Chapter 107: A Cheap Trip (4)

A cheap trip (novel) Zhang Baotong 2016.4.28

It rained again during the night, and the next morning it was still raining, but the rain was gentle, and the sky was bright, so we started cruising the Li River on a yacht. Because it is still raining, the water of the Li River is very full, and the river surface is also very wide, and the rain and fog from the wind and water make the scenery and mountain peaks on the shore have a dreamlike ethereal. When people go to Guilin to swim on the Li River, they want to take a boat from Guilin down the river to Yangshuo. On both sides of the 83-kilometer Li River, the peaks and peaks are beautiful, the clear water is like a mirror, the green mountains are floating in the water, the reflection is fluttering, and the scenery is like a hundred miles of splendid gallery, which is extremely beautiful. Especially in this rainy morning in spring, the river surface seems to float with a layer of white rain like a light veil, and the landscape at this time has a hazy beauty.

In the drizzle, the yacht lined up a long line with no end in sight and no tail in sight, and sailed calmly and steadily through the river at the same speed. Regardless of the drizzle getting wet, everyone held cameras and mobile phones, and kept taking pictures of themselves and others on and off the boat, in front of and behind the boat. This is the most lively moment in the two days we have been in Guilin.

When I arrived in Yangshuo and stayed in a small hotel, the tour guide began to ask everyone to register tickets to watch the performance of "Impression Liu Sanjie" at night. Each ticket is $260. But when I came here to watch "Impression Liu Sanjie" two years ago, the ticket was only 120 yuan. I think the tour guide will definitely make a profit from it, or else, what kind of money will he make with this low travel fee? He will never be idle and lose money to play with everyone, right? But you can't ask about this kind of thing, and even if you ask, you can't ask the result. So, just shell out.

All afternoon, we wandered around the small town of Yangshuo. The town is small, but small and exquisite. So, in a little while, the whole town was gone. Among them, West Street is more distinctive, and there are several scenic spots that I have not seen in the past. However, we found a small restaurant with Yangshuo specialty, beer fish. So, I invited my wife to eat beer fish. However, my wife said, "If we pay for our own food, then we don't pay for the food in vain?" I said, it's not easy to come to Yangshuo, and we can't even taste the famous dishes here? Besides, if you pay that money, you won't even have enough to eat, so how can you eat any beer and fish? Listening to what I said, my wife didn't say anything.

I watched "Impression of Liu Sanjie" in the past, and I didn't want to watch it, but my wife insisted that I accompany her to watch it. No, since we were in a relationship, we watched movies together twice, and I almost haven't seen a movie with her in the past few decades. We arrived at 8 p.m., and soon the show began. The stage of the performance is a large landscape theater with about 2 square kilometers of water in front and 12 mountain peaks and a vast sky dome in the background. More than 200 girls wearing bright silver special national costumes walked to the floating platform stretched in the middle of the river 150 meters away from the shore, with fluttering postures and swaying reflections, presenting those Guilin landscapes and cultural landscapes that tourists could not see during the day, shocking and dreamlike. The wife couldn't stop exclaiming: It's so beautiful!

The next morning, it was raining heavily, so we braved the rain to go to Yulong River, of course, the tickets still have to be taken care of, and the price is very expensive. Now that you're here, you have to pay for it, no matter how expensive it is. However, everyone still feels good sitting on the bamboo cutting and watching the beautiful scenery on both sides of the strait.

However, when everyone left the bamboo felling and went to the shore and took the minibus back to Guilin, the minibus suddenly broke down on the way. The car was parked on the side of the road while it was raining heavily. The driver and tour guide got out of the car with a poncho and went to repair the car. However, after repairing it for a while, it still didn't get it repaired. There was no way, so the tour guide called the shunt to pick us up. We sat in the car and waited, and it took about two hours for the car to pick us up. The tour guide dropped us off and into another car. So, by the time we returned to Guilin, it was already one o'clock in the afternoon, and the food was already cold.

In the afternoon, the car pulled us to a bamboo silk shop. When we entered the store, we divided into two teams and entered two huts as if we had been recruited for training. There were one or twenty bamboo chairs in the hut. Everyone sat on the chair and listened to the clerk tell us about the production principle of bamboo silk and the excellent role of bamboo silk products. The most amazing thing is that the clerk made the bamboo silk products dirty with thick black oil, and then, after washing them with tap water, the bamboo silk products turned out to be exactly the same as new. In order to convince us, the clerk also asked our people to go up and do hands-on experiments. Perhaps the training of the clerks was more successful, or perhaps everyone's attitude had changed, so when the training was over, everyone began to buy in the bamboo silk store. My wife not only bought us five pieces of bamboo silk underwear, but also bought more than a dozen towels. It's as if if you don't buy it today, you won't have it tomorrow. At this moment, seven or eight hundred land dollars were spent. Therefore, when everyone lined up at the payment counter of the store with their belongings to pay, the tour guide guy was very happy.

