Guilin in Brief

Guilin City is South China’s shining pearl, with verdant mountains, elegant waters, and magnificent crags and fantastic caverns. The scenery of Guilin has been called the finest under heaven. Guilin enjoys a mild climate with sufficient rainfall. The Limestone, weathered and eroded by water, became todays fantastic stone forests, peaks, underground streams and caves, thus giving unique features to Guilins scenery. The mountains are rising abruptly from the ground, stand in various stately shapes. Moreover, they have in them a great number of colorful caves. These mountains with strangely-shaped peaks and caves of unique formation, together with the crystal-clear rivers surround the city are very attracted by all the people. Many foreigners have a good impressive of Guilin’s special scenery.

There are more than 30 noted scenic spots within the boundaries of Guilin Peak. Among them are a hill standing in solitary loftiness in the center of the city; the Elephant Trunk Hill, the citys symbol, so named because of its resemblance to an elephant’s sipping water from the Lijiang River with its trunk; the Piled Festoon Hill that is broken here and there with its rock strata exposed on its sides like piles of fancy festoons; and the Crescent Hill that is named after itsmoon-shaped cave opening.

There are two fantastic caves in the area--- the seven-star-rock cave, which derives its namefrom the arrangement of surrounding peaks resembling the pattern of the stars of the Great Bear constellation, and Reed-Flute Cave, named after the reeds growing around the cave mouth. They both contain spectacular stalactites and stalagmites.

The city also boasts other beautiful hills, such as the Fubo Hill, which is supposed to restrain the waters of the Lijiang River, and Nanxi Hill that stands magnificently like a huge screen.

Guilin people

As a tourist destination second to none in China, Guilin will surely continue to attract ever more visitors from home and abroad.

Besides, Guilin has a various minorities which has different cultures and customs. Many ethnic minorities represented here that include the Zhuang, Yao, Hui, Miao, Mulao, Maonan and Dong enriches the cultural life of the city. These groups all have colorful customs and mostly rural lifestyles. Each minority has its own unique customs and festivals and this means that they are much more abundant here than in many other places elsewhere in China. Northwest of Guilin are the towns of Longsheng and Sanjiang, where you can find mixtures of Dong, Zhuang, Yao, and Miao minority villages. These people tend to be very friendly and may offer to be your guide and possibly invite you into their home for a meal and an overnight stay.

Guilin is a well-developed tourist center with convenient transportation, communication and accommodation facilities. You can enter Guilin by air, by train or by bus and get around on free buses. From luxury hotels to hostels, from splendid restaurants to local snacks, you are sure to find that your needs will be met beyond your expectations.

Guilin History

Guilin was first established by Emperor Qinshihuang (214 BC) as the Guilin Shire. It was located on the Guixiang "Corridor", which was an important passage connecting Zhongyuan and Lingnan. During the Three-Kingdom period, the Wu Kingdom built up Shian Shire here, and from then on Guilin has come to be a political and transition center. Till Tang Dynasty, Guilin had become a relatively big city. In Song Dynasty Guilin was the capital of Guangnanxilu, which governed Guangxi and Hainan Island. In Ming Dynasty, Guilin was also the seat of Jingjiang Prince Mansion. The revolutionary pioneer Sun Yat-san had his residence set up here and directed the Northward expedition. In 1940 Guilin was reset as a city of Guangxi Province.