ESPAÑOL

HOW TO GET THERE

GUILIN LIANGJIANG INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT

Nearly 30 km west of the city center, there are direct flights to major Chinese cities and multiple international destinations, most of them nearby, especially Malaysia, Hong Kong (considered international flight), Japan and South Korea. Some examples are:

• Shanghai, more than 5 a day, from 650 ¥.
• Hangzhou, 6 a day, from 450 ¥.
• Beijing: 5 a day, from 830 ¥.
• Xi’an: 5 a day, from 475 ¥.
• Chengdu: 2 a day, from 800 ¥.
• Chongqing: 1-2 a day, from 1,500 ¥.
• There are no direct flights to Zhangjiajie (Dayong), you have to stop in Kunming or Xi’an, it takes about 7 hours and the price is around ¥1500-2000.

It is one of the airports that allows a 72-hour visa to visit the city and its surroundings without the need for a tourist visa.

To go from the airport to the city:

• Airport Shuttle Bus. There are several:
  • Line 1: the most reliable, finishes at CAAC (Civic Aviation Hotel) building in the southern part of the city, from where we will probably have to take a taxi. From 6:30 a.m. to 9 p.m. It costs 20 ¥, every half hour in theory, although if they are very empty, their departure is delayed until more passengers arrive. It takes 40 minutes to get there.
  • Line 2: goes to the North Train Station, 5 a day. Same price.
  • Line 3: finishes at Wanfu City Terminal, quite south of downtown, 5 a day. Same price.
  • There are 8 buses a day from the airport to Yangshuo. 50 ¥, it takes 90 minutes. There are also buses to less tourist towns.
• Many hotels offer free or reduced-price pick-up service, although in return they will expect excursions to be booked through them. We hired the Li River cruise and the day trip to Longji rice paddies and they charged us 90 ¥ for taking us to the airport.
• A taxi should cost around 120 ¥ and take as long as the bus. Almost no driver will speak English. As always, you must ask the meter to be on.

TRAIN

Among the most eminent touristic destinations, there’s only no direct train to Huangshan, you have to change in Changsha. There are 3 stations:

• Guilin Station, the most central, at the junction between Shanghai Road and Zhongshan South Road. Most are high-speed trains. There are few trains that start or end here, so it is very difficult to get a “sleeper” ticket. It is reached by 12 urban bus lines; towards the center go lines 10 and 100 (2 ¥). Be aware that when you leave, to get to the bus stop you have to go through an underground passage where it is easy to get disoriented; we made a mistake and took bus 10 in the opposite direction; luckily only 5 minutes later we reached the last stop, which is next to a shopping center, where we could hop off, ask for an ice cream, and take the bus again this time in north direction.

DESTINATION	TYPE OF TRAIN	FREQUENCY AND SCHEDULE	DURATION	APPROXIMATE PRICE (¥)
				1st/2nd class	Soft/Hard Sleeper/Hard seat
Yangshuo (Xingping)	Normal	9:07 and 16:15	40m	32/26
Beijing	Both	10:33, 12:08 14:22	10h40m 19h30m	1250/805	650/430
Kunming South	Normal	7:30 and 14:47	7h40m		555/375
Guangzhou South	High-speed	8 daily	3h30m	170/145
Changsha South	High-speed	14 daily	1h35m	250/180
Hangzhou East	High-speed	4 daily in the morning	8h15m	930/590
Shanghai Hongqiao	High-speed	11:45	9h30m	1050/660
Chongqing West	High-speed	4 daily	5h20m	365/265
Chengdu East	High-speed	9:50 and 11:53	7h30m	600/370

• North Station: 9 km north of downtown, most are slow trains. The buses to get there are 32, 100 and 302.

DESTINATION	TYPE OF TRAIN	FREQUENCY AND SCHEDULE	DURATION	APPROXIMATE PRICE (¥)
				1st/2nd class	Soft/Hard Sleeper/Hard seat
Yangshuo (Xingping)	High-speed	4 daily	25m	25/20
Beijing West	Normal	4:30, 18:42 and 21:30	From 20 to 28h		650/430
Kunming	Normal Slow	9:47 12:29	8h 20h	555/375	430/280/150
Guangzhou	High-speed	12 daily (+1 slow)	3h (slow 11h)	230/135
Changsha	Normal	10 daily	5-7h		215/140/75
Hangzhou East	Normal	4 daily	15-19h		490/325/180
Shanghai South	Normal	5 daily (the one at 3:51 am goes to Shanghai Central)	18-26h		540/350/200
Chongqing West	High-speed	10:33	5h	360/260
Xi’an	Normal	18:10	21h30m		565/365/200

• New West Station, opened in 2016, far to the northwest of the city. Few destinations, all high speed. Buses 22 and 303.

