Highlights

Minority peoples, farmers markets, Yangshuo Cooking School, cultural performances, Asia's largest waterfall, old stone town, hiking, dramatic rice terraces, ancient paper and indigo cloth making, drum towers, wind & rain bridges, river raft trip.

Duration: 18 days
Start: Guiyang, August, 2012
End: Guilin, September, 2012
Maximum Group Size: 18
Style: budget
Cost: TBA (land only, all inclusive)

Join photographer, Brian Smith, and travel writer, Rick Green, to visit the minority regions of Guizhou and Guangxi in Southwest China. We'll meet Dong, Gejia, Miao, Shui, Yao, and Zhuang people who continue to live a predominantly agrarian lifestyle in the temperate highlands on the borderlands of the Han Chinese heartland. We'll then visit the karst region of Guilin District, the birthplace of Chinese landscape painting and immortalized on China's 20 yuan bill.

Itinerary

Day 1 Arrive Guiyang
No activities scheduled.

Day 2 & 3 Anshun
Travel from Guiyang to Anshun. Visit the Longgong Cave complex in the afternoon. Have special Anshun toasted fish dinner.

In the morning of Day 3, we visit Huangguoshu Falls, Asia's largest waterfall, followed by the Tianxingqiao Scenic Area in the afternoon.

Day 4 Guiyang
Visit the Wenmiao Confucius Temple in Anshun, then see the Tunpu villages of Yunshantun, Benzhai, and Tianlong. In Tianlong, we will be given a performance of traditional Dixi street opera, then we return to Guiyang to stay overnight.
 
Day 5 & 6 Kaili
Travel from Guiyang to Qingyan, an old stone town with Buddhist temples, a Taoist temple, a Catholic church and a Protestant church. Continue to Kaili where we will stay for two nights.

In the morning of Day 6, we drive to Matang to visit the minority Gejia people who will give us a musical performance. In the afternoon, we drive to the Miao village of Qingman, where we will learn about their traditional agrarian lifestyle. Finally, we will go to Shiqiao, where we will see how residents make paper using traditional techniques.

Day 7 Rongjiang
In the morning, we drive from Kaili to our guide's ancestral village where the Miao inhabitants will give us a dance performance dressed in their finest clothes. We then have a delicious lunch at our guide's home prepared entirely from local ingredients. Afterwards, we travel to Rongjiang where we will stay overnight.

Day 8 & 9 Zhaoxing
Visit the Dong village of Yintan where we will see the various stages of making indigo cloth by hand. We will then drive to Zhaoxing where we will stay for the next two nights.

On Day 9, we will hike in the surrounding hills, visiting the Dong villages of Jitang, Dengjiang, and Jilun along the way.

Day 10 Sanjiang
Today, we cross into Guangxi province and drive to the eight Dong villages of Sanjiang Dong Autonomous County where we will see the famous wind & rain bridge at Chengyang. We will also visit a tea plantation and try a local specialty, oily tea.

Day 11 Huangluo
From Sanjiang, we drive to the Red Yao village of Huangluo whose women are are the Guinness World Records holders for the longest hair in the world. We will see a Yao musical performance and enjoy a special dinner prepared by a Yao chef from fresh, local ingredients.

Day 12 Tiantouzai
Hike the amazing rice terraces from Ping'an to Tiantouzai, where we stay overnight in order to witness the sunrise over the rice terraces. Excellent photo opportunities along the way. Clouds often shroud the mountains in the morning, lending a dream-like quality to the scene until the sun burns them off.

Day 13 & 14 Guilin
After breakfast, we will hike down from Tiantou to Dazhai, where our bus will take us to the Guilin Tea Science & Research Institute, which used to be the royal tea garden for the Jingjiang princes. After touring the gardens, learning about the tea grown there, and sampling, we drive to Guilin, renowned as the birthplace of Chinese landscape painting due to its unique karst topography.

On Day 14, we'll see some of the city's unique spots and enjoy the change of pace from the countryside.

Day 15 - 18 Yangshuo
Hike and raft through the magical limestone landscape along the Li River to Yangshuo. On Day 16, we'll have a session at the Yangshuo Cooking School in a converted village farmhouse. For the remainder of the trip, you are free to do as you wish, with options for going cycling, exploring caves, hiking, rock climbing, taking a leisurely raft trip, or seeing the Impression Liu Sanjie show produced by Zhang Yimou.

On Day 18, transfer to Guilin for flight to Vancouver.