Any advice for Yunnan and Guangxi trip in August?

Travel International Travel
1

My wife and I are planning on travelling to Southwest China for all of August, and I was wondering if any fellow forumosans have been there and wanted to share any experiences or advice. I haven’t booked a ticket yet, but my tentative plan is to fly to Kunming (via Hong Kong of course) and then fly back from Hong Kong at the end of the month.

The 3 areas I’m most interested in are from Dali up through to Deqin (Tibetan area), Xishuangbanna (SE Asia flavour), and Yangshuo (limestone mountains), but everything is flexible. Anyone have any better ideas?

I’m wondering how rural Chinese and minority people would accept my Taiwanese wife. I’m sure some will frown upon both her nationality and her choice of a white guy as a husband, but would it likely be a problem for us?
I was also wondering about what to expect from the weather. I realize it’s the wettest time of the year, but will it really be that bad?

Thanks for any info you want to share!

2

  1. When I was in the countryside, whenever I mentioned I had spent time in Taiwan, I got it pretty good (especially if they already knew that I was American.) Pretty soon I stopped telling people that I had ever even been to Taiwan. It’s nothing serious, just a bunch of good-natured and not-so-good-natured ribbing, but I got sick of it pretty quickly. I’d come up with some sort of plausible alternate story (i.e. you’re both Germans.)

  2. Do you have any time to check out Guizhou province? It’s probably my favorite province. Personally, I’d rather check out south-east Guizhou than Guangxi.

3

dali and yangshuo are terrible tourist areas
if you want to travel rural china try gansu or eat tibet

4

Go to Lijiang and tiger leaping gorge. It’s fantastic!! (well tiger leaping gorge is, lijiang isn’t anything too special)
You can see some pictures of the region here:
spinningvortex.hamesh.com/album06
mmm, and if you decide to partake is some local ummm plant life, and are going to XiShaungBanna, watch out, they search everyones bags on the bus.
XiShaungBanna is a nice relaxing place, although the hike that is recommended in the Lonely Planet isn’t really a forest hike any more, they’ve cut down almost all the trees…
What to do in XiShaungBanna is rent a nice bike, and ride around all day.
The best bikes are found at MeiMeis (I think thats the name) cafe. The bikes at the other places are, in a word, Horrible. (we had chains falling off, brakes not working, etc…)
If you want some more suggestions, pm me.

5

Has anyone got any stories or advice regarding Guizhou? I’ve decided to spend a week or two there and was hoping for some suggestions. thanks.