Next stop, back to the countryside, this time in southern China in the Guillin province.  This area is known for its amazing karst limestone outcroppings that look like huge gumdrops, and its dreamy, almost surreal landscape.  Again, we found ourselves there off-season, but in a way this added to the appeal… being socked in by fog and mist with these huge lush gumdrops emerging from the rivers.  We arrived in the night so did not witness the splendor until we opened our curtains in the morning.  See following photo taken from our hotel.  One of the kids, “This is what I thought China was going to look like.”  This was a fabulous week spent biking, hiking, sitting by the fire, meeting fellow travelers, scrabble, reading, home school, ping pong and badminton ( I do count this as PE in our home school as my boys are actually able to turn ping pong and badminton into full contact sports).

Having our fill of China, we next turned our sites south on Vietnam in search of sunshine and Pho.