Yiling Caves

Today we went to a place called Yiling Caves. The mountains of Guangxi are famous for the limestone formations and ancient caverns. When you see a traditional chinese painting of steep mountains, with farmers in the valleys working the fields with water buffalo, this is the area that inspires that. It is exceptionally beautiful, very green and lush. The farmers here are very poor, these are minority people who still farm and live in the same ways as generations before them. An average annual family income in this countryside is about 5000 Yuan, or approximately $625 US. We feel very excessive in our Reeboks and toting fancy cameras, etc. The caves are over a million years old, it took us over an hour to tour only one area. We went down deeply, on steep stairs and winding pathways. There were stalagtites and stalagmites all around, but the formations here are each unique, many are named for the resemblance to things.I was astounded by one that looked like a huge old man with along beard, and another that looked like 2 men playing chess. There are a lot of myths and fairy tales about the formations. Inside, you are sometimes in almost complete darkness, except for colored lights up in nooks and crannies to illuminate some of the most fascinating ones. It was really incredible. Also at this area the people perform Bamboo Dancing, Primitive dancing in furs with large bamboo drums, we had ginger tea and some local delicacies to try, and 4 women sang a folk song for us. Glenn said that when someone sings to you, it is common courtesy to also give them a song in return. Everyone was shy, but Jimmy started up with "Yankee Doodle" and we all sang and everyone cheered. A woman came over and put a "love-ball", a very fancy decorated ball on a string with multiple tassels, around his neck. They took a sort of 'Touristy' photo of us inside the cave that we could buy and we did get ours.(less than $2)On the way back to the hotel, Glenn let us pull over to take some photos of the farms and people with oxcarts on the street. We came back for lunch and talked about our journeys tomorrow. We will be dividing into 2 groups to go to the areas where our babies were found,so Jimmy and I with Laina, will be going with a couple Bob and Tina, their 6 year old son Zacchary, and new baby Isabella to the city of Laibin. A local guide will help us find places to go, and Pat will be with us also.This will be meaningful for us to tell Laina about when she is older, so we hope to find something special to get there for her, and maybe we will go by the orphanage too. On Sunday we will go to the mountains, and in the afternoon to the local outdoor market for shopping, then on Monday we leave Guangxi and head toward Guangzhou to meet back up with the other families. I am in my own room, it is naptime for daddies and babies, after resting, we plan on going for a walk around the neighborhood, just the three of us.That's all for now. Forgive me if everything is just in one long column, I cannot use the Layout feature, and also cannot view the blog or the comments. At least I finally managed to get the prompts in English!