People's Republic of Hell Hotels in China - Part 16 - Escape from Hell (Hotel) - Day 10
After having the sh##est night sleep - and Ant having the reoccuring nightmares of being raped by a prostitute - I braved the shower to discover that it had the best water pressure and temperature of any shower we have used in China thus far. You just had to put all the mould out of your brain whilst using it.
We headed downstairs to exploit this hotel as much as we could before checking out permanently (yeah!) - by having a free breakfast. It was actually a chinese breakfast (quasi-yum cha deal) with nothing western in site. We both had half a cup of (pretty much cold) jasmine tea. This seems to be a common occurance throughout China that the tea isn't that hot. We were also treated to a "rice / porridge" concoction which wasn't too bad. At least there were no fish heads in it (a la Japan). The waitress then plonked down a tray full of luke warm noodles and a couple of dessert things (eg: egg tarts). I had a couple of bites of the cold noodles and then tried to kill the tasted with the luke warm egg tarts...
As you probably have guessed from the title of this blog - we had one "aim" for today - escape from Hell Hotel! We went back to our rooms and finished packing.
We headed down for the street (without checking out yet) in an attempt to scope out hotels or find an internet cafe. Guilin is a city with about the same population as Canberra. It is built around tourists (as there are heaps of sites around the city to explore including the Li River) and thus - there are heaps of touts and taxi touts and prostitutes. On first glances - it appears to be a little underdeveloped when compared to Shanghai and Nanjing (but we were staying near the train station - so things a little seedy around there).
After about 15 minutes walking down the main street of Guilin - we came across an internet cafe - which costs about 2 yuan (or 33 Australian cents) per hour - yeah baby yeah. We immediately checked out hotel booking websites and everything seemed reasonable - except we didn't want to go to another 3 star Chinese hotel (a la the Hotel de Hel aka Guilin New Plaza Hotel). Ant checked the Sheraton website - and we booked a standard room for about $80 AUD per night (a five star hotel cheaper than the Forumla One Hotel in Kings Cross Sydney - sweeeet!).
After booking the room - we made our way back to the pits of hell (aka Guilin New Plaza Hotel). I double dared Ant to check out the lobby hotel and smell how bad it was... He did - and confirmed with me that it was the worst toilets in China thus far. We went back to the 14th floor - and our key wouldn't work on the lock. I questioned Ant about the allegeded midday checkout - but he seemed confident about it. We went back to the lobby and tried to get the staff (who didn't really speak any engrish) to reactivate our key. As soon as we got the key reactivated - we grabbed our bags and checked out of the hotel de hell (aka Guilin New Plaza Hotel).
A footnote on the hotel - it was the last hotel we had booked (right on our last night in Australia) - and if you do a search for the place in Google - the pictures make it look alright. It was sort of modernly furnished - but the place was so dive-y and dirrty. The pictures also seem to miss the totally grotty bathrooms. And I don't get it - usually the lobbys for hotels are really classy looking (to draw people in) - but the New Plaza Hotel Guilin was very dark and dusty looking (not to mention that dank urine smell). Just thank gawd we only spent one night in that dank hell hole....
We caught a taxi out the front of the hotel and asked to be taken to the Sheraton (sort of a bit weird - asking for a taxi from a hotel to another hotel). After a quick 10 yuan trip - we arrived at the Sheraton....bliss... almost. The mosh pit crowds were pretty bad at reception. It took us 15 minutes to get served. We gave this rude Chinese woman the death stare (whilst Ant was going - it is sooo rude to push in) when she and her white husband pushed in front of us. Evil chunt!
At least we know where you stay in Guilin - so watch out! Our room was huge - king bed, big room, bathroom sin mould, working TV, no bed hairs! After the really sh## night sleep the night before - I crashed on the bed (after making a couple of dodgy clothed poses for the digital camera - coming to the trip advisor website near you).