DESTINATION	TYPE OF TRAIN	FREQUENCY AND SCHEDULE	DURATION	APPROXIMATE PRICE (¥) 1st and 2nd class
Yangshuo  (Xingping)	High-speed	8 daily	25m	25/20
Guangzhou	High-speed	More than 30 daily	3h	165/135
Chongqing West	High-speed	20 daily	4h45m	360/255
Chengdu East	High-speed	8 daily	7h20m	570/350

BUS

The main station is Guilin Passenger Transport Terminal (65 Zongzshan Nalu, buses 3, 9, 10, 11, 16, 25, 51, 88, 91 and 99), near the Central Railway Station. There is also a North Station and another station called Qintan 2 km southwest of the main (Qintan Qiche Zhan 31 Cuizhu Lu, Xiangshan, buses 2, 12, 26, 32, 85 and 91).

Destinations of interest:

• Yangshuo:
  • Express buses from Central Station: every 15-30 minutes, from 7 am to 9 pm, 70 minutes, 50 ¥.
  • Not-express buses, cost the same as the train (25 ¥), take up to an hour and a half, but leave you in the center, not like the train that will leave you in Xingping, another bus hour from Yangshuo. They leave every 15 minutes from 6:30 am to 10:30 pm in front of the Central Train Station. If they are taken at the North Train Station, they cost twice as much and take 2 hours.
  • Not recommended: minibuses (20 ¥) that leave in front of the Central Train Station, because they do not leave until they are full and also stop by continuously picking up and dropping passengers, so they take longer and are more uncomfortable.
• Longsheng (for Longji rice fields, you have to get off the bus in Heping):
  • Central Station: 40 ¥, 2 hours, 5 a day (8 am, 8:30 am, 9:30 am, 1 pm and 3 pm).
  • Qintan Station: 30 ¥, 2 hours, every 40m from 6:10 am to 7 pm.
• For the rice fields, there are also 3 buses that go directly to towns closer than Longsheng; from the Main Station they go to Dazhai through Ping’An, 50 ¥, 3 hours; at 8:30 am, 9:30 am, and 2 pm.
• It is not clear if the bus to Fenghuang is still active; at least until 2016 it was like this: from Qintan Station, 160 ¥, one a day at 11:00 a.m., 6 h.

BOAT

The Li River cruise connects the cities of Guilin and Yangshuo through one of the most spectacular places in China. For complete information, check its specific article.

GETTING AROUND

Guilin is an excellent base to take the scenic Li River cruise to Yangshuo and to visit Longji’s rice terraces, but itself, the city has fewer attractions. The majority are related to the karstic formations that surround it.

• The city has a considerable size, so it is not recommended to cover all on foot, except the central area, where most attractions are (see the post ONE DAY ITINERARY IN GUILIN).

• Bicycle can be a good means of transport. Most accommodations rent them for 20 ¥ per day.
• Buses work efficiently. They cost between 1.2 and 2 ¥ (without and with air conditioning), but buses 51 to 58 are free (tour buses), although infrequent and usually full:
  • 58 is the most convenient, it passes close to several main attractions: the Elephant Trunk, 7 Star Park, Reed Flute Cave, Folded Brocade Hill and Wave Subduing Hill.
  • If 58 takes a long time to come, number 2 goes through the Trunk and Brocade Hill.
• Most taxis will use a meter in the city, but they will prefer a fixed rate for outlying points. The minimum fare is 9 ¥ and it increases 2 ¥ per km (more expensive in night fare). Official are yellow and black, or yellow and green.
• A gentle way to see several of the main points of interest is to take the Two Rivers – Four Lakes cruise. Any hotel or travel agency organizes it, costs between 150 and 350 ¥ (depending on where we book it and the time, it is more expensive at night) and lasts about 90 minutes; It makes a circular tour of the small lakes in the center of the city and the Li River near the center and although they are expensive, they allow us to appreciate decently some of these places, such as the Elephant Trunk, so we can save the admission to several places

MORE ESSENTIAL INFORMATION IN GUILIN:

<WHEN TO GO, DANGERS AND ANNOYANCES

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∇ Destinations / ∇ Asia / ∇ China / ∇ Guangxi / ∇ Guilin Prefecture / ∇ Guilin City