Once we were through the caves we were taken to yet another gify shop, but just the one this time, before we headed on to our final destination, a cruise up and down the Li river through Guilin city centre.
Many years ago I took a ride along the Li river, but far away form the city and with nothing but the rolling cliffs and crystal clear waters. This time the peace and serenity was troubled only a little by other passing tour craft and the occasional fishing boat.
The merky fog and cloud were here thicker than ever, as was the chilling wind made all the more fierce as there was nothing acting as a shield from its driving force across the river.
I did think that a light snack would be included in the ride, but apparently not, however there was a menu if you to chose a few basics from, asuming you could read Chinese. As I sat there, sheltering form the wind one of the waitresses came over and made a real good effort to get me to buy something and in the end her best effort to convince me that I wanted to order the fish had me nodding and hoping it would not be too expensive and also be quite tastey.
What I was not hoping or expecting was to see a mini shoal of fish, freshly caught, just dipped whole into batter and then shallow fried before being served to me on a small plate. No garnish or sauce, no rice or noodles and complete with bones, heads and tails. Feeling every so slightly guilty I managed to consume just over half, enough to make me feel that I had given it my best, before the taste and the thought overcame me and I could not manage any more.
Once we were on dry land we were bundled into our minibus and as luck would have it my hotel was barely a few minutes away from the pier and so I was first out and back into my room in double quick time.
After getting a chance to finally post some emails and blog entries I headed back out into the night, armed with a map, a desire to see the twin pagodas all lit up and the knowledge that there was both a cinema and a McDonalds all along the main road that my hotel was on, albeit the other side of a river. I would have made plans to visit the theatre but I got back too late to book any tickets and by the time I would arrive there by taxi I would be barely in time to get the tickets and that assumed good traffic.
The twin pagodas looked much better lit up at night than they did in the drab daytime gloom and it was quite fun trying to see what camera settings made them look the best. I would have gotten closer but they required paying a small toll fee and I would prefer to pay dring the day than for the smae thing at night.
Next I found the McDonalds next but chose to see what was on at the cinema first, although finding the cinema was a lot harder than it sounded and the locals were almost no help. Once I was there I was further dismayed at the fact that there were no poster adverts for films and so I had to do an 'enie, menie, miny, mo' on the four chinese titled films and hoped that I was not picking a love story.
As it turned out it was a Russian film based on a blond and inexperienced version of Lara Croft, ( complete with a computer nerd who made a video game heroine to look like his girlfriend ) and they ended up raiding some rocky mountain fortresses and escaping from some evil but incredibly inept badguys wearing what looked like blackend paintball gear.
Once the film finished I made my back over to the McDonalds, where I got a satisfactory meal after a lot of confusion from the staff who couldnt quite get her till to work properly, and then I headed on back to my hotel. As I passed I heard a few locals riding bike pedalos offer to take me to a place where I could get a massage, but I wasnt quite in the mood for that and besides it was late enough and I was feelin very tired.
Even though it was quite late the hotel tour desk clerk tried desperately to get my attention and buy yet another trip with them, but knowing that it was gonig to be even more cloudy and foggy tomorrow having already checked the weather forecast, and knowing that I didnt want to spend almost 300 CNY for one day being surrounded by strangers I decided against it.
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