We traveled from the airport in the dark of night and could see nothing. When dawn finally arrived, this view of the Yulong river was the first thing we saw from the porch of our hotel room.

Front gate at the Yangshuo Mountain Retreat, home base for our self-guided tour. We highly recommend it for travelers who want to avoid the bustle of the city and organized tours.

Like most of the employees at the Yangshuo Mountain Retreat, “May” is from a nearby small village. The sustainably run hotel offers employment and on-the-job training to the rural villagers of the region. As they gain proficiency in English, they have the opportunity to move from room service and maintenance jobs to restaurant, front desk, concierge and assistant management positions.

On rainy days, the Yulong river tourist rafts sport bright umbrellas.

John stopped to help these construction workers load up. With their noisy 2 cycle engines, you can hear these trucks approaching from a long distance.

Dragon carving on a grave marker. It’s common for the rural villagers to locate such graves along hillsides and rural paths in the Yangshuo area. I saw several while biking and hiking in the area.

Yulong river raft base. Several dozen locals make their living poling tourists down the river.

The Yulong River Valley, viewed not far from the Yangshuo Mountain Retreat hotel.

We enjoyed making the acquaintance of many warm and friendly people on this trip. We were especially fortunate to meet up with molecular biologist Yisheng Sun while bike riding along the Yulong River Valley. He accompanied us the rest of the day and served as our translator.

We found beautiful farms and villages when we left the main roads and rode our rented mountain bikes down rural tracks.

The view from Moon Hill. Unfortunately, we didn’t have a clear day on this trip. As a consolation, the mist and haze often made the landscape appear that much more mysterious.

The view through Moon Hill

Posing with some fellow tourists at Moon Hill. The internal tourism market in China is booming.

At the insistence of “Sally” a self-employed local tour guide who approached us on her electric scooter as we bicycled to Moon Hill, we visited Mud Cave, a typical tourist attraction. There are many caves in the Yangshuo area and this one had some nice formations and a cool underground waterfall. The final stop on the cave tour is the eponymous mud bath, which we enjoyed with some Chinese bus tourists. We didn’t speak each others’ language, but we had a good time together.

The gateway to our hidden valleys adventure. Note the unremarkable path in the right bottom corner here. I spotted it while walking down the road and, looking to find some serenity away from the busloads of tourists at popular attractions, followed it. If you keep a sharp eye out while traveling the backroads around Yangshuo, you can spot paths like this one that lead into the numerous remarkable hidden valleys in the region. A tip for travelers: the geography can be a maze. Use the aerial view on apps like Google Maps on your smartphone to keep track of where you are in relation to nearby roads and you can easily find your way out.

We encountered no other travelers once we left the beaten path of popular Yangshuo tourist attractions.

Flowers among the hidden valleys.

We were constantly awed by the variety of karst formations. It seemed that every hill and turn revealed a strange new shape.

John, capturing a panorama of a spectacular hidden valley.

This was a typical pose as we gazed up and around at the incredible scenery. Another tip for travelers: hidden in the vegetation behind me is a long deep crevice that appeared to be a cave entrance. The region is rich with caves and sinkholes, so step carefully when off-trail.

The ride back to the airport was a tour in itself.

We enjoyed a beautiful sunset over China on our flight back to Hong Kong—a fitting end to a memorable trip.