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Introduction
April 8 - Flying to Beijing
April 9 - Beijing
April 10 - Beijing
April 11 - Beijing to Guiping
April 12 - Guiping
April 13 - Guiping to Guilin
April 14 - Guilin to Beijing
April 15 - Beijing to home
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We drove from Guiping to Guilin on the express bus today.
It took 6 hours and included some stops along the way. We
got a bottle of water and a can of sweet congee. It was a
boring drive and quite bumpy.
We got to Guilin and checked into our hotel, The Western
Hill. It was new and beautiful, with bamboo floors and large
rooms, but no working A/C. We eventually transferred rooms
to the deluxe suite.
 
We exchanged money to give to the Guilin orphanage as part
of our FCC donation
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We then went back to the hotel to pick up our guide's 5-year-old
daugher Michaela and headed to the public square. We stopped
for chesnuts at the best chesnut-maker in town. The girls
got along famously, despite the language barrier. They played
in a kids' park with fast rides and play areas. Every kid
there was a huge sweatball because of the heat and humidity,
with no wind. The rides went super-fast, making it impossible
to get a good picture of them. The public area was great for
kids. There were tons of kids' rides and activities, plus
many vendors just for them. There was a huge square that was
great for roller skating, too.
Along the parkway, there were lots of vendors, including
the (in)famous pickled-everything vendors. When we went by
later in the evening, most of these bins were empty.
We went to dinner on the square at a touristy restaurant
with very good food. Amy and Michaela liked to watch the performers,
singing and dancing.
After dinner, we walked around the area filled with tiny
shops for tourists. We wandered out of this area, close to
where we were before. The girls sat and painted window stickers
while Xixi and I hunted down dance fans. When we came back,
I bought a spinning light-up top that needs to be whipped
at to keep spinning. We walked to the Waterfall Hotel and
watched the huge waterfall show over the side of the hotel.
We left and crashed at our hotel soon after.
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