Big wheels keep on rollin'...

Oh My!!! If you enjoy major sweating, humidity bar none, have issues with using air conditioning, and don't mind being eaten alive with mosquitos - all in a gloriously beautiful place then this place is for you! Yangshou China. A village along the Li River that is a popular Chinese tourist area was our next stop. The hotel was magnificent, but they turn the air conditioning off when 'they' think it's cool enough, and there were NO screens to open the doors. When you did open them a multitude of mosquitos were waiting patiently to swarm into their luxury new home with plenty of yummy 8 year old skin to enjoy. For whatever reason, John is who they loved.

We asked our guide to take us into the country side to experience 'real' life in China and she did just that. Along the way we saw rice fields, water buffalo, and so many other interesting sites it would be impossible to list them all. We toured a local family's home and they were incredibly kind. They showed us how they pump their water, cook their food and lived daily life. One most interesting point was that the families build (or pick out) their burial caskets prior to their death. They store them in the home waiting to be used.

Along the road, we stopped to enjoy watching the rice farmers work in the fields with the water buffalo plowing (note the farmer's arm is missing) and at one point an elderly woman came out of the bushes and came at us with a hoe. She kept waving the hoe and coming closer and closer shouting something in Mandrian. Our guide scurried us back into our van and said she wanted money. We decided we had seen enough of that spot :)

We opted to eat dinner at the hotel and ordered a "ham and cheese" sandwich. The Chinese version of this would be white bread lightly toasted, spam, and an unwrapped slice of american cheese. Period. :) ll