I heard Yangshuo was good for biking and after not getting to ride a bike for 2 and a half weeks I was really looking forward to renting a bike. I spent some time researching bike rentals in Yangshuo. There are countless places to rent bikes, but most of the bikes are pieces of shit. I found a place called Bike Asia that had a good reputation. I stopped by the night before and talked to them. They hooked me up with a pretty decent mountain bike, some tools, a spare tube, a lock, a pump and helmet... all of this for about 10 bucks / day. Bike Asia also had some pretty decent maps and the woman working there gave me (once she realized i wasn't a total noob to riding) some advice on some longer self guided rides.
I took off in the morning and headed up to the village of Xing Ping, one of the most famous scenic villages. It was about a 36k ride. I spent the afternoon in Xing Ping, riding around some of the dirt roads and trails and just relaxing.
Instead of going back the same way, I took a ferry (yup a ferry!!) across the river and decided to head back a different way. The woman at Bike Asia told me that the other route had a lot more hills and was a bit more isolated... both of which were definitely understatements!!!!
After crossing the river and riding through a few small villages the road / path just kept going uphill. At one point I got a bit worried because I was running out of water and hadn't seen anyone for about an hour!!! Somehow bikes always seem to get me in trouble! After about another hour I finally came to a peak that over looked the entire valley! I thought this would be the last hill, but I was wrong! The next 25k was rolling hills, which is still better then just going straight up!
The highlight of the ride (well other the skitching off a dump truck up a hill.. skitching is where you hold onto a car / bus / truck and let them pull you) was finally getting to a paved road that led back to Yangshou. Although by that point I probably rode at least 80k, i got some energy up and bombed all the hills back into town. (check out the video at the bottom!!!)
Although I got pretty lost at points, I managed to make it back into Yangshuo right as the sun was setting! This ride was definitely the highlights of my trip!
Riding some dirt roads outside the village of Xing Ping.
This was my best friend for the day! I gotta say it held up very well.
Another shot from Xing Ping.
After hanging out in Xing Ping for a while (I was trying to avoid the extreme afternoon heat) I took a ferry across the river and started my ride home.
This was the last village i saw before starting my massive climb into the hills!
This view made the hellish climb a bit more worth it!!!
I was so happy to see the sun setting, not because of the nice glow of light, but because it was so extremely hot!
I definitely rode through some parts that most foreigners don't see! and i definitely got some looked when i flew by people!
The last photo i took before decided to mount my camera to my bike! See video below!!!