Ant was feeling a little more wide awake - so he checked out downtown Guilin. The Sheraton's location was infintely more better than the New Plaza - it was a "stone throw's away" from the People Square and downtown Guilin. Ant alledgedly had McDonalds for lunch (tut tut@!) and after his slight transgression - he came and collected me from the hotel whilst I just had a couple of crazy Asian bakery stuff from a couple fo bakeries (I had to throw away one bun as it had dead rat in it or something horrible).
We were here at Guilin to do a couple of tours - one being the Li River cruise and the other being a tour of nearby rice fields at Longsheng and Ping An. We headed to a nearby tourist agency as the Sheraton tours costed about $100AUD a pop per person - a bit pricey. We entered into a travel agency that had "Li River Tour Cruises" in engrish on their window. Both women in the agency looked bedazzled as we entered the shop. Ant asked them for information on the Li River Cruises - and they both turned to each other in complete awe and wonder. Ant then repeated "Li River Cruises!" and pointed at the "Li River Cruises Ticket Office" sign on the front window. The younger girl finally went "ooohhhh!" then sort of mumbled to us that the tour would be 350 yuan per person and we would have to make our own way to where the boats leave (outside of town). Feeling slightly worried about this - we bailed out of there.
The YHA "Backstreet Youth Hostel" was just around the corner from the Sheraton and we thought - maybe they could book us a tour (even if we weren't staying there). The lady there was extremely helpful and could speak better engrish than the Sheraton front desk chick. She said there were a couple of options with the Li River Cruise - we could go on a chinese cruise for about 300 yuan per person but they could be busy - or we could go on a private motorboat with four people for 1000 yuan (for the boat). We decided that we would go the private motorboat option as it wasn't that more expensive than the tour option if we had to do it alone with two people (eg: 500 yuan each). But the woman said that she would try and find another couple to do the tour with. We also booked the terraced rice field tour for the next day at 180 yuan (pretty cheap - $30AUD). Plus our tours were way cheaper than the ones at the airport that those gullible Americans booked. Looks like the Youth Hostel was a good bet - and it even looked 100 times better than the New Plaza Hotel.
After booking the tours - we headed next door to a cool "Chinese stone statue and furniture shop" (which one of our friends would cream their jeans at this Chinese furniture stuff)... I bought a little (3kg) golden coloured "Good Luck Buddha" for about 15AUD. When I bought it - Ant rubbed my "buddha belly" and the store attendants all laughed - thanks Ant. Ant went a little crazy - he not only bought a rock Buddha head sculpture (which probably weighed more than my fat buddha) but also a Chinese Calligraphy stone thingy mounted on a board (so you can hang it on the wall) which weighed about 7kgs... I'm so not looking forward to carrying this stuff all over the rest of China! Ugggh! We are probably going to go over our China Eastern Domestic Flight Bag Limit - but according to Ant - it will only cost about 90 yuan (or $15AUD) per flight - if his calculations serve him correctly.
After dumping our shopping back at the Sheraton - Ant had spotted a Sushi Train which might be fun for dinner. Upon arrival - the staff (all decked out in traditional Japanese gear) say "Mushi Mushi" to everyone. I know more Japanese than Chinese (Mushi Mushi, Arrigato, Geri, Gero, Chin Chin... well I guess some of these words aren't that appropriate in good company). Although the pickings were slight on the train (no meatball or hamburger sushi like in Japan!) - we had a good time and it only was 70RMB for two people. Although I can't remember when a California Roll consists of fish, prawn and fish eggs??
We headed out beyond the People's Square to the main drag of town where a night market was happening. Something that DK "Didn't Know" about (damn you DK!). There weren't any fake DVDs - but plenty of fake gucci bags, wallets, perfume and the latest craze - Bejing 2008 Olympic knock-offs. We totally understand where Hot Dollar (in the Canberra Centre) and Homebase (in Woden Plaza) get all their cheap, nasty and tacky crap from - Chinese street markets. There were a couple of sweet auctions going off - where an auctioneer was selling ritzy stuff like hair dryers and razors to a massive crowd. Sweeet...
