This year for the first time, we decided to travel on the four-day holiday. We traded traditional turkey dinner for an adventure weekend. It is not a busy travel weekend as the only students out of school are American schools. Elle goes to the British school, therefore, she had no days off.

We flew up to Yangshuo with our traveling friends, The Humes; Mary, John, Kelly & Erin. Yangshuo is the beautiful mountains seen on Sagwa the Cat on PBS. What an amazingly beautiful place. We spent Thanksgiving morning AND afternoon at the airport. Our flight was to leave at 8:00am. Due to plane troubles, we finally left at 1:30pm. We had to pass on the adventure to the rice terraces known as Longji Titian (Dragon Backbone Terraces) in Longsheng.

The temperature in November is cool and crisp in the mornings and evenings. The days are beautiful when the sun comes out. We stayed at the Guest Village Inn. The Inn was new with basic rooms and HEAT. There is no heat south of the Yangtze River. Any heat available is from free standing heaters. A friend of Jim’s owns this place and the Mountain Retreat. He now lives in Thailand. He was visiting the hotels this week. He didn’t plan to remain for the weekend, but the airport had been closed due to demonstrations in Bangkok. Jim enjoyed the time to catch up with Chris.

We started our first day of adventure hiking through the rice patties along the Li River. The girls enjoyed this hike along the river and through the patties.

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We took photos of the old Dragon Bridge. The bridge is over 700 years old. It is beautiful with the mountains as a backdrop.

Then, down to the river for lunch on a raft only the locals (and our guide) would know about. We went through alleyways, doorways and yards to reach this place. I don’t know if we could get back on our own. The girls played with some local girls while we waited for our food.

After lunch, we rafted down the river in the two-man bamboo rafts. Kelly and Emmy were on a raft without parents. The water was not deep and they both know how to swim.

The highlight of the raft trip was the older girls. They had been busy splashing everyone and having fun. Jim decided he would push their raft away from his raft with his foot. Well, he pushed too hard and both girls went flying into the river at the same time. The look on their faces was priceless…no picture…I was in shock that Jim “pushing” them in.

After a quick shower and dry clothes for everyone, we had a quick dinner on the rooftop terrace of our hotel. We had tickets to a show on the lake with the karsts peaks/mountains as the backdrop. It is an outside show with seating for over 2, 000 with floodlights on the karsts as a backdrop and the lake in the foreground as the main stage. Over 500 actors perform various acts to songs and music all choreographed on the water and land. The same man choreographed the opening and closing Olympic performances. You could see the similarities. It was a cool, cold night. Elle feel asleep in the middle of the show on Jim’s lap. I had Emmy sit on my lap for a bit more warmth. It was worth a bit of chilliness. After the performance, we headed back to the heat in our rooms and a glass of wine. As season traveler of China, we knew to bring our own wine. The ONLY wine outside of the main cities is a brand called The Great Wall Wine…not worth drinking.

We decided to start the day off with a hot air balloon ride. Jim and I have never been up in a hot air balloon. The girls were all very excited. We watched the balloons come up over the mountaintops. It was a beautiful cool, crisp and clear morning.

As we started to walk towards our balloon, Elle got very scared of the fire. She suddenly no longer wanted to go in the balloon. She said she would stay with the van. The balloon’s basket had foot holes for climbing in. We got her to get in the basket so she could see the fire would not hurt her. She decided her spot would be sitting on the floor of the basket looking out the foot holes…as far as possible from the fire.

Emmy loved the ride. She enjoyed watching the view. A truly amazing view of the lakes and mountain. I can’t image a better place to enjoy my first hot air balloon ride.

Back to the hotel for a late breakfast/lunch. No worries as the menus in China always have noodles for breakfast. Since it was later, the sun had warmed up the day. We enjoyed sitting outside on the terrace overlooking Moon Hill. After filling our tummies, we began our next adventure, biking. We had tandem bikes for the older girls and a traditional Chinese child seat basket for Elle. No helmets, no safety straps, no worries!!

We biked the countryside with our guide. Out of our group of adults, I was the one always at the back…due to being in the worst shape!! Emmy decided she was tried of being last. I won’t mention we wouldn’t be last if she helped to peddle a little more! So, I traded Emmy for Elle in the basket. My thought was Elle is lighter and Emmy’s effort of peddling weren’t showing. Elle and I took my position of last place. Now, Elle was complaining about being last. At one point, Jim and John had stop to take pictures (not to wait for me). Our trusted guide with Mary and her girls took a fork in the road without stopping. The good part was that I was lost on the country roads of China with Jim, Emmy, Elle and John. The bad part was I had to peddler extra distance with Elle in her basket. When we found our way back to the main road, we stopped for a sugar cane stick break. The cane stick is sold along side the road. We peddled through the country side for about four hours.

After biking, we went to The Mountain Retreat. The retreat has more green area for the kids to run. It located along the river…a great spot to sit in the warm sun and enjoy a drink. After a couple drinks, we left the boys to drink and watch the kids. All the kids are water safe, but one!! Mary and I went to the ONE street of shopping for a quick shop. As a Mom of small children, you learn to shop quickly and take any opportunity to shop without kids.

On our last morning, no one was ready to go home. The girls played in the courtyard while we packed the final bags. We drove to Guilin to catch our flight to Shanghai. We decided we would come back next year for Thanksgiving.