I recently visited the township (and future city of five million) of Yangshuo located about 60 Kilometres downstream from Guilin in the Guangxi province of Southern China. Countryside world famous for its landscape of Karst limestone pinnacles dotting the plains and fading into the mists. Beneath them scattered villages and rice paddies and an abundance of greenery and vitality. I get a feeling the landscapes haven’t changed much at all over the centuries.
The township (or city of 300,000) of Yangshuo is a bustling place (like most in China) and besieged by Chinese visitors and increasingly visited by Westerners drawn to its climate, landscapes and laid back nature of its people. I’d visit sooner than later if I was you and enjoy the bustling of West Street at night with its shops and restaurants, streetside patter of people, players of trade and festive nature of a street and environs free from vehicular access. Oh! You also come here for the landscapes and the river life.
But what about sustainability in tourism if the pundits are correct and the town of 2/300,000 becomes 4/5 million? What of the surrounding countryside as increased numbers of Chinese people are more able to afford a holiday or honeymoon in such surroundings? What of the landscapes, way of life for the farmers and peasants, villages and streams? Maybe there’s a solution.
Bamboo river rafting along stretches of the Yulong River offers one and is sustainable. The Yulong River flows into the Li River and gently courses its way through the limestone peaks, valleys and plains, though paddy fields of rice and small villages where Chinese farmers subsidise their income by acting as raftsmen.
Rafts constructed simply of bamboo stitched together with wire and upon each one a platform large enough for a two seater seat, the raftsman to the rear guiding the raft using a pointed bamboo pole. I suggest wrap your valuables into something waterproof in case you take a spill going over the numerous weirs along the way. You can take a five hour trip or two hour. We took the two hour one settling down for the ride after passing over a weir or two, knowledgeable the raftsman was still behind us.
Time to sit back and enjoy the landscapes, get your picture taken as you go over a weir (don’t grimace too much), have something to eat or drink from the floating stalls and listen to the laughter and chatter of those hundreds of people there with you. We were lucky and listened to a voice of a Chinese lady singing opera; maybe this is such a place in the auditorium of river and limestone peaks. It’s nice for us Westerners to connect with the Chinese people in this way.
Bamboo rafting offers a near perfect solution to sustainable tourism. The river carries away the intrusion of mankind as long as rubbish isn’t discarded to mar the pureness of water and beauty of the place, the river host and nurturer of the landscape and permitting us to move through it.
I feel I could for one, return in say 4/5 years and do the trip again and hopefully, things will be pretty much the same.
I hope you enjoyed reading my article as much as I enjoyed pondering over and writing it. For more related topics and complete eBook Publications, please visit my website Feng Shui Garden – a Modern and Unique Concept to Feng Shui in the Garden and Harmonious Chi (Qi) Within Our Lives. Drop by and pick up your Free Feng Shui Ebooks Sample today!! Regards, Ross Lamond
