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Li River, situated in Guilin City of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, is a bright pearl in China and it is the highlight of sightseeing in Guilin. And the 83-km-long waterway from Guilin to Yangshuo is the most famous of Li River. Along the waterway are rolling hills, steep cliffs, fantastic caves, leisure boats and green bamboos as well as some tourism interests. It is said that traveling Li River is just like enjoying a melodious symphony. Hanyu (a very famous poet of ancient China) vividly described the enchanting beauty of the Lijiang River in his poem: The River looks like a blue silk ribbon, and the mountains resemble emerald hairpins" and there is another famous revolutionist-Chenyi had said "One shouldn't be willing to be God if he has been in Guilin".

The beautiful Li River is the proud of all Guilin people. So as a Guilin native, I thought.it was totally a shame because before I entered my current university, I had never left Guilin city in my life, I had no chance to see this beautiful scene before my past 20 years. But when I was 21 year old, I made a plan. I was planning to travel this well-known scene with my three university classmates.

Finally, in the early morning of May Day Holiday, 2007, I got up early and packed all the necessity for my short vacation (a trip from Crown Cave-a very beautiful cave in Guilin to Yangshuo). With a heavy backpack, I set up from my university. The first step was from Guilin city to Guanyan by bus. Oh, I had to say that it was a horrible experience to take bus during May Day holiday because it was completely overcrowded. But it didn't destroy my exciting emotion because that in the trip, we enjoyed some beautiful scenes of the road, like the busy peasants, the sweet fruit flowers, the naughty but lovely children and the old houses with long history and so on.

When we got Crown Cave, the leader made a decision-we should get off and hike and then take boat from Crown Cave to Xingping because it is said by the experienced visitors that the best way to enjoy the landscape scenery between these two places was by hiking or boating. I thought that it should be our second step when we began to hike. Well this was really a wonderful experience to walk along the river. During the May, the mountains were grotesque and still very emerald and sometimes colorful wild flowers emerged in our eyes. Once in a while, we could hear the bird singing. Their beautiful rhythm echoed out and seemed to fill the unknowing air. The terrain there is varied. So sometimes we walked on the high and dangerous cliffs; sometimes we stepped on the cobblestones of the river with our shoes wet, and, sometimes we weaved in and out through the narrow passes in the villages or in the endless fruit trees. The farmers there were so friendly that they invited us to drink some water and eat some fruits which they produced by themselves and the children and the elders were so shy that they always smile at us and sometimes sing and chat with us. From our chat, we can learn that they were of plain and pure personality. Thus, we just walked around and went, passed many villages-Banbiandu Village, Taoyuan village, Yangdi Village, Langshi Village and finally we got the Nine Horse Mount. When we got the Nine Horse Mount, it had been dark. To encamp at the foot of the Nine Horse Mount and along the Li River was one part of our plan. So after the leader gave everybody of our tasks, we did our own jobs individually. I and another two team member were set to collect firewood; the leader prepared the camps for the night. When the night came, we lit our firewood. Sitting together around the bright fire, we sang our children's songs, shared our foods, and competed to tell ghost stories. Happy time passed so quickly. No one remembered when we sleep. In the midnight, I waked because of the cold air. The fire burnt out. At the first sight after I opened my eyes, I was shocked at the bright stars in the so clean sky. I felt it seemed that at that moment all the boring thing which bothered we had left. I suddenly understood a person was just as small as a drop in the ocean however the world was so huge. The sounds I made at the quiet night waked my classmates easily, the atmosphere warmed again quickly. We chatted again……
 
In the morning of the next day, I waked up with the birds' songs and the sirens of the cruise ships. The air was so fresh. The sky was so clean and blue. After we washed ourselves, we looked at the mountain around ourselves carefully. It is said that there were 9 horses painted in the  Nine Horse Mount. The person who could count them completely will be considered as the cleverest one. So in order to be the cleverest person in the world, all of us tried our best to count the horses. But we had to admit that we were not the ones. With the pity that we were not the cleverest person, we set off again. This was our third step I thought because our main transportation was boat. Along the river, there were many peasants who ferried visitors when they were not busy at farming things. Some of them charged a lot but you could bargain with them easily. Finally, we took on the boat in this trip. The boat glided over the water slowly and the breeze blew us quietly. Endless mountains passed by. Some of them are high, some of them are short, some of them look like a person, and some of them look like cows. The boat swung our young hearts as well as our annoyances. The mountains seemed to swing also because of the swinging bamboos on them. The naughty water wet our shoes now and then. We couldn't help singing songs to the rhythm of the water. Looked at the bottom of the water, we couldn't tell whether they were green float grasses or the reflections of the green mountains. They were mixed. The water was so clean that we just could see the fishes swimming in it. We yelled and smiled happily. The valleys remembered our laughter.

Maybe 3 or 4 hours later, we got Xingping. There was one thing I had to mention. If you look carefully, you will find that there is a mountain whose photo is printed on 20 RMB of China. In order to remember this, we took a lot photos there. Then the forth step came. We got on the bus to the Yangshuo directly. The sceneries on the road were beautiful but we were too tired to enjoy them. We just want to have a nap.

We got West Street, Yngshuo finally. When I got off the bus, I was a little confused. Though I heard that there were many foreigners living there, I still want to ask myself was I in my country or at abroad. And I noticed that though most people there were foreigners, it was obviously that they came from different countries because their skin colors were different. Yangshuo was totally an international village. Along the street, there were many stalls which sell all kinds of tourist souvenirs like traditional Chinese painting, Quotations from Chairman Mao, DIY T-shirts and silks and so on. And one thing we didn't miss was to have a little drink in the bars of the West Street. There were so many bars in this street; some of them were famous abroad. The night life of Yangshuo was so colorful. The endless people, the red lanterns, the loud music, the pretty foreign girls and handsome boys, the delicious snacks, bottles of alcohol, and sweet barbecues all impressed me so much. Was it a real world or it just existed at the deep night? I didn't want to find the answer; I just wanted to enjoy and to experience at that moment.

Checked in at a youth hostel, we spent our night sweetly.

When the sunset again, we knew that it was time for us to go home. Looked at the photos we took on the road stored in the computer, I knew it happened. In that May Day holiday, I travelled Lijiang. Some memories have gone, the beauty of Guilin leaves in my deep heart forever.