Guilin Tours

Guilin is the postcard karst scenery, and the trip is built around one boat: 83 km down the Li River to Yangshuo. Two days covers the river and the town. Three adds the Longji rice terraces, two hours north and a completely different landscape.

The Li River

Boats leave Zhujiang Pier, forty minutes from the city, between 09:00 and 10:00, and take four to four and a half hours to reach Yangshuo. There are three classes and the difference is the deck and the lunch, not the view. Sit on the left side facing forward for the section between Nine Horses Fresco Hill and Xingping, which includes the bend printed on the 20-yuan note. The best scenery comes in the last ninety minutes, so stay on deck rather than in the cabin.

Yangshuo and the Yulong River

Yangshuo is a small town that grew a tourist strip along West Street. The reason to stay two nights is everything around it: the Yulong River, a tributary with bamboo rafts and no engines; the cycling loop through Jiuxian and the rice fields; and Xianggong Hill, a twenty-minute climb that gives the classic view of the river bend at sunrise. Rock climbing and via ferrata are on the karst towers west of town.

Longji rice terraces

Two hours north of Guilin, the terraces are cut into slopes between 300 and 1,100 m and have been farmed for at least 650 years. Two villages take visitors: Ping an, with the easiest access and the classic view of the Seven Stars with Moon, and Dazhai in the Jinkeng area, which is larger and steeper. Day trips are possible but rushed. One night in a village guesthouse gets you sunrise and empty paths before the buses arrive at 10:00.

Guilin city

Elephant Trunk Hill, Reed Flute Cave and the Two Rivers and Four Lakes night cruise are the standard circuit, and half a day is enough for all three. Guilin is a transport hub with a pleasant riverside, not the reason you came. Do not let an agent sell you two nights in the city and one in Yangshuo; it is the wrong way round.

Where to stay

One night in Guilin near the pier end of town, two in Yangshuo on the Yulong River rather than West Street, and one in a Longji village if you want sunrise over the terraces. Rooms on West Street stay loud until midnight.

When to go

Getting there

Guilin Liangjiang Airport (KWL) is 30 km west of the city, about 40 minutes by road, with direct flights from Shanghai, Beijing, Xian and Hong Kong. High-speed rail: Guangzhou 2.5 hours, Shenzhen 3 hours, Changsha 3 hours, Shanghai 8 hours. Yangshuo has its own station on the Guiyang-Guangzhou line, 30 minutes from Guilin, with a 40-minute bus into town.

What trips people up

• The Li River boat is one-way. Your luggage travels with you and you finish in Yangshuo, not back in Guilin.
• In winter the low water can move the departure point to Yangdi, cutting the first hour of the route.
• West Street prices run roughly three times the back streets fifty metres away.
• The terraces are harvested once, in late September. After that they are stubble until the spring flooding.
• Guilin is a city of five million people, not a village. Allow for traffic between the pier, the airport and the hotel.

We run Guilin and Yangshuo as a three- or four-day block inside longer China routes, with the boat, the terraces and a driver throughout. Send us your dates and we will send the plan.