After having the sh##est night sleep - and Ant having the reoccuring nightmares of being raped by a prostitute - I braved the shower to discover that it had the best water pressure and temperature of any shower we have used in China thus far. You just had to put all the mould out of your brain whilst using it.
We headed downstairs to exploit this hotel as much as we could before checking out permanently (yeah!) - by having a free breakfast. It was actually a chinese breakfast (quasi-yum cha deal) with nothing western in site. We both had half a cup of (pretty much cold) jasmine tea. This seems to be a common occurance throughout China that the tea isn't that hot. We were also treated to a "rice / porridge" concoction which wasn't too bad. At least there were no fish heads in it (a la Japan). The waitress then plonked down a tray full of luke warm noodles and a couple of dessert things (eg: egg tarts). I had a couple of bites of the cold noodles and then tried to kill the tasted with the luke warm egg tarts...
As you probably have guessed from the title of this blog - we had one "aim" for today - escape from Hell Hotel! We went back to our rooms and finished packing.
We headed down for the street (without checking out yet) in an attempt to scope out hotels or find an internet cafe. Guilin is a city with about the same population as Canberra. It is built around tourists (as there are heaps of sites around the city to explore including the Li River) and thus - there are heaps of touts and taxi touts and prostitutes. On first glances - it appears to be a little underdeveloped when compared to Shanghai and Nanjing (but we were staying near the train station - so things a little seedy around there).
After about 15 minutes walking down the main street of Guilin - we came across an internet cafe - which costs about 2 yuan (or 33 Australian cents) per hour - yeah baby yeah. We immediately checked out hotel booking websites and everything seemed reasonable - except we didn't want to go to another 3 star Chinese hotel (a la the Hotel de Hel aka Guilin New Plaza Hotel). Ant checked the Sheraton website - and we booked a standard room for about $80 AUD per night (a five star hotel cheaper than the Forumla One Hotel in Kings Cross Sydney - sweeeet!).
After booking the room - we made our way back to the pits of hell (aka Guilin New Plaza Hotel). I double dared Ant to check out the lobby hotel and smell how bad it was... He did - and confirmed with me that it was the worst toilets in China thus far. We went back to the 14th floor - and our key wouldn't work on the lock. I questioned Ant about the allegeded midday checkout - but he seemed confident about it. We went back to the lobby and tried to get the staff (who didn't really speak any engrish) to reactivate our key. As soon as we got the key reactivated - we grabbed our bags and checked out of the hotel de hell (aka Guilin New Plaza Hotel).
A footnote on the hotel - it was the last hotel we had booked (right on our last night in Australia) - and if you do a search for the place in Google - the pictures make it look alright. It was sort of modernly furnished - but the place was so dive-y and dirrty. The pictures also seem to miss the totally grotty bathrooms. And I don't get it - usually the lobbys for hotels are really classy looking (to draw people in) - but the New Plaza Hotel Guilin was very dark and dusty looking (not to mention that dank urine smell). Just thank gawd we only spent one night in that dank hell hole....
We caught a taxi out the front of the hotel and asked to be taken to the Sheraton (sort of a bit weird - asking for a taxi from a hotel to another hotel). After a quick 10 yuan trip - we arrived at the Sheraton....bliss... almost. The mosh pit crowds were pretty bad at reception. It took us 15 minutes to get served. We gave this rude Chinese woman the death stare (whilst Ant was going - it is sooo rude to push in) when she and her white husband pushed in front of us. Evil chunt!
At least we know where you stay in Guilin - so watch out! Our room was huge - king bed, big room, bathroom sin mould, working TV, no bed hairs! After the really sh## night sleep the night before - I crashed on the bed (after making a couple of dodgy clothed poses for the digital camera - coming to the trip advisor website near you).
