The unique hills towering over the rivers and lakes passing through the eastern part of Guangxi province make Guilin one of China's most famous scenic spots. Its beauty has been lauded in countless paintings and poems dating as early as the Tang Dynasty.

The city planners were well aware that it's Guilin's hills that make the former capital of Guangxi special. With the exception of a handful of newer buildings, Guilin's buildings do not exceed seven stories. "There is undoubtedly some sort of government regulation limiting the scale of buildings to a certain height because of the hills nearby," said Mr. Mo, a local taxi driver, "Some buildings cannot exceed seven stories and in other places [in Guilin], the buildings cannot exceed five stories."

Countless tourists have made the journey to Guilin over the city's 2,000-year history to admire its surrounding landscape. In 1999 alone, Guilin attracted 8.98 million tourists, 605,300 of who came from abroad. Although the majority of Guilin's foreign tourists hail from Japan, it attracts its fair share of Westerners. The city proudly points out that when US President Bill Clinton visited China in 1998, Guilin was one of the places he toured, as did President Richard Nixon in 1972.

Tourism is the main engine responsible for driving Guilin's economic growth. In 1999, Guilin's tourism industry took in 3.66 billion-Yuan (but how much of Guilin's economy tourism accounted for last year is currently unavailable because statistics on Guilin's GDP for 1999 have yet to be released). However, its exorbitant entrance fees and scams targeting tourists have earned it a "perhaps China's worst tourist trap" label in more than one English language guidebook. Every taxi driver I met made some sort of pitch for a "personal tour of Guilin." And more than one never took us to our requested destination and dropped us off at a souvenir shop or restaurant charging exploitative prices instead.

One of the best things to do in Guilin is to leave the city and take the four-and-a-half-hour cruise down the Li River to Yangshuo (INSERT). For Chinese tourists, they have the option of purchasing a 180-Yuan ticket or 420-Yuan ticket for the boat ride; the only difference is that lunch is provided with the more expensive ticket. But foreign tourists must shell out more than 600 Yuan to take the same trip down the Li River.

The 83-kilometer trip down the river is very peaceful and provides an excellent opportunity to see the twenty-two famous peaks along the Li River. Each famous peak has been given a name based on images that peak invokes. However, some peaks require a great deal of imagination to see how it got its name. One of the most famous peaks along the Li River is the Nine Horse Mural Hill, yet only one person in recent history has successfully pointed out all nine horses the first time he saw the hills. That person was Premier Zhou Enlai.

Within the city of Guilin, the most famous hill is Elephant Trunk Hill located in the middle of town, where the Li River and Taohuajiang River meet. From afar, this Guilin landmark looks like a huge elephant is standing in the Li River, taking a drink.

The large hole at the northern end of Elephant Trunk Hill is known as Shuiyue Cave (Water Moon Cave) because, from across the Li River, when the water is still, the cave creates the illusion of one moon rising just over the skyline and another moon reflecting off the water. Inside Shuiyue Cave are more than 50 stone inscriptions dating as far back as the Tang dynasty carved on the cave wall.

On top of Elephant Trunk Hill are the 10 meter high Puxian Pagoda. Built during the Ming Dynasty, the cylindrical pagoda looks like a handle of a sword sticking out of the elephant. Legend has it that the mythological elephant once started drinking up all the water out of the Li River. To stop it, the gods above thrust a sword into the elephant. The handle of the sword is the Puxian Pagoda.

East of the Li River, about 1.5 kilometers from the center of Guilin is Seven Star Park, the city's largest park. Its name comes from seven peaks in the park, which are arranged like the stars of the Big Dipper (Ursa Major). Tourists have come to visit these hills since the Sui dynasty more than 1,000 years ago, leaving more than 500 inscriptions on the cave walls. After 1959, many of the parks older temples, pavilions and other architectural structures were renovated and new gardens, an amusement park and a zoo were built in the park. Although the zoo isn't much, there are wild monkeys and peacocks roaming freely around the park.

The other site worth visiting in Guilin is Xi Shan (Western Hills) Park, 1.5 kilometers west of downtown. Xi Shan's history is closely tied with Buddhism so not surprisingly, Xi Shan's peaks are named after Buddhist deities. The Xiqinlin Temple, built during the Tang dynasty is one of the five biggest temples in southern China.

Perhaps in an attempt to attract a younger crowd not interested in Buddhism, the park planners designed a haunted cave inside Hidden Hill. In each of Hidden Hill's six caves, there are exhibits of corpses, mechanical ghosts floating around and traps that don't work all the time. Nevertheless, the tour of the caves is still an amusing experience.

Foreigners who detest Chinese food are out of luck in Guilin, which doesn't even have a McDonalds. However, there's a wide selection of seafood and snakes for the gastronomically adventurous served in Guilin's restaurants.

Less than a block from Elephant Trunk Hill on Bingjiang Road is a row of restaurants, which comes to life after the sun, goes down. On evenings when the weather is nice, the restaurants will move their tables outside. In front of the restaurants, there are cages and buckets filled with live fowl and fish, shellfish or snakes respectively, sitting on the sidewalk. If you're lucky (or unlucky if you're vegetarian), occasionally, the vendor will hurl an animal against the pavement and kill it for the chef. One caveat emptor for customers: when I asked one restaurateur to weigh a fish first, he killed it, weighed it and then forced us to buy it.

A cheaper dining option is Mei Shi Cheng (City of Beautiful Food), located off Zhongshan Nan Road a block or two north of the train station. The courses are no less exotic than those on Bingjiang Road and there are lots of souvenir shops in the area that sell reasonably priced tea, cakes or other souvenirs.

(People's Daily 05/14/2001)