The last time we came to Guilin for a tour, the first to go to the psychic and Detian, maybe the payment was not enough, those places were not allowed to go, but the reed flute rock is in the city, and if you don't go, you can't say it. However, when I asked the tour guide, the tour guide said that there was no such arrangement and itinerary. It doesn't matter if I go by myself or not, but it's not easy for my wife to come here, so I can't help but go. I asked Lao Mu and said that everyone should go to the Reed Flute Rock to have a look. Because the Reed Flute Rock is a classic of Guilin's landscape, if you come to Guilin and don't go to see the Reed Flute Rock, you will definitely be ridiculed when you go back.

Lao Mu felt that what I said made sense, so he went to negotiate with the tour guide. However, the tour guide disagreed, saying that he would go to the food street tomorrow morning, rest in the afternoon, and return by car in the evening. As soon as Lao Mu told everyone about the tour guide's arrangement, everyone immediately coaxed, saying that if they don't go anywhere tomorrow, they will go to the Reed Flute Rock. The tour guide had no choice, so he asked everyone to pay 20 yuan per person. Everyone handed over the fare to the tour guide. The tour guide said that he would get up at seven o'clock in the morning, eat at half past seven, arrive at the Reed Flute Rock before eight o'clock, and then rush to the food street at nine o'clock. Because the people in the store will receive us at that time.

After seeing the reed flute rock, the minibus pulled us to the food street. After a while in the streets, I went into a food processing factory. The factory technician gave us some very beautiful flowers to process into food, and then asked the young and beautiful girls to cut the food into very small pieces and put them on a plate for us to taste. After that, the girls took us into a large room filled with all kinds of very well-packaged food items and let us choose from them.

Since the evening is the return trip, everyone wants to buy something to bring back to family and friends to taste or give away, so everyone chooses a lot of food and then carries it to the minibus in large bags. My wife and I bought nearly 20 boxes of this Guilin specialty. If it weren't for the fact that we couldn't get it, we would have bought ten more boxes.

When we returned to the hotel at noon, we began to pack up and start to check out, otherwise we would have to pay for another day for the hotel. The minibus dropped us off at the train station. The tour guide stood right on the station square and waved us goodbye and said that we were welcome to come back next time. We were all very angry at the travel agency's desire to get rid of us early, but there was no way, who made us a cheap tour group? We looked at the tour guide with angry eyes and replied in our hearts: We will not come again. Even if I come back, I won't ask you to be a tour guide.

It was only two o'clock in the afternoon when we arrived at the train station, and the car we took departed at half past seven in the evening. And this more than five hours is called free time, which is actually waiting time. Lao Mu gave everyone the tickets and asked everyone to gather at the square at half past six, and then let everyone move freely.

Because I brought a lot of things, it was not convenient to move freely, so my wife and I left our belongings at Zài Station and then went shopping. Actually, we were all tired and didn't want to move anymore, but if we didn't, we had to sit in the waiting hall. It's a hot and chaotic waiting hall, and it's better to spend five hours dry here than to be active on the streets. We walked around the street for a while, came to a park, sat in the park until four o'clock, then went to the restaurant, asked for a few dishes and a bottle of drink, and slowly soared, and ate and drank slowly, until half past five, when we got out of the restaurant and walked towards the train station.

Finally, when it was time to get on the train, we got into the sleeper car and sat in our own bunks, which was a sigh of relief. At this time, my wife and I began to take stock of the cost of the trip. In addition to the 3,200 yuan travel fee that two people must pay, we spent 8,000 yuan in the gold store, 3,150 yuan on various items, food and medical treatment, 2,480 yuan on tickets for various attractions and performances, and 800 yuan for meals and odd expenses, a total of 17,630 yuan. Originally, we estimated that the cost of this tour would not exceed 6,000 yuan at most. Of them, 3,200 yuan has been handed over to the travel agency, and we have brought another 3,000 yuan in cash, but we have brought an extra 2,000 yuan in reserve. That is to say, we brought 5,000 yuan in cash. However, the 5,000 yuan was not only spent, but also 13,000 yuan was paid with a UnionPay card. Now we only have more than 130 yuan left in our pockets.

We have suffered a lot, suffered a lot of sins, and spent a lot of money, but we have learned a lesson: never to join such cheap tourist associations again.

2016.5.4 The second draft was held in Xi'an