Guilin
- Amazing Landscape
Taking a trip into the hully
karst landscape of Guilin at sunset is one
of the most breath-taking site in China.
Guilin by the banks of the Li River in southern
China is justifiably considered to be one
of the most beautiful in China. Today, Guilin
attracts innumerable tourists because of
its unique landscape. Until the end of the
1970s, it was a quiet, sleepy area. Since
then, Guilin and the settlements along the
Li River have undergone an incredible development
through tourism. This town with over 400,000
inhabitants acquired its name from the Cassia
trees, whose blooms carry their sweet scent
through the whole town in autumn. Guilin
literally means "Cassia Tree Forest".
Guilin is said to be founded in 214 BC.
At that time, the Lingqu Canal was built
under the regency of the first Chinese emperor,
Qin Sin Huangdi. It still connects the central
Asian plain with southern China, and South-East
Asia, via the Yangzi, the Lijiang and the
Pearl river. Guilin and its surroundings
are still mostly agricultural, but this
is limited by the numerous mountains which
pose a problem in the whole of Guangxi region.
The landscape is characterised by terraced
rice paddies, water buffalos, and bamboo
groves, and peasants with turn up trousers
and cone-shaped straw hats. Guilin is famous
for it spicy Guilinjiang, a type of pepper
sauce. From the Mountain of Coloured Layers,
a 223 metre high mountain on the north,
visitors can get a wonderful view of Guilin
and Lijiang. The most beautiful tourist
spot is the Crystal Palace of Dragon King,
in the Reed Flute Cave at north west of
the city centre and a subterranean water
landscape, which resembles the landscape
around Guilin and the Li River.
A boat trip on the peaceful
Li River is the absolute high point of any
visit to Guilin. A cruise from Guilin to
Yangshuo, visitors will experience the winding
and twisting Li River, goes past the many
bizarre mountains whose shapes have inspired
and fired the Chinese imagination, the Elephant
Trunk Mountain, Old Man Mountain, Pagoda
Mountain and Hole Mountain. Cormorant fishermen
in narrow bamboo boats, bathing children,
water buffaloes, small settlement and women
doing their washing on the banks of the
river can be seen along the way. Yangshuo,
at the end of the boat journey is today
a developed village that thrives mainly
on tourism and seems to have nothing but
tourist shops.
North-east of Guilin is Sanjiang,
a settlement of the Song people. Changyong
Bridge is an architecturally unique sight.
South-west of Guilin, in the centre of the
Autonomous region of Guangxi is Linzhou
with 600,000 inhabitants, is an expanding
industrial town, pricturesque and typically
southern Chinese. The main attraction is
the Dule Rock with its numerous karst caves.
Another area with a beautiful landscape
is the settlement of Guiping. The capital
of the Autonomous Region of Guangxi is Nanning.
It is located deep in the south and is only
160 km from the Vietnamese border. South-west
of Nanning, near the Vietnamese border by
the river Zuojiang, is a landscape as fantastic
as that in Guilin. In Ningmeng county, visitors
can see a 1,700 year old mysterious rock
painting along a steep rock face by taking
a boat on Zuojiang river.
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