Longji rice terraces

On the January 6th we got up early and took 3 hr bus ride to the Longji rice terraces. It was a crazy ride up a curvy hill, I joked that it would be fun to ride back down on a bike but it would be suicide. A few minutes later right around a turn we saw a broken helmet on the road and then a
body under a tarp. One of those China experiences that make you think.

We got to the entrance of the rice terrace area and we were instantly surrounded by old women trying to sell us all sorts of products (even though we were at the less touristy part of the mountain). That's the one thing about China, any beautiful or interesting area is turned into a park which you have to buy a ticket for which then attracts people who want to sell to or swindle every visitor. Its always a victory for us if we find a place that is outside of the rush and off the beaten (like really beaten (a small village outside of Guilin has about 17 million tourists a year (if I heard correctly), it kind of causes stuff to lose its magic) path.

Anyhow, the rice terraces were really amazing. It wasn't the best time of the year to visit the terraces because the was a mist that was pretty low and we climbed through it in not too long and missed a lot of the views. Also, as we climbed higher there was more and more snow on the ground and ice covering the bamboo leaves. You can see the difference between the top and bottom between these two pictures.



I would definitely like to come back here during a nicer part of the year but it was still a great time.