Longsheng Terraces and the Acrobatic Show

We spent the afternoon wandering around Elephant Hill (a hill with many paths, a nice view and wild pot plants growing on the sides of the foot paths) and taking the path along the lake and river back to the hostel. The next day we were on a trip to see the amazing Dragon’s backbone rice terraces, and the hill-side village of Longsheng. The trip to the rice terraces was a bit overwhelming, on a air-conditioned tourist bus, we arrived at the Ping ‘an village where we were herded into the village like sheep and told to buy tickets to watch some hair show (the woman of the village cut their hair once in their life, when they were 18.) which we passed on and opted to wander around the village alone while the hoards of people went into to watch some woman and their long hair. We then hurled up a mountain road twisting and turning as the bus came close to flipping itself over numerous times, we eventually made it to the top, alive and safe and sound (phew). A good half-hour hike up the hill found us at a restaurant for lunch and just in time for the heavy seasonal rains to start!! We lucked out though, it poured the entire time we were eating and stopped just before we got ready to continue the journey up the hill. Another hour long hike with many other people and many amazing views and we found ourselves at the top of Longsheng Terraces, looking out on what can only be viewed as an engineering marvel of rice terraces. The expansiveness of the rice fields was amazing, and not because of the size, but how they managed to build so many onto the sides of these steep hills for miles and miles. After viewing the terraces from the many lookout points along the way up, it was time to trudge back down and through the hillside village of Longsheng. It was amazing to be up there, the majority of locals went about their daily lives as if we were not even there, and the few who had opened up shops were very friendly and smiled for every picture. The most amusing part of the trip up and back was the many tourists who opted to be carried up in old-fashioned people-carrier carts.
Our last full day in Guilin we went to the Chinese acrobat circus, where we were treated to a show that could have been part of Cirque du Soleil, with high-flying acrobatics, spinning plates and a young girl balancing 5 flaming chandeliers’ as she twisted her body in ways I didn’t think were humanely possible. At one point a jolly Chinese clown came out, now as some of you may know Scott has a problem with clowns that he has never fully explained. When the clown came out everyone was cheering and clapping.... except David. I warned him that clowns pick on the people who don’t look thrilled and sure enough, within seconds of getting on stage he called upon David and another un-sure looking Chinese woman to be his assistant in a thumb trick. A rather confident looking David got up in front of hundreds of onlookers and wound up with the clown’s thumbs tied together wrapped around him. I think this was my favorite part of the show!! And so we find ourselves embarking on the 22hour journey to Shanghai via train. Shanghai here we come!! Expo, ridiculously tall buildings, and museums galore! We shouldn’t be bored in this international city!