2015
The Li River originates out of the Mao’er Mountains in northern Guangxi Zhuang, an Autonomous Region (county) in south central China, bordering Vietnam. The Li River flows south past the cities of Guilin, Yangshou before merging at Pingle, with the Lipu and Gongcheng Rivers, that continue southeast as the Gui River that empties into the Xi Jiang River, a western tributary of the Pearl River, in Wuzhou, where it flows south and just west of Guangzhou (Canton), into the South China Sea.
Guilin is famous for its surrounding Karst topography; shaped by the erosion of limestone (also known as chalk or calcium carbonate) some 250 million years ago, it is a soft rock that dissolves in water; as rainwater seeps into the rock, it slowly erodes. Karst landscape can be worn away from the top or dissolved from a weak point inside the rock, creating caves, underground streams, and sinkholes on the surface. Where erosion has worn away the land above ground, steep rocky cliffs are visible.
Guilin is part of a larger karst landscape — South China Karst — which spreads across the Chinese provinces of Guangxi, Guizhou, and Yunnan.
Such spectacular formations, but no blue sky… Even in this relatively rural area, the smog is very thick, thereby eliminating almost all direct sunlight, and therefore contrast!
