We decided to stay 5 days, as we were tiring of big cities and felt the need to stop and explore one place for a little while. We liked the relaxed atmosphere of the village, with it's small streets and reduced traffic. I particularly liked the edge streets, which ended abruptly before becoming orchards and vegetable plots.
We decided to spend one of our first days cycling, and set off with an American couple we befriended on the bus into town.
We rode through acres of agricultural land, which was intermingled with natural vegetation, bamboo groves and orchards of gigantic citrus fruits called pomelo's.
It was harvest time, and we saw many groups of people collecting them, and were even given one for free. It was like a grapefruit, but with a much thicker skin and a bit less flesh.
The scenery was impressively epic, with huge towers of limestone amidst fertile valleys. It meant that even though a lot of tree cover had been removed for food production, it still had the feeling of a natural area.
The river Li also provided a beautiful focal point in the area, winding around the mountains and providing local people with endless opportunities to offer us bamboo raft rides, though the bamboo has long ago been replaced with look-a-like pvc piping.
I preferred to watch the locals on the original bamboo rafts, though going upstream would have been a much more arduous task.
As well as stunning natural phenomena, the village also had a twice-weekly market that was very interesting to visit. All manner of things were being sold, most fairly standard, but these reptiles preserved in a strong-smelling chemical boggled the mind for what they could be used for.
In addition to goods, services offered included open-air haircuts, and dentistry for all to see.
As our last location in China, we felt we had chosen well with Xing Ping - it's relaxed atmosphere and cornucopia of walks and cycle opportunities were exactly what we needed after the string of interesting, albeit similar cities we had visited.
