Guilin
The landscape on the twenty-yuan note, and the town you leave to reach it
- When to go
- October 22° · 8 rainy days
- Per day
- €€price 2 of 5
- How many days
- 3days
- For you
- 6 questions →
- Nearest airport
- 27 km Guilin
- Right now
Guilin is not where you stay — it is where you land and move on. What you come for is 83 kilometres of the Li River downstream, between limestone cones, and the town of Yangshuo at the end of that ride, which is where you actually sleep.
The cones are limestone that water dissolved over millions of years until only this was left — karst, the same process as in Slovenia or Montenegro, but in a wet climate and at another scale.
The boat does not leave from Guilin itself but from piers 27–28 kilometres south, and from two different ones: three-star boats from Mopanshan, four-star from Zhujiang. Mix up the piers and you watch your boat from the bank. The trip to Yangshuo takes four to five hours; a three-star boat is €28 without lunch, a four-star one €46.30 with a buffet.
The Longji terraces are the second reason to come and an entirely different side of the region: about a hundred kilometres from Guilin, hills cut into staircases of rice paddies some 650 years ago. In spring they are flooded and hold the sky — the young plants go in at the start of June — and in autumn, before the harvest, they turn yellow. In summer they are simply green.
What to see in Guilin
The Li River, Guilin to Yangshuo
Downstream through limestone cones, from the piers south of Guilin to Yangshuo. The upper deck is cold and windy and worth every minute.
Xingping
The village beside the stretch printed on the twenty-yuan note. A motorised bamboo raft runs there from Yangdi — a shorter ride than the boat, early in the morning.
The Longji terraces
Rice paddies at 600 to 800 metres. Sleep in a village on the terraces, because there and back from Guilin in a day is a long day.
Yangshuo and West Street
The town at the end of the boat ride. The main street is loud and touristy; everything good is ten minutes out of it, by bike.
Moon Hill
A stone arch through a hill outside Yangshuo, with a path up to the opening itself and a view over the valley.
Reed Flute Cave
A limestone cave near Guilin, lit with coloured floodlights. If you have seen a European show cave — same rock, entirely different direction.
Two things you probably did not know
The hills around Guilin are what is left of a limestone massif that rain ate away for three hundred million years. Only the hardest parts remain, standing like pillars in the middle of the plain.
The view from the Li river is printed on the Chinese twenty yuan note. The exact spot is near the village of Xingping, and people go there to hold the note up against the view.
Ready for Guilin?
Within reach from here
Places sorted by straight-line distance from Guilin — day trips or weekends.
China
→A country the size of a continent, where the hard part is sorted out before you fly: payment, internet and tickets
Japan
→A country where a train five minutes late hands the passenger a written delay certificate
Vietnam
→A country sixteen hundred and fifty kilometres long, where north and south are never in season together
All 277 places we write about sit on one page — narrow them down by continent, country, price or what you are travelling for.
Within reach from here: Ha Long Bay, Hanoi and Sapa
See how much of that actually suits you — or pin Guilin if you have been.
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