Day 27: 2/5 Floating on Air...Well, Technically Water

                I woke up this morning and went straight up to the roof to look at Yangshuo in proper lighting, and let me tell you it was beyond any words I could say.  The entire area was probably the most beautiful place I have ever been.  Through the hostel, we booked a 1:30 bamboo boat tour, so in the mean time we just planned to walk around town and explore.  We first went to this little restaurant/café that had an awesome breakfast menu.  I got the “Special Breakfast” (I think that’s what it was called) which included a fried egg, steak, French fries, a banana pancake, coffee, and orange juice.  The French fries weren’t the best but they were much better than river shrimp! The banana pancake was delicious! It was basically a crepe with bananas in it, but it tasted so good.  And I am not an OJ fan, but the orange juice was fresh squeezed and extremely tasty.  I was so happy to have something substantial in my belly.  During breakfast we were approached by this Chinese woman, Wendy, who spoke English well and asked if we would like to take a bicycle tour with her the next day.  We all decided that it would be fun and set up a time to meet up with her the next day.  We then walked around town wasting some time, looking around, and trying not to die crossing the hectic streets.  After enough time had passed we headed back to the hostel where we would leave to go to the bamboo raft rides. 

We were picked up by this van which had about four rows of seating behind the driver.  We picked up many other groups of people and happened to pick up a life-long learner, Rachel, from SAS.  The van drove for about an hour or so, much of which was on a small dirt road which had several large dips and bumps.  On top of the not-so-great road, we had a pretty crazy driver.  I’m not sure if it is just the culture, but many of the drivers here seem to regard the lines in the road as mere suggestions rather than something to follow.  I think our driver spent just as much time in the center of the road or on the other side of the road passing others as he did on the side of the road he was supposed to be on.  Also, honking here is something used about every ten seconds by one driver, so add all the other drivers and you have a pretty constant tune of honks.  The honking here is used to inform other drivers that you are there, or you are passing them, or whatever it may be, rather than what I’m used to where we use our horns to tell someone to pay attention because the light is green or to tell them how big of a jerk they are and where they can stick it.  After my life had flashed before my eyes more times than I would have liked, we finally made it to where the boats were.  These boats each held four people and were (to my disappointment) motorized.  I was imagining and hoping for a boat that was paddled by a person with a stick similar to the gondolas in Italy, but there was no such luck.  As we were herded onto the boats by a Chinese man who sounded like he wasn’t very happy, we were handed life vests and were motioned at to put them on.  We then set off to the river.  My boat was unfortunately attached to another boat, so I wasn’t able to see some parts of the mountains that we passed but it was still amazing.  The boats traveled at a decent pace, but everywhere you looked there were these astounding mountain formations that seemed to just jut out of the ground.  I was in complete awe for the entire boat ride.  I couldn’t even wrap my mind around the fact that I was in China in this beautiful, majestic place.  It blew my mind.  I think I took a ton of pictures because I wanted to capture the beauty of the region, but no matter how much I try to describe it or try to capture a picture to depict it there is no way to do it justice.  It is one of those places that you have to see to be able to understand what I’m talking about.  Don’t get me wrong…the pictures help, but seeing these things in person is 1000 times better than any picture.  During the boat tour, we stopped at two “scenic” spots where they would take your picture and you could buy a copy.  We took pictures in both spots but with our own cameras.  After those stops we headed back to where we started.  At this point, if you looked toward a certain direction it was the exact scene that is pictured on the back of the 20 Yuan bill!  Cool huh?

After another heart-stopping van ride, we arrived back on familiar ground.  We went back to the hostel for some good down time.  We sat around the hostel’s common area drinking a big bottle of beer that cost 6 Yuan (approximately $1) and talking to the other travelers staying in the hostel.  It was really cool just talking to these people and hearing about their travels and what had brought them to the No Kidd Inn; some were backpackers travelling all over the world, others were in China teaching English to children, and others were just there on vacation.  After a while, a SAS student, Bryson, came into the hostel who knew Braden and Emily.  The five of us then went out to try to find some dinner (preferably not river shrimp).  We ended up at this restaurant right off of the river.  Allie and I decided to play it safe and split a lemon chicken (which turned out to be delicious!) and some noodles which very well could have just been ramen noodles.  While we were sitting there, fireworks were going off in the distance and reflecting off the river which was pretty cool to watch.  We then ventured down this street of little market stands where people were bargaining left and right for miscellaneous items.  As we were walking, everyone seemed to get a hankering for some ice cream and I also realized that I had to pee really badly (yeah that’s probably too much information, but this leads to quite a personal accomplishment so bear with me).  We then came across a McDonalds, so I thought that I’d be able to kill two birds with one stone.  When I got into the bathroom, it was a squatty-potty which have been everywhere in both China and Japan, but I had avoided using one up until this point.  I won’t go into any more details, but it was definitely a different experience.  Anyway, we all got McFlurries and headed back to the hostel.

When we got back, I decided that I should probably take a shower and be a little hygienic.  The bathroom in our room at the hostel was basically a room with a toilet, a sink, a shower head attached to the wall, and a drain on the floor, so if you wanted to take a shower the entire bathroom would turn into your shower.  It was kind of nice not having a confined space that was covered by a curtain to shower in, but the entire bathroom was wet and flooded after my shower. 

The group then decided to check out the night life of Yangshuo, so we went to the busy street of the town and found many different “clubs” bumpin’ music and packed with people (and smoke).  We went into this one place after paying a set price; I wasn’t sure if that was for a certain amount of beer or more like a cover charge to get in.  When we got in, we noticed that there was this little stage in the middle of the room with a lit floor and a pole on one side.  We sat in this booth and were drinking beer when the “MC” (the guy that was dancing around on the stage with a mic in hand) motioned for us (the only non-locals) to go dance on the stage with him.  All of us were compliant with his request and made our way through the people around the stage.  We started dancing a little bit when the people around the stage (most likely intoxicated) were taking pictures like teenage girls seeing Justin Bieber and then were getting pictures with Braden and Bryson.  The locals were having a great time watching and dancing with all of us, and it was really fun for us as well.