What we did: Bus to Xingping, Xingping market
Budget: 450 Yuan/$75; Spent: 403 Yuan/$67.17
Jeff here.
Today was our first day in the tiny town of Xingping. Unfortunately, the weather was not cooperating with us and it was cloudy all day, with some rain. We spent as long as physically possible in our hotel this morning and had another wonderful breakfast there. They practically had to drag the two of us out of there when our shuttle arrived to take us into Yangshuo town. Confusingly, the entire area we are in seems to be called Yangshuo, which includes Xingping. But, there is also a town in the area called Yangshuo.
We took the shuttle ride into town with two other ladies who were from Taiwan. One of the ladies spoke great English and we chatted most of the ride there. They were staying at the same hotel we were. It was their first time in the area, but they have visited China many times in the past. They were very happy we skipped Shanghai. Yay!
We got dropped off at the bus station and it only took two minutes to find the correct bus, which left seconds later. It’s pretty amazing the good luck we’ve had with timing lately. The ride wasn’t very memorable, except that the road is being reconstructed for much of the way to Xingping. The condition of the road in parts was ridiculous, with the bus swaying around wildly even though it was moving at a snail’s pace. It was nothing dangerous, but it was a bumpy ride! It was also cloudy and misty so we couldn’t really enjoy the landscape, which must be just spectacular when it’s clear.
We arrived in Xingping and immediately saw a sign for our hostel. Unfortunately, it pointed in two somewhat different directions, so we were confused. We followed one direction and ended up walking down a really old lane. The buildings were literally crumbling before our eyes, but people were living in them and there were shops in them. We were slightly concerned we were heading in the wrong direction, until we saw a sign for our hostel’s restaurant, which is in a different location than the actual hostel. It was then we understood that the two directions led to the restaurant and hostel, respectively.
We only had to walk a couple minutes from the restaurant to our hostel. It is pretty nice for a hostel. It’s no Yangshuo Village Inn, but it’ll do. We’re scared that we’ve forever scarred ourselves by paying a little extra for a nicer place. We’ll have to get back into the hostel mindset!
They ended up selling us a Hosteling International card, which offers discounts at all HI-affiliated hostels, which we’ve been staying at almost exclusively the past couple of places. I’m not sure why none of the other hostels offered this to us. It cost us 50 Yuan, but it saved us 60 Yuan off our bill. These hostels also operate all over the world and the card is valid for one year, so I’m sure we’ll be able to make use of it elsewhere.
Sadly, our room is nothing like our previous room. Even though it’s clean and fairly large, it made us sad just to see it. We’ve truly been tainted. Sigh…
We had heard that it was a market day, so we asked the receptionist and she pointed us in the right direction. We wandered down the streets toward the market and strolled through the various vendors for an hour or so. There wasn’t anything really interesting. It’s basically just a time for locals to pick up the essentials. We bought some bananas and a small towel for our hands, all for $2. I was looking for some street food, but it was mid-afternoon and not too many people were eating and food was sitting out, so I wasn’t convinced. I’m missing the fried potatoes from Xi’an!
We decided to head to the hotel’s restaurant to look at their menu. Turns out they have quite an extensive menu, but it was a little too early to eat dinner. From there, we ended up buying what could be used as a centre placemat from a little old lady in a small shop. We bargained her down to 20 Yuan, but felt kind of bad for doing so. We don’t get the feeling that people are trying to rip us off here in Xingping, at least as much as in other places.
From there we headed to our hostel and we realized they made wood-fired pizzas. Of course, we couldn’t resist ordering one with mozzarella, olive oil, ham, anchovies, onions, and tomatoes. It was worth even cent of the 45 Yuan ($7.50)…delicious! It wasn’t enough to satisfy us, but that’s what dinner is for.
We hung around the hostel for a bit, figuring out how we’re going to get to Macau from Guangzhou, which is where our next overnight train drops us off. It seems that this train station is the largest and busiest in all of China (great!) and we need to find our way to the coast from there, and then onto Macau. We haven’t quite figured it out just yet, and it seems like we have a couple options. It will be another ‘interesting’ travel day!
Once we got hungry, we went to the restaurant that is affiliated with the hostel and ate dinner. We were very pleasantly surprised with our order of beef stir fry and Sichuan beef. They were both very tasty and very spicy. Without our white rice eating them would have been difficult! The meal was so spicy we didn’t even feel the cold in the restaurant! Actually, I’m not sure whether Patty or I have mentioned this in the past, but most restaurants in China are completely open to the outside. So, if it’s cold outside, you’re cold inside. Mom – you would definitely NOT appreciate the setup, especially at this time of year!!
Speaking of weather, it looks like the forecast is more cloudy, rainy days while we are in Xingping, which is really too bad because most of what there is to do here involves being outside, whether it’s walking, biking, or taking a raft down the Li River. Hopefully the forecasts are wrong and it’s a little nicer tomorrow. Otherwise it’s going to be a pretty boring day holed up in our room tomorrow!
No comments:
Post a Comment