South China

Things in the South of China are different. The Chinese here carry guns and vote Republican; they drive trucks and make a mean apple pie. But seriously, the Chinese Southwest is full of minorities, mountains, and glimpses of Tibet.

Lijiang:

Imagine a quiet village, the narrow dirt streets of which trace freshwater springs, with occasional wooden bridges for the residents. And the residents... The residents are a whole another charm. They're not your boring Chinese minorities, but the kind that get photographed by whities to prove interaction with ancient tribes. They wear colorful outfits and feathers, work in the rice fields, and carry crops in baskets on their back. They sell their goods at the local market, eat at home, and tilt their heads clockwise at the sight of a TV set. The village and the residents are all separated from the world by scenic mountains covered with rice terraces. What an amazing feeling.

That was Lijiang 15 years ago.

Once backpackers discovered this little paradise, the Chinese government stepped in to make it even more attractive to tourists -- Chinese tourists, to be exact. In their efforts to add to the village's charm, the government built nearby the following: an airport, an amusement park, and a commercial center ('new' Lijiang). Every single house in the village (now known as 'old town') was converted to either a restaurant, a hotel, or a souvenir shop. Every resident was given extra feathers and a money allowance to stop working and begin dancing at the entrance to the village in traditional village attire. The whole 'old city' was given a facelift, where old buildings were razed and new ones were built in their place in the same 'style.' Luckily, the mountains and rice terraces survived.

This is not to say that the once-village is no longer worth a visit; it's just that there is nothing authentic left. It's natural that certain sights may over time get more commercialized as their popularity increases, but by the time China was done with Lijiang, there was no room left in the 'old town' for any of the things that originally attracted backpackers. Today, herds of Chinese tourists are deposited in the 'old town' to be told of times past, with little to show for it except the little springs on the streets and the occasional renovated bridge. It did not take us long to get out.

Dali

Dali faced a similar 'renovation', but maintained (1) better food, (2) better hostels, and (3) mopeds for people who want to explore around.

This was the first time we rented out a moped on our travels, and it was a spectacular one. We zoomed through the town, reached the highway, and stopped for a break. The highways in China are pretty hectic. The 'highway' itself consists of a lane and a shoulder going each way. Larger vehicles not only have the right of way but also drive faster. Buses typically pass others by getting into the opposite traffic lane, causing smaller vehicles in the lane to scatter into the shoulder. The shoulder is risky as well since the Chinese don't look when they merge into traffic. Moreover, the whole 'highway' is raised 6 feet above the grounds surrounding it, without any sort of rail, which means that driving off the shoulder would get you into a ditch below. So at first, we decided to just cross the highway rather than get on.

A small road took us past working farmers and their animals, kids getting off school, and fields and mountains. By and by the road became a street, the street an alley, and the alley a dirt path to a boardwalk-slash-pier on the peaceful lake. We parked the moped a hundred feet away from the lake and made our way to the pier. On both sides of us old Chinese ladies were selling toys, various roasted and roasting nuts, and living seafood. The fact that the turtles and crabs in the baskets were all alive was the guarantee of freshness that every Chinese appreciated. To us, the seafood part was a sad sight. We relaxed at the scenic pier for a little while, doing honeymooney things that are unfit for blogs, and moved on.

Feeling better on the moped, we got on the highway. Abby's blond locks in the back signaled to the drivers behind us that we are foreigners and, as such, a road hazard. The truck drivers made sure to go around us gently. We zigzagged into a few villages on the way, and drove by the three pagodas, snapping some shots but never going in. Then we took the moped back into town to munch on some amazing street food. Our favorite was large flatbread made with spices, chopped into small squares into a paper bag. Greasy awesomeness. The street vendors also sold fried tofu with spices and fish snacks.

Shaxi

Shaxi is a one-street village between Lijiang and Dali. The village was on its way to sacrifice its cultural authenticity for semi-urban development, or even emigration, when the folks at the WMF opened a book and recalled that Shaxi is the only remaining town on the tea-horse trade trail. Westerners descended upon the town in 2001 or so and began restoring the old market, the square, the temple, and the theater, all on the same street, within 500 feet of each other. To prevent Chinese-style restoration with all the bells and whistles, Shaxi refused to develop transportation routes to the cities nearby. To get to the village, we had to hail down a minibus on the highway. We rode in the minibus with the locals for about 4 hours, during which half of the passengers and the driver smoked a few. Once we arrived at our destination, we had to take another minivan to Shaxi, with Chinese tourists on board. The hour-long drive to the village was some of the most picturesque drives in all of China: we drove on the ledge of forested mountains, looking down on villages and fields down the valleys.

