Discover Your Way

The morning starts on a guilin li river cruise tour from the town dock, settling in as the banks widen into the first of the karst hills.

On this guilin boat tour the stretch called Nine-Mile Beauties unrolls on both sides, peaks named for a rooster, a hen and a lotus cushion.

The day begins along east west alley guilin, a pedestrian spine of old storefronts and tea houses, threading between the southern gate and the market blocks.

You reach the ancient south gate, a rebuilt Ming rampart and arch over the road, where your guide shows how the old city walls met the rivers and canals.

The xingping ancient town photo tour opens before sunrise at the lower Li, framing the karst stacks and the twenty-yuan hillside reflected on flat water.

Near Yangshuo the day moves to a ten mile gallery photo spot, a lane of pull-outs over rice fields and rock cones best lit at either edge of the day.

The morning walks the Pingan section of the longji rice terraces day trip, a ridgeline of stacked paddies curving down the mountain toward the valley.

From the high platform one day guilin rice terraces views fan out over the Nine Dragons ridge, the shelves running away in long curving lines.

The day starts at silver cave yangshuo, a two-chamber limestone show cave at Tongguan with a subterranean stream and dripstone lit against the rock.

Late afternoon turns to an yulong river evening, a bamboo raft sliding the shallows under farm smoke and the peaks going amber before dusk.