adventures in *

Near Xingping

I had noticed the previous day, locals would order bowls of noodles and top it with various vegetables from a table in the back. Rather than ordering the specialties, which most tourists probably get rooked into because that’s what the waitress shows them on the menu first, I tried out the noodles. It’s a rice noodle, with slices of roasted pork. A stockpot had a broth to pour on top after adding condiments like pickled beans, radish, green onions, peanuts, cilantro. Good stuff, it was only 3 rmb!

After breakfast, I went to the river dock wanting to head north to Xingping. A boat owner spotted me right away and offered to take me there for 200rmb, seemed like a good deal. The first hour was a bit boring, not too many karst mountains, but the I did see the rural china. Locals were washing clothes and vegetables along the river. Cormerants were hanging out on fishermans’ rafts. Oxens were feeding in the grass along the riverbank.

As we got closer to Xingping, the mountains started appearing in the distance. This is what I came to see. The boat operator docked on the opposide side of Xingping, there was a ferry shuttled passengers to the other shore for 1 yuan each. We had noodles for lunch, at the restaurant, I noticed they used coal cores as a heat source for cooking. Come to think of it, I don’t think I saw any propane or natural gas stoves the entire time in Yangshuo or Guilin. The boat guide offered to take me further up the river for another 100 yuan, what the heck, I was already here. 100 yuan is only 12 usd, so a bargain. He pointed out the mountain range featured on the 20 rmb note.

We passed by some more amazing scenery to a bend in a river. Canopies were set up along the shore with locals sitting around camp fires. Some were cooking up food for visitors, others had computers and printers set up, powered by car batteries. The locals all had Canon or Nikon dslr’s, offering to take photos of visitors in traditional festive outfits next to the river for a few yuan. I had a photo taken of me holding a couple cormorants on a bamboo pole. I ran into a couple that I had first met in Guilin at Reed Flute cave.