Guilin
Guilin, formerly romanized as Kweilin, is a prefecture-level city in the northeast of China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.
It is situated on the west bank of the Li River and borders Hunan to the north. Its name means "forest of sweet osmanthus", owing to the large number of fragrant sweet osmanthus trees located in the region. The city has long been renowned for its scenery of karst topography.
Getting to Guilin
Visitors from ASEAN countries may visit Guilin for up to 144 hours (6 days) without a visa provided they join an approved group tour, enter and depart China through Guilin Liangjiang International Airport, and do not travel beyond Guilin, Yangshuo and Longsheng.
Things to do
Li River Cruise, bookings@lirivercruises.com. 3-4 hr. The boats operate on a daily basis and reservations can be booked in advance or at any hotels in Guilin. Most tourists will go from Guilin to Yangshuo (a very picturesque smaller town downstream of Guilin). The river winds through some truly spectacular limestone formations and a slow boat trip there and back (with a stop in Yangshuo) will take a whole day.
Where to eat
Guilin cuisine is influenced by Cantonese and Hunanese styles, but with more use of fish and spices and often prepared using stir-frying or steaming. Restaurants often assume westerners do not like spicy food and will make your food bland as hell if you do not insist otherwise. Even then there is a chance they will not believe you. Guilin has some distinct local ingredients used in a number of dishes.
Getting around Guilin the local way
- Get inFrom Yangshuo — Minibuses (¥18) depart when full from the square in front of the Guilin railway station.
- Get inYou can get to Guilin by cargo boat from Guangzhou via Wuzhou, but there are no passenger boats to Guilin anymore, except the boats to and from Yangshuo.
- Get inYou can take a cargo boat if you want to at almost no cost from Wuzhou to Yangshuo.
From Wikivoyage: Guilin, CC BY-SA. Not yet checked by us. Last edited 2026-09.
Text adapted from Wikipedia and Wikivoyage, CC BY-SA 4.0. Photograph: Wikimedia Commons (see file page), Wikimedia Commons.