Traveling in China Part VII: Relaxing in a tiny river village surrounded by karst mountains - Original Work

One of the only things that was on Sabrina's absolutely have to do list was an amazing little Airbnb guesthouse that she found online just a day before we left on our trip. She had been looking at the listing as we made our way through China and we decided that it was definitely something we wanted to check out. We contacted the owners and as luck would have it they had a room available for us exactly when we were planning on being in the area.

The village was called Yangdi and it was in the Yongshuo area. To get there we flew from Xi'an to Guilin (our tickets were purchased earlier with the help of the lovely owner of our guesthouse in Pingyao, she was so awesome). Once we arrived in Guilin we took the shuttle into the city, then managed to find our way to the local bus which would take us to the landing area on the river where our guesthouse owners would pick us up in their bamboo river boat.

I have to admit that having never done an Airbnb before I was pretty skeptical, and especially since the owners were very laidback guys who didn't provide too much direction or instructions. I'm glad to say though that everything went totally smooth and according to plan, and before we knew it we were chilling out in a 300 year old family home in some random, isolated little farming village surrounded by the most incredible karst mountains and far away from the rush, buzz and pollution of the cities. It was an incredible place to relax, and one of our absolute highlights from the trip.

Yangdi Village

We didn't get many photos of our travels to the place, but we started getting photos once we arrived in the Yongshuo area as we waited in this little village to be picked up by bamboo boat.

Locals going about their business.

We found a little shop and had a look around, this guy was doing the same :)

We had no idea what he was saying, but it sure seemed this guy was a proud father.

Found this cute little chicken just wandering around the streets.

Finally our guesthouse owner arrived in their bamboo boat.

Leaving the boat launch.

I took this panoramic image of the valley just before we set off down then river.

Arriving to Yangdi Village

We got some awesome shots of the scenery as we traveled up the river towards the village.

The mountains in this area are incredible.

On the bamboo boat.

I was gettin' pretty beardy at this point, Sabrina got this photo of me on the boat.

This was our first sight as we arrived at the village.

After we got up the staircase, this is the main walkway of the village.

These village "streets" were awesome to just wander around and look at.

We arrived at our guesthouse and started settling in.

This is a composite image of the view from the courtyard just outside the front door of the guesthouse.

The house had this amazing carved woodwork all over the place, so cool.

The village has a ton of pomelo farms, we opened one up and the guys and a visiting local fellow peeled off the thick rind and used it as a type of casing to fry up some delicious pork dumplings.

Mincing up some pork.

Frying the delicious dumplings.

A local friend's daughter was hanging out, we shared our snacks with her :)

This is the guy who cooked up the dumplings. He was affectionately known in the village as "Caveman" because he and his brother had deconstructed their house to sell the bricks, and now basically lived in one of the mountain caves. From what the locals told us it wasn't really a case of bad luck, but more that they just didn't want to work and it was easier to sell the bricks from their house than get a job, hahaha, what a guy. He was pretty entertaining.

He noticed me taking his picture and had an idea for a better composition. He pulled me over to the door and gestured for me to get this shot. I can't really take credit for these ones, it was all caveman's idea :)

As per my custom, I just couldn't help but go out exploring.

Crazy old truck by the road I wandered down.

Another composite image, I loved the rock formations in this place.

One more composite stitch of the "main road through town" that I wandered down for a bit.

I was going to include the impromptu photoshoot that we did with the random German couple who were staying at the guesthouse as well, but I figured I would do a dedicated post just for that as this one is already quite long. So stay tuned for what will be the final post from our trip through China, a photoshoot on top of a mountain! From then the travel series will continue as Sabrina and I made our way overland from Naning in southern China to the famous city of Hanoi in northern Vietnam! As always if you like the post feel free to throw me an upvote, you know I always appreciate them! Be sure to follow me @dexter-k on Steemit to see the continuing story of our travels around the world, as well as more original content all the time.

Thanks for reading!

Dexter