A 5am start saw us say goodbye to Xian. A flight to Guilin mid-morning and a bus trip (via a visit to a tea plantation and a lunch stop) had us arriving at the foot of some fairly serious hills, with our lodge in one of the villages an hour's uphill walk away. As soon as we arrived in the carpark, the bus was swamped with a horde of chattering Yao women, all wanting to take our baggage up to the lodge. The phrase "Kilkenny cats" comes to mind - there seemed to be a lot of bargaining and hustling going on, with Jason in their midst trying to sort out who to employ for the task.
My bag was the biggest and apparently the heaviest, and the ladies wanted extra payment to heave it upwards. Who knew that those bricks from the Great Wall would weigh so much? It was incredible to see these women carry the bags on the long and steep trail - their efforts match those of the porters in Nepal. As well, it was very warm with about 500% humidity - I was absolutely drenched in sweat by the time I arrived.
That's my bag on the right. Maybe it wasn't really that heavy after all.
Our lodge.The views here were simply spectacular. The rice terraces are incredibly beautiful and awe inspiring, and I'm not sure that my pictures do them justice at all.
Of course, there were other sights as well in the villages and on the trails, but I wasn't able to update the blog mainly because I didn't bring a cable that was compatible with their communications system :
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