Roland's Travelog: Guilin (桂林)

Guilin (桂林), lying in a lovely setting on the banks of the Li River, has long been a popular tourist resort for foreigners and nowadays more and more Chinese. It gets its name from the tree that lines its streets, the osmanthus, Guilin means literally 'osmanthus forest'. To be honest I had never heard of the osmanthus tree before, I always thought trees had simple, memorable, monosyllabic names such as elm, oak, fir, gum or ash, osmanthus doesn't sound like a tree at all ;-) so I learnt something new by coming here.

It's quite a touristy place which means there are some people who speak English making it easier to get around and discuss what to do in the area, but, it also means you get lots of hassles from tourist touts, many of who will just not give up chasing you. I also had many random people stopping me in the street wanting to speak English, English students, English teachers, or just those working in the tourist industry wanting to practice English with a 'westerner' who as far as they are concerned are all native English speakers!. Usually this was an innocent, friendly practice but occasionally they turned into touts trying to take me to a tea-tasting shop, an art gallery or sell some tickets for an evening show. I did the tea-tasting anyway as I wanted to and tried a few teas including osmanthus flower tea - which is good for the skin - and osmanthus leaf tea, which had a bitter, sour taste. This bitter taste in the mouth felt quite appropriate when they then tried to force me to buy some of their tea at silly prices and then asked for more silly amounts of cash for the usually free/small fee tea-tasting. Others I met were more pleasant and I had interesting chats with a couple of students who wanted to know absolutely everything about differences between Chinese and European cultures.

Left: Guilin's two pagodas at night.
Right: Osmanthus trees line the road and water sides in Guilin.

I arrived in Guilin on New Year's Eve and during the evening wandered around the lake area with its two pagodas, many bridges, trees and quiet paths all nicely lit, which creates a relaxing atmosphere. Each evening there is also a street market selling all kinds of clothes, art, food, souvenirs and many more such things which I wandered around before searching out a bar in which to have a couple of new year drinks. Pubs/bars are not common place in Chinese cities, but luckily Guilin, due to its touristic nature has a couple and I spent this new year's evening in one with a singer/guitarist playing some decent music.

Guilin's popularity is due to its location on the Li river, among many limestone peaks, that are familiar to many worldwide from Chinese scroll paintings or photos that are often seen depicting this strange scenery. It was interesting to see these peaks on the roadside travelling through Guanxi towards Guilin for the first time with my own eyes. The town has many peaks, which you can climb for views of the city and surrounding countryside. One of the more famous peaks is called 'elephant trunk hill' which remarkably, does in a way resemble a crouched elephant with its trunk drinking from the river, this has given rise to an elephant theme across the city, with 'golden elephant', 'elephant trunk', 'elephant hill' hotels, restaurants and shops all over. One peak within the grounds of the palace is less imaginatively called 'Scenic View Peak'.