Kaitlyn was driving and this video will show you what happened during this time! haha It was scary in the moment but funny afterwards. Luckily nobody was hurt. (Sorry I didn't/couldn't edit the video before I posted it.) I thought that I had stopped recording after the accident but apparently I didn't. So after the wreck you can stop watching. :)

This is what happened to our Moped

Ok apparently the video doesn't work so you can't watch it. But basically what happened was we were riding our moped on the side of the street and there was nobody in front of  us. Remember how I said driving in China is crazy? Well, suddenly this white car pulls off to the side of the road and just stops! He didn't even pull off all the way. He stopped right in front of us and we couldn't just swerve out into the road, otherwise we would have been hit by other cars. We were able to miss crashing straight into him but we ended up hitting the back corner of his trunk. It left a couple scratches on the trunk but our moped definitely got the worst of it.
They got out of the car to talk to us but we couldn't understand what they were saying and they couldn't understand us so eventually they just waved us away. There was nothing we could do! We didn't have an insurance card or anything, or a number to write down. Plus, we didn't live there!

Oops!

 When we took the Moped back to the lady we rented it from, she didn't notice at first that it was broken and she said, "Thanks, bye!" (In Chinese of course) So I started to kind of walk away but then my conscience got to me and there is no way I could have just walked away without saying anything and let her find it later. That just was not right. I actually started to cry when I thought about doing that. I would have had so much guilt and regret. So I turned around and showed her it was broken, then showed her the video. In the end we only payed 400 Yuan for damages, though she wanted more, I just didn't have it at the time. I felt terrible. Luckily nobody was injured though!

While we were walking around in the park, there was a guy making cotton candy and he made this awesome flower for me.
Well, that's all for now. I know it's a lot and that doesn't even begin to explain or cover the amazing experience I had in Yangshuo. We had delicious Mango smoothies, explored the magnificent walking street, and also got fish pedicures! Definitely a first and last time for everything! haha It was so weird! I screamed and couldn't put my feet in for the longest time!

Until next time! 

 

A cotton candy flower. So cool!

Enjoy the Ride!!