Two Rivers and Four Lakes
Somehow I feel am writing one after a very a very long time.
In between, wordpress and the theme ran into trouble few times and I had to do a lot just to get it back to the stage what it was.
After a real long time, we are back to a vacation in abroad to count our wedding anniversay. I had definite overheads about choosing a place thats just calm and requires less physical efforts to explore the region. Initially I considered Japan, Australia and Korea (Jeju Island) on the big scale and all of them really had enough to offer that would again change the trip to a long and bit hectic. I saved those places for a later stage and started considering Bali (Villas) and driving to Malaysia. However, she was not much interested to these and suggested China. I was bit pale considering the previous experience it gave me in 2008 (sichuan earthquake) and still brave enough to look for the options that meet my criteria.
After plenty of search, Guilin was chosen for its beauty, weather and most importantly for the english-understanding culture. Unlike other long vacations, this didnt give me real overheads to fix the itinerary as Guilin got just few things to see and do. Applying visa in chinese embassy was the quickest visa applying affair so for, for me. Pre-requisties, Flight tickets, hotel booking, photos with the application gets the visa on 4th business day for a cost of 90$(??!!) per person.
02 April 2013
We took Cathay Pacific to Guilin with the Hong Kong transit for few hours. We spent some window shopping in Hong Kong airport and got the connecting flight almost when they announced last call. Thanks for the very long and odd way to reach Dragon Air flights. Weather forecasts were shouting T-storms in Guilin for the rest of the week and I had very less hopes about sightseeing and counted high on the hotels we would be staying (both were the best hotels in Guilin. 😉 ).
We landed in no time (or 1 hour and 10 mins to be precise) in Guilin. And the domestic-only looking internation airport had no other passengers other than my flight. Which clearly helps to clear the immigration quickly. When I came to the arrival hall, I started to get the sense of Guilin – its just sleepy. My first attempt – to find the airport shuttle to the Guilin town.
First things first.
Guilin may be the most beautiful place in China – no doubt. Obviously that led to turn the country to get exposure to english (still at a scale of 2/10). However, one thing they mastered is – How to make the tourists pay the highest fee across the globe. For chinese economy, they charged higher than Singapore tourist attractions fee itself. And worst part is, its not straight forward. So extreme caution required. In any case, for a 3~4 day sightseeing, be prepared to spend around $500 (USD) for couple.
So – this expendituer may start even from the airport if we opt for Taxi or pickup options. They charge anywhere between $50 to $100. Cheapest option is to take the airport shuttle which charges 20 CNY per person to get to the town.
Even asking where to board airport shuttle cant be answered by anyone as they dont understand anything – but we managed to find as its a very small airport. We got dropped off at Guilin Civil Aviation hotel and took a taxi that charged us to drive to Lijian waterfall hotel thats hardly 1KM away for 15 CNY after bargaining a lot.
Lijiang Waterfall hotel.
This is one of the best hotels in the town without any doubts and if we consider access to the shopping and access to sight-seeing areas – this IS THE BEST.
My initial bet was Sheraton considering my comfort level with chinese food – however, ended up booking this hotel for 3 nights and kept the last night stay to Shangri-la to make it special.
On the day of landing, I considered “Two Rivers and Four Lakes” for the evening trip as the lighting along the banks of the river is pretty amazing. I should have done more reading on that. I enquired the staff and they booked it from hotel – and later realized, the starting point for that tour is right in front of the hotel (lake). Prices were not different to the hotel and the attaraction but obviously I would have opted to my choice given an option.
Two Rivers and Four Lakes
Li River just the major part of the town and anywhere you go, we are not far from the river. In this scenic place, Li river, Taohua river, Mulon Lake, Guihu lake and Shanhu lake are covered. Sun and Moon pagoda glow more than gold at night and thats spectacular thing to watch. I wished a tripod for my new 5D Mark III to steal the lovely sight!
Its basically a boat trip in circle that passes through various bridges and dedicated bankside performances. Lightings are a delight to watch. They make the place very dramatic. Somewhere I read that the investment and maintenance is still not covered by the management despite higher entrace charges. Imagine the decoration!
In the middle of the tour, there will be a cormorant fish catching show. The cormorant bird’s nect will be tied with a loose knot enough not let the bird to swallow the fish and then kicked to the water. Those fast fierce looking dive into the water and get the fish but fail to swallow completely and return to the boat. Then the fisherman gets the fish and the bird goes to the work again. Am not sure whether people still continue to fish this way anymore – but tourist are truly entertained by this act. I heard it takes years to make the bird to practice for this.
We wished to try the streetfood but ended up in eating in the Spanish restaurant right across the sheraton – cheaper but mouthwatering food.
Lijiang waterfall hotel has it own show at 8:30pm every day that creates waterfall from their hotel for 10 mins with milky lights which makes the whole place look beautiful.
And as if thats not enough, this place is surrounded by way too many pedestrian streets which offer suveniors to food. We took a leisure walk in that cool weather which drizzled very light to make it even bettter.
0 Comments