Day 15: Yangshuo (阳朔), stone forest, rock climbing, cards in the park, maracas 🪇, and basketball 🏀

Our base in Guangxi district is away from Guilin, closer to Yangshuo. We wanted a few days of calm, with fairly easy access (you’ve guessed it, DiDi) to the two main hubs.

The district is famous for spectacular limestone karst mountains, the mighty River Li, and lakes.

Yangshuo

Having visited Ha Long Bay in Vietnam a couple of years ago we looked forward to ‘living’ in such a landscape for a few days, rather than a day-long trip on a tourist boat (if spectacular) – see blog post here

Ha Long Bay, October 2024

The name ‘Yangshuo’ derives from the Chinese words ‘yáng’ (阳) and ‘shuò’ (朔).

阳 (yáng): Means positive, sun, or the male principle in Taoist philosophy

朔 (shuò): Means the beginning, the first day of the lunar month, or north

The implication is that, night or day, Yangshuo is one of the brightest places on Earth.

The landscape in Yangshuo featured in the movie Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sithas Chewbacca’s home planet of Kashyyyk

The image of the Li River on the 20 yuan note is also very close to Yangshuo…

Karst is an area of land made up of limestone. Limestone, also known as chalk or calcium carbonate, is a soft rock that dissolves in water. As rainwater seeps into the rock, it slowly erodes. Karst landscapes can be worn away from the top or dissolved from a weak point inside the rock.

Karst landscapes feature caves, underground streams and sinkholes on the surface. Where erosion has worn away the land above ground, steep rocky cliffs are visible.

Shílín (石林) – literally, stone forest – is a karst formation in southern China. Shílín got its name because the tall rocks that formed due to erosion look like stone trees. Shílín is part of a larger karst landscape called the South China Karst, which spreads across the Chinese provinces of Guangxi, Guizhou, and Yunnan.

Karst formation diagram

October-November is the peak rock climbing period in Yangshuo. We did notice a few wiry-looking girls and boys around the place. Yangshuo is a favoured destination for top climbers throughout the world. It boasts over one thousand bolted routes with names including Spam the Chinese Ham, Spicy Noodle, Swiss Cheese crag, Tsingtao Beer, One Love, and Moon Hill.

The area was made famous in the 1990s by the American climber Todd Skinner, revered as a legend throughout the rock climbing community.

Todd Skinner on the ‘Moon Hill’ climb

Skinner met his end through a climbing accident in Yosemite on 21 October 2006; coincidentally, 20 years ago, this week. A lovely piece by Skinner’s climbing friend, Paul Piana, here.

We were taken by the life story of local climber Qin Weiwei…

Ten years ago, Qin Weiwei was training to join the Chinese army. For five days a week at his base in Guilin, he underwent gruelling military exercises. But a chance encounter with climbers scaling the mesmerising karst peaks 65 kilometres away in Yangshuo was about to change the course of his life.

“During a trip with the army school, I saw people rock climbing in Yangshuo and immediately I wanted to try it,” he recalls. “I began volunteering at the Black Rock climbing shop, and they let me use their equipment to climb.”

Nearly a decade later, Qin – now known in the climbing world as Aniu, or ‘ox’, for his muscular physique – is one of the most successful climbers in China, sponsored by The North Face to take part in competitions across the country, and owner of the shop he used to volunteer in. “When I quit the military, my family wouldn’t speak to me for six months. In China, the army is a safe career,” he says. “But when they started to see me on TV and in magazines, they realised maybe climbing was not so bad or so dangerous.”

Our rock climbing days are over. Truth be told, they never actually began!

How today’s Yangshuo town centre compares to the Yangshuo Todd Skinner would have remembered is a moot point. I think we can be sure that his prime interest was the limestone karst pinnacles that towered above the place, from every point. It makes for an incredible setting, despite the kaleidoscopic array of tourist focused outlets that mark the town; notably, Xijie (West) Street.

Who remembers the maracas from school? I wasn’t trusted with them. I was the child with the triangle, under strict supervision, directed by the burliest, strictest teacher, told just when to strike.

This is NOT me btw! Far too angelic, and looks far more adept with the old triangle than I ever did. I suspect that I used to give it a good old whack.

Anyway, back to the maracas 🪇

On the subject of school. We loved this. Your real-life Dorling Kindersley…

Yangshuo’s very own tribute to DK

Your Chinese Fiat Panda?

Yangshuo Park on a Sunday afternoon…

In amongst some moving tributes to former Yangshuo residents…

Zhang Side – His death for the people’s interests is heavier than Mount Tai.

Zhang Side (1915-1944) was a shining example of the Party and the Army’s principle of wholeheartedly serving the people… He was brave in combat and wounded multiple times. on 5 September 1944, while on a charcoal-burning mission in the mountains of Ansai County, northern Shaanxi, he tragically died when a charcoal kiln collapsed. On 8 September, at a memorial service held for Comrade Zhang Side by the Central Committee, Chairman Mao Zedong delivered his famous speech “Serve the People”, calling on the entire Army and the entire people to learn from Comrade Zhang Side.

There are many other such tributes in the Yangshuo Park

Dong Conrui – The most glorious thing is to complete the arduous task assigned by the Party.

Dong Conrui (1929-1948) was a renowned combat hero of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army… His column posthumously awarded him the titles of ‘Combat Hero’ and ‘Model Communist Party Member’, and named his squad the ‘Dong Conrui Squad’.