Is this the most beautiful city in the world? 4 days in Guilin, Yangshuo

This city claims to be the most beautiful in the world. Let's see if it's true. Today we're escaping the skyscrapers in Hong Kong for the limestone peaks in Guilin. We're also trying out business class for the first time on the high-speed rail to see what all the hype is about. Hong Kong Kowloon station to Guilin West takes around three hours on the high-speed rail and there are three different classes to choose from. We booked our train tickets on trip.com and they have photos of how each class looks like. We paid 1319 HKD for this trip which also includes a business lounge prior boarding. For high-speed rail you can only book up to two weeks ahead of time and for business class they sell out super quick. Usually you need to book during the morning of them releasing the tickets two weeks ahead which is what we did. Getting on the train from Hong Kong is less busy because it's one of the most expensive legs of the journey. Once you stop at Shenzhen and Guangzhou the train gets really packed. Even though the lounge did not include a hot meal, on board this train there are hot meals, drinks, a bottle of water, a box of snacks, slippers and a blanket included. This is the hot food included of our ticket but you can also order non-train food to be delivered from restaurants through the train app. They deliver the food at the stations that the train stops at along the way and the cabin attendants deliver it directly to your seat. So here you can see that Daniel ordered himself an extra meal. Once you start to see these karst hills you will know you're getting closer to Guilin and if you lay your seat down flat it will feel like the fastest three hours ever. There's a very famous proverb from the ancient times about Guilin. It directly translates to However this is not referring to Guilin's urban city centre but instead the landscape, the rivers and limestone karst mountains which have been around for 360 million years already. Namely in a county within Guilin called Yangshuo which is exactly where we're staying in this video. I'm so excited to show you this room. This is the view, isn't it gorgeous? So we have a spinning bed here. It spins 360 degrees so you can face wherever you want. Here is a bathtub which overlooks this gorgeous landscape here. These are limestone mountains. There is an infinity pool overlooking the same view and some hobbit houses. We have this staircase to heaven and like bubble igloo thing. We have some swings over there and another big swing here just lots of different places you can take photos with. They also include a 30-minute photo shoot in this hotel. Sunset is over there, it's coming and we have the mirror here. I'm going to show you the bathroom quickly. So it's a standard rain shower and we have a Japanese style toilet here. I'm just so excited to wake up with this view every morning for the next four days. Stay tuned! So Daniel's gone for a swim after dinner. He tries to do exercise seven days a week. I have a meeting in about half an hour so I'm just waiting and chilling here. I see some rocks that are lit up in the distance over there. This one kind of on the right looks a bit freaky. There is also a light show I think here. I can't really make out what is showing. These little huts here are also lit up. This pool looks pretty cool at night but other than that there's generally not much to do around here at night I don't think. Meeting is done. We've got an early start at 7am tomorrow to go bamboo rafting. steamed egg here as well which is different. This is the morning view when no one swims and this is what it looks like. We're off to bamboo rafting. He's wearing his Crocs and I do not have Crocs because I'm still not a Crocs girl. So I'm wearing my water shoes from Dubai that we got from Atlantis a few weeks back. This is what the outside of the hotel looks like and there's our car to go. Do you see the green shuttle in the background? Green little bus. Cheapest way for us to do is to walk from our hotel to the final destination and then take this free shuttle. I ordered this dds because it's only seven dollars. Why would I be staying there outdoor with all the heat while I can just enjoy the AC with seven dollars? Or you could rent an electric scooter. I think it's around twenty dollars or thirty dollars On today's itinerary we're going to float through one of what looks like a Chinese landscape painting. The legendary 10 mile gallery. This is named after an endless scroll of art where it's a 10 mile stretch along the Yulong river that is stunningly beautiful. There are six main routes to choose from and we went with option six. Option six did not require getting the whole body soaked in river water but it still had some exciting small drops. It was also the most popular. This is one of the most famous attractions in the area and even though we pre-booked a time slot the queue was long even though we were not here during peak season. These bamboo rafts have been the traditional way people have navigated these rivers for generations so don't worry they feel more stable than it looks. If you do come to visit do not miss this even though the queue is big hotel. It is free. It was a replacement for not being able to go on a helicopter ride today actually so we originally planned a helicopter ride today which was the one thing we were really looking forward to this trip but just like a hot air balloon I think they could just cancel it at any time without any warning even if the weather is fine they just reserve the rights to cancel it so my advice is if you come and you want to do either the hot air balloon or the helicopter ride to make sure you do it on the first day because you want to allow buffer for if it doesn't happen to do it tomorrow. Fingers crossed we'll be able to do it tomorrow. I'm gonna go to dinner now I'm gonna change out of this and I'll show you what's for dinner. We are having dinner at the city center of Yangshuo. It's called West Street. Daniel chose dinner tonight so we're gonna see if it's good. He said that it's meant to be one of the best in this area. It's very busy. The street outside was... I can't even walk. I don't even want to go there. It's pretty modern actually. It's a lot more modern than I was expecting. could do it for us and they actually said they can give us a discount and they gave us a free ride. So top tip always ask your hotel first to see if they can do it for you and if they do they often have some kind of freebie that they can give for it. Okay so firstly that was really really really worth it. It's definitely the best scenery we've seen so far here but there is more. So have you ever seen this picture on the 20 RMB note? So this picture here is an actual real place and it's in Yangshuo so obviously picture that you see on the note. So we're here to find this picture on the 20 RMB and we have found it. So if we look at mountain ABCDE we have it here. Do you think it looks prettier on the note or in real life? There is a leaf here but we'll show you another scene in a sec. Do you see it? These bamboo rafts are all here free to take pictures with and you can also pay extra for this old man here which you might see in a lot of photos online. Okay it's so hot I'm literally dripping sweat that you didn't need to know but we are so excited to be going to a restaurant and getting some air con. This place is supposedly famous as well it's quite pretty and it's about five minutes away from the area we were just at by Didi. Unfortunately not by walking. Look at all the sweat. Relaxation for a bit. So if you're scared of mosquitoes and heat like us, September is actually not a great time to come. It is really hot, it's scorching hot during the day. October would be a better time to come but yeah we're here now. So the 20 RMB note viewpoint is in a town called Xinping which is an ancient town. You can also take a ferry here directly from Guilin city. However I personally do feel that the 10 mile gallery area is prettier and it's walkable from our hotel which is also in a more modern area. Cloud. Looks like a disease. This hotel is really new. On the final morning here we decided to have a breakfast at a nearby hotel. This hotel requires to have a meal in order to visit their dears so we paid 118 RMB each for breakfast which included some carrots to feed their in-house dears. This hotel was modern, it had an epic backdrop and it's got its gimmick. It was walkable from our hotel so we came to check it out but we also left pretty soon because a male deer attacked Daniel which ends our video here. So is this place I've seen in paintings, poems and even printed on money really as beautiful as they say? I mean to me I feel beauty isn't something you can just measure, I think it's a feeling. It's the feeling of peace that hits you when everything is quiet and it's the awe of seeing something that makes you feel tiny but in the best way possible. So for me this was a beautiful place and being able to travel safely and comfortably also plays a huge part but your most beautiful place might be a desert under a blanket of stars, you might be watching a sunrise over a really busy city or even a cozy snowy winter wonderland. So I'll leave you with this, where is your most beautiful place? Maybe you don't even need a passport to find it. Thanks for joining us on this journey, see you in the next one!