Stumbling off the minivan, we looked around for any signs of orientation, but none of the streets were marked. We walked a bit along the village without running into a single soul, and soon found an old lady enjoying the afternoon sun on a wooden bridge outside the village. As always, we used our hands to communicate, I showed her the word for 'theater' on the iPhone (she was not impressed), and we were on our way with guidance. Walking along the bank of a small river we found the entrance gate to the village and, once through it, our accommodation.

With rustic adventures come rustic accommodations. The good news is that we had a toilet bowl. The not-as-good is that it was next to our beds. Luckily, it wasn't the first time that we've had a toilet bowl in the middle of the room, so we resorted to the tried habit of walking out of the room when the other person is going to the bathroom (happy honey moon..). Our beds consisted of mattresses thrown on top of a built-in wood boxes. To warm up the room from the 50F we found it at, we kept boiling water in the kettle and running the hot shower (also conveniently in the middle of the room), which only lasted about 5 minutes. Eventually, the temperature rose to a much welcome 55F, and we got out to see the village.

The place is a charming undeveloped square mile, probably as charming as Lijiang used to be before Disneyfication. We took it all in -- the temple and the ancient theater across it, and the natural beauty around us. There aren't many restaurants in Shaxi, so we went to the most authentic one we could find. It's a Muslim joint, where you come in, point at vegetables that are on display, and the aproned lady fixes up a dish made of the vegetables. In addition, there are always 2-3 stews made of different meats, that can be mixed with rice. Not a lick of English. The tables and chairs are all knee-high as is customary in China. This was hands-down the best food we've had in the People's Republic. Then we returned to our wooden room and froze to sleep, wearing everything we've had.

Kunming

Kunming is a peaceful city with a park and a lake and a handful of foreign students to sit in western coffee shops by the lake. It's the city of 'eternal spring' (or "city where Spring weather always" in Chinglish) in the beautiful south, where all streets signs are also in English, and where no u-turns are allowed. Our only problem with this place was the lack of good hostels. The first hostel we tried had the bathroom inside the bedroom again and no internet, and the second was a filth-hole in the middle of the party district. But we're Global, and so we rented an apartment for a few days.

That's right. Our very own Chinese condo on the 32nd floor of an apartment building, with a large window to look down at the city and the mountains away. To blend in further (yeah, right), we went out shopping at the local grocery store too. Got some provisions, forks, Dove chocolate, laundry soap, you know, the necessities. One of the best features in the apartment? The kitchen sink. As soon as the bags were in, I began running the water for a major laundry operation, impossible in any of the bathroom sinks in hostels. Then two hours of hair-drier action on the clothing and bam! We got ourselves some fragranty apparel in bulk. To reward ourselves for all the hard work, we went down to the local Pizza Hut, the Chinese version of which is a classy restaurant, with leather couches, glossy floors, and an incredible pizza.

We didn't do anything touristy in Kunming, which is why we enjoyed it so much. Walked the town, did groceries, got visas to Vietnam, and strolled the lake while leaving ice-cream drops behind on the cobble stone.

Yangshuo

Our final stop in China is the town that karst dreams are made of. Yangshuo. Long after leaving China we were still saying things like "we don't need to see -- we've seen Yangshuo." The town itself is nothing to speak of -- two streets full of souvenir shops and overpriced restaurants. It is the surrounding karst scenery that makes it amazing. And to this effect, we'll let the pictures do most of the talking. We took most of these while riding a tandem bicycle and taking a bamboo ride down the river.

The bamboo ride was the most scenic thing out here. The set up is simple: Abby and I sat in two chairs on a bamboo raft, and behind us was the bicycle and a guy with a 7-foot pole to push of from the bottom of the shallow river. Every once in a while we'd reach a small drop, forcing us to get off the raft and get back on. All the while we were munching on corn-on-the-cob and a pomelo, the local snacks. The first time we went over a bump there was another raft waiting for us, on which two Chinese girls were trying to sell us… a picture of us going over the water-bump in the canoe. Apparently, they had a fully equipped desktop-printer-laminator station on their raft, which produced about 50 pictures of us to choose from. Stealing tricks from Disneyland in the middle of nowhere.