Dongjing -> Guilin And we’re back! A big thank you to Emily Bei Cheng for planning and organizing, wrangling and translating, guiding and concierging, this amazing trip!!! ❤️🙏 Every day has been warm but over the course of the week the wind has gotten chillier. We started off with some rice noodles and bao for breakfast before making our way back along a major road (highway) to Guilin. Outside of town we started a very long climb over the mountains to get back. It felt like forever because it was rolling. I simply could not wait for it to be over. All along the roadway were landslides that blocked the road so there was only one lane. Partway up the climb we were stopped for what we guessed was some kind of explosion the crew was planning. Emily doesn’t like loud noises so she stuffed pieces of bao in her ears to block out the sound and help with her anxiety. Meanwhile, I couldn’t wait. After a few minutes we could hear them doing a countdown over their walkie talkie. Then, in front of us, four jets of white dust or smoke shot up from the ground followed by smoke rings. The sound wasn’t as loud or deep and percussive as I was hoping. It was pretty short attack and quick decay. I was the only one that cheered. I don’t understand why no one else did. I think because we were unsure what was really about to happen and curious, no one took any video or photos of it which we all regretted. Once we got over the mountain, we were back to the scenic karst formations. The views on the descent were so pretty we were all stopping multiple times and the group got pretty spread out. On the descent, there were huge 2 foot deep chunks of the roadway that had been dug out. Since the roadway is concrete and the gravel is also gray, sometimes it wasn’t obvious that you were going from smooth to rough while descending at speed. Some sections, it was just one side of the road that had been dugout. At one point, after stopping for photos, I was catching back up to the group and right as I did, the right side of the road was dug up. I was focused on Brian at the back and didn’t see the construction ahead because the road was dropping down from a crest and turning. Brian changed directions suddenly to avoid the “hole”. I didn’t realize what was happening and once I did, it was too late to swerve to the left lane. I was committed to going in. It was by far the roughest of the road construction sections we’d gone through. The closer we got to Guilin, the busier it got. The trucks are so loud. Honestly, I’d rather listen to the road construction explosions. It was fun weaving through the mopeds again once we got back in town.