China was the top of Cheryl’s “must do” list so, after places like Vietnam and Hong Kong, it was good to cross something off her list, in fact, long overdue. Her ultimate “must do” is to walk The Great Wall but that will have to wait until April/May.

Getting the visas in Hong Kong turned out to be a great plan with the whole process going perfectly and much cheaper than having to make two journeys to London. Getting out of Hong Kong and into China at Shenzhen was, quote Lonely Planet, “a breeze”. Get on the metro, one change onto the East Railway Line and, 45 minutes later, you’re going through immigration. Once through customs it’s a 500m walk to the main station.

Even though there wasn’t a single English sign, getting a ticket for the overnight sleeper was also relatively easy once we had shown the nice lady a copy of the trusty guidebook with its translation of Guilin, our destination, into Chinese characters. “Hard or soft sleeper”? “Soft please”. It was done, all we had to do was while away 5/6 hours. Downtown Shenzhen is very glitzy and the malls are full of very expensive brands, much like HK. Lunch was also easy as there were familiar HK brands in the malls.

Every new adventure brings at least one funny story and Neil had yet another while checking out the mall near the station. Going up the escalator he was followed by a young guy trying to sell him jeans, watches, in fact, anything you could think of. Neil kept silent as he always does. Up four flights and he was still trying to sell him stuff. As Neil started his descent his friendly salesman shouted, ‘you want Viagara”? At this point Neil could not hold out any longer and burst into laughter and shouted “no, no viagara, I don’t want to buy anything, only my lunch’!!! “You must want something, anything, you must buy something!” “Yes, my lunch”!! He went away.

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Once on the train we found our cabin. Soft sleeper comes with 4 berths so we were pleased to find out that one of our room mates spoke Chinglish very well, in fact, he was very well educated and spoke very good English. He was very chatty and explained that he and 17 colleagues had been to Taiwan on business. They had flown into HK and many of them had followed the lead of their younger member, our room mate, and bought iPads. He spent much of the start of the journey showing them how to use it. He went off to speak with some of his other mates and returned shortly later to tell us that he had been able to switch his berth leaving us on our own……result!

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The compartment was excellent. Very comfortable berths, carpet, a/c, sheets/quilts/pillows all provided and hot water in a flask to make tea/coffee (wish we’d known!). All in all, at £40 each to cover just over 1000kms, it was fab value. We did have a peep at hard sleeper class and decided that we had made a top decision. 6 berths in much narrower cabins, no lockable door, just open corridor with occasional seats for people to get away from their “room” mates! Yes, as we are worth it, a top decision.

We had taken provisions onto the train to see us through the journey which very soon ran out. Neil went up to the buffet car to find that the beer was sold out…..”what”? Two guys and a girl, who had been translating for him to the buffet attendant, had obviously drunk most of the beer on the train as they had multiple empties on the table. After much banter she talked Neil into buying a bottle of local hooch….mmmm….£1’s worth of fire!!

We both slept well and arrived in Guilin a little early at around 07.00. The guest house was only around a 10-15 minute walk and we were shown to our room without delay. Hot shower, breakfast and the day was on. The guesthouse is away from the centre of town which is great as it’s quiet with its own bar, garden (where this is being typed), and large rooms with funky art work on the walls. We’ve checked out some other guesthouses and decided that this one is OK.

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Just a short walk away is a large shopping mall with a great food court offering many superb food options, on table BBQ’s and a large beer and a coke for 90p!

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Guilin is much more China as we expected. While a lot of it is grey concrete it does have a lovely walk along the Li River, one of reasons we came here. The people are generally affluent, there is some poverty which we didn’t see in Shenzhen, but they are so friendly. The guys in the guesthouse speak great English and are helping us with planning our “off piste” adventure but communication with many locals is via sign language which can be hilarious for all concerned.

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As we neared the hostel on our way back after dinner, a little guy in the security gates beckoned us in and played his musical instruments for us. He danced as he sang with his banjo then followed with an impressive tune on what can only be described as an elongated 2 string violin played with a bow but balanced on his knee. He giggled as his picture was taken, a thoroughly lovely old man.

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We are getting cocky and decided that organised trips (tourist rip offs) are not for us. We’re leaving our baggage at the guesthouse to travel independently via local bus, to The Dragons Backbone Rice Terraces. We’ll be gone for 3 nights, finding beds on the way, so watch this space.