Ant was feeling a little more wide awake - so he checked out downtown Guilin. The Sheraton's location was infintely more better than the New Plaza - it was a "stone throw's away" from the People Square and downtown Guilin. Ant alledgedly had McDonalds for lunch (tut tut@!) and after his slight transgression - he came and collected me from the hotel whilst I just had a couple of crazy Asian bakery stuff from a couple fo bakeries (I had to throw away one bun as it had dead rat in it or something horrible).
We were here at Guilin to do a couple of tours - one being the Li River cruise and the other being a tour of nearby rice fields at Longsheng and Ping An. We headed to a nearby tourist agency as the Sheraton tours costed about $100AUD a pop per person - a bit pricey. We entered into a travel agency that had "Li River Tour Cruises" in engrish on their window. Both women in the agency looked bedazzled as we entered the shop. Ant asked them for information on the Li River Cruises - and they both turned to each other in complete awe and wonder. Ant then repeated "Li River Cruises!" and pointed at the "Li River Cruises Ticket Office" sign on the front window. The younger girl finally went "ooohhhh!" then sort of mumbled to us that the tour would be 350 yuan per person and we would have to make our own way to where the boats leave (outside of town). Feeling slightly worried about this - we bailed out of there.
The YHA "Backstreet Youth Hostel" was just around the corner from the Sheraton and we thought - maybe they could book us a tour (even if we weren't staying there). The lady there was extremely helpful and could speak better engrish than the Sheraton front desk chick. She said there were a couple of options with the Li River Cruise - we could go on a chinese cruise for about 300 yuan per person but they could be busy - or we could go on a private motorboat with four people for 1000 yuan (for the boat). We decided that we would go the private motorboat option as it wasn't that more expensive than the tour option if we had to do it alone with two people (eg: 500 yuan each). But the woman said that she would try and find another couple to do the tour with. We also booked the terraced rice field tour for the next day at 180 yuan (pretty cheap - $30AUD). Plus our tours were way cheaper than the ones at the airport that those gullible Americans booked. Looks like the Youth Hostel was a good bet - and it even looked 100 times better than the New Plaza Hotel.
After booking the tours - we headed next door to a cool "Chinese stone statue and furniture shop" (which one of our friends would cream their jeans at this Chinese furniture stuff)... I bought a little (3kg) golden coloured "Good Luck Buddha" for about 15AUD. When I bought it - Ant rubbed my "buddha belly" and the store attendants all laughed - thanks Ant. Ant went a little crazy - he not only bought a rock Buddha head sculpture (which probably weighed more than my fat buddha) but also a Chinese Calligraphy stone thingy mounted on a board (so you can hang it on the wall) which weighed about 7kgs... I'm so not looking forward to carrying this stuff all over the rest of China! Ugggh! We are probably going to go over our China Eastern Domestic Flight Bag Limit - but according to Ant - it will only cost about 90 yuan (or $15AUD) per flight - if his calculations serve him correctly.
After dumping our shopping back at the Sheraton - Ant had spotted a Sushi Train which might be fun for dinner. Upon arrival - the staff (all decked out in traditional Japanese gear) say "Mushi Mushi" to everyone. I know more Japanese than Chinese (Mushi Mushi, Arrigato, Geri, Gero, Chin Chin... well I guess some of these words aren't that appropriate in good company). Although the pickings were slight on the train (no meatball or hamburger sushi like in Japan!) - we had a good time and it only was 70RMB for two people. Although I can't remember when a California Roll consists of fish, prawn and fish eggs??
We headed out beyond the People's Square to the main drag of town where a night market was happening. Something that DK "Didn't Know" about (damn you DK!). There weren't any fake DVDs - but plenty of fake gucci bags, wallets, perfume and the latest craze - Bejing 2008 Olympic knock-offs. We totally understand where Hot Dollar (in the Canberra Centre) and Homebase (in Woden Plaza) get all their cheap, nasty and tacky crap from - Chinese street markets. There were a couple of sweet auctions going off - where an auctioneer was selling ritzy stuff like hair dryers and razors to a massive crowd. Sweeet...
posted by NicknAnt @ 1:06 AM
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