TripAdvisor Reviews

This review is for the Guilin portion of an 11 day private tour through Marco Polo Tours. Highly recommend Arthur as your guide of Guilin. He has been doing this for a long time and still loves showing off his home town. He speaks English well, and is enthusiastic and courteous. Grateful for the early and frequent communication prior to meeting. He met us at airport very late in evening with excellent driver Mr Tree. They took us to hotel and Arthur checked us in and made sure we were good before saying good night. He picked us up early the next morning and we drove to cruise boat for 4 1/2 boat ride down Li River. It was abdolutely beautiful. We then drove back to Guilin through countryside for photo stops. The evening was to ourselves which perfectly aligned with Lantern Festival fireworks for many hours! The next day Arthur and Mr Tree picked us up late morning and headed to The Reed Flute Cave which was a natural wonder. We then were driven to train station to head to our next China destination. Arthur came through security with us to make sure we knew which gate our train would leave from.

Thank you Arthur, you made Guilin visit great! Thank you Mr Tree.(Hope spelling close). Less

Lily – my personal Thank You for the lovely reception that we received upon our late arrival in Guilin at 11.00 pm and arranging for our rooms to be cooled before reaching our accommodations at the Sheraton Hotel. This gesture was thoughtful, considerate and most welcomed. I wish to express my appreciation that she ensured that the minutest details were also taken care of, resulting in our visit in Guilin to be lovely, pleasant, most enjoyable and memorable.



I especially want to thank Lily for supporting me, and speaking on my behalf to the authorities as there was a perceived recorded error of the expiry date that conflicted with my new passport. Her professionalism, her ‘common sense’ approach to the said misunderstanding, her calm demeanour, her quiet perseverance in explanations to the authorities diffusing the situation, gave me the comfort of knowing that the matter would be resolved amicably. Her composure in handling the problem not only assured me, but that calmness exuded itself to me and at no moment did I feel alone, abandoned nor anxious. I was totally confident in her ability to settle the issue.



Further, I wish to acknowledge and compliment Lily for recommending and arranging the ‘Impression' show by Sanjie Liu. The show was definitely a show stopper and, in my humble opinion, should be one the visits that Guilin has to offer.



Lily is a total credit to the travel agency - Travel China Guide, her professionalism is of the highest quality, setting a high bar for integrity and competency! Less

As part of the excellent Classic China Tour we spent two days in Guilin with the very helpful and informative QiuyanLi as our guide for the area.



QiuyanLi ('Li' for short) met us at the airport and took us to the very impressive Reed Flute Cave complex which we really enjoyed. It can, apparently, be very busy but was not at all crowded when we visited so Li was able to show us around the caves without any difficulty.



From there we headed towards the city to see Elephant Trunk Hill. Unfortunately, it was extremely crowded and noisy around the best viewing areas when we visited making it hard to see the best views or hear all of the commentary, despite Li's best efforts.



Our hotel, the Sheraton, was in a great location close to the river and city centre and we found the buffet style breakfasts in the coffee shop were excellent though it was very crowded both mornings. Our room was OK but just a little tired and disappointing compared to some of the others on the tour. Two comfortable chairs would have been better that just one for a couple.



The city is very interesting and friendly with markets and food options of all sorts though we did encounter some issues with misunderstandings over language translations but that can all be part of the travel experience in a foreign country.



We discovered that one of the best (and reasonably priced) options for a local meal is, ironically, the Irish pub next to the hotel which had almost no Irish meal options but some excellent Chinese ones making it a favourite of many of the locals, including Li!



The artificial waterfall which flows over the side of the Waterfall Hotel in the city at certain times in the evening is as spectacular as it is unexpected and worth the short walk.



The beautiful cruise to Yangshuo on the Li River was outstanding and one of the highlights of the whole tour. Li came along and made sure we missed nothing. It was wonderful! We had been warned that the lunch provided on the cruise might be disappointing but we enjoyed it very much and found the hospitality on the boat to be excellent.



Yangshuo was a very interesting and attractive little town where we had time for a short break before heading out to the countryside to walk around a small farming village which was quite interesting and showed us a very different aspect to local life.



There was an optional evening cruise on the Li River in the city area. We nearly didn't bother but that would have been a huge mistake. It was breathtaking and another of the highlights of our whole trip! It is so good that we think it should be included as part of the main tour. Guilin really puts on a show! Li, again, came along to make sure that we really enjoyed ourselves.



Thanks, Guilin and thanks QiuyanLi. Less