With Southeast Asia in close proximity to the south, and sitting adjacent to Viet Nam, the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region on the northern extremity of the Beibu Bay is southwest china's gateway to the sea. Nature has endowed the region with a unique landscape that belongs only in fairy tales. As typical of a karst landform, limestone formations cover almost half of the land, giving rise to spectacular natural wonders that won Guangxi a lot of adages. 'Guilin's Landscape is unmatched under heaven', says one. 'The natural beauty of Yangshuo beats that of Guilin,' runs another. The Silver Beach of Beihai, which is typical of the subtropical seashore of Beibu bay, is an enchanting summer resort with 'gentle waves, long beach, white sand, and no sharks'. The Zhuangs, Yaos, Miaos, Tongs and many other ethnic minority peoples in Guangxi are known for their time-honoured and exotic folkways. The Sino Vietnamese border, more than 1,000 km in length, is studded with beauty spots and ancient sites.

Abbreviation: Gui
Area: 236,000 square km
Population: 46.33 million

THE PROVINCE'S MEAN TEMPERATURE ()

Month City	Jan	Feb	Mar	April	May	June	July	Aug	Sept	Oct	Nov	Dec
Nanning	12.8	14.1	17.6	22.0	26.0	27.4	28.3	27.8	26.6	23.3	18.6	14.7
Guilin	7.8	9.0	12.9	18.5	23.3	26.2	28.1	27.8	25.5	20.3	15.2	10.2

Nanning

Nanning is capital of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, and a rising industrial city. Under a subtropical climate, it is a fine tourist city that is extolled as an "evergreen metropolis". This garden city has so much to offer its visitors, such as Guangxi Museum, Guangxi Ethnic Artefact Garden, and Guangxi Medical botanical Garden. Its outskirts are clustered with attractions as well. These include the Yiling Cave of Wuming County, Stone Forest and one of the world's eight major slanting pagodas in Chongzuo, the mysterious Huashan Murals in Ningming County, the waterfall that crosses the Sino-Vietnamese border in Daxin County, Friendship pass at Pingxiang, as well as the exotic folklore on the Sino-Vietnamese borderline.

Guilin's Landscape

The world-renowned scenic city of Guilin is naturally a fine tourist city in China. A distinctive karst landmass is the reason behind Guilin's fabulous landscape that is characterized by green mountains, sparkling waters, strange caves and statuesque monoliths. Xing'an County, 60 km to the northeast of Guilin, is the site of the Lingqu (a world-famous ancient canal), and the Leman Geological Scenic Zone where visitors go for both recreation and leisure. Ziyuan County, 149 km north of Guilin, features a landscape corridor where the scenery is by turns mysterious, breathtaking, strange and graceful. Longsheng County, 97 km from Guilin, features the folkways of the ethnic Zhuangs and Yaos, hot spring sanatoriums, and the world's most spectacular Dragon-Ridge Terraced Fields.

Beihai's Silver Beach

Overlooking the sea to the northwest, the city of Beihai on the northeast shore of the Beibu Bay in south Guangxi is southeast China's convenient gateway to the sea. Nearly 100 countries and regions have fostered maritime ship ping ties with Beihai. An average annual temperature of 25.3 degrees Celsius and a subtropical marine climate have endowed Beihai with long summers and warm winters, as well as a pleasant environment with fresh air. On the southeast seashore of urban Beihai lies the 12-square-km Yintan (Silver Beach), a national holiday resort covered with a kind of sand rarely seen anywhere in the world. Apart from a long line of holiday making facilities, the resort also has enough facilities for the benefit of swimmers, surfers and divers.

Liuzhou

Otherwise known as "Dragon City", Liuzhou is Guangxi's largest industrial city and railway hub. It is also a national famous historical and cultural city. Major scenic spots: Yufeng Mountain, Dule Cave, Lord Liu's Temple, and the Dalongtan Scenic Resort which is actually a vast assemblage of architectural masterpieces in ethnic Zhuang, Tong, Miao and Yao styles. Rongshui, Jinxiu and Sanjiang counties in the vicinity are major destinations for those interested in the habits and customs of minority peoples.

Beihai

Beihai in south Guangxi is subtropical seaside city as well as a top tourist city where summer is long and winter warm, with an annual average temperature of 25.3 degrees Celsius. The air is fresh, and the environment very beautiful. The local Silver Beach is a national summer resort marked for its gentle waves, long beaches, white sand and safety from killer sharks. There are also the Weizhou Island, extolled as "Penglai Isle South China", mangrove forest at Shankou, a national marine nature reserve, the Star-Isle lake, where mountains are set off beautifully by rippling waves, and the Pearl City, now crumbling in ruins in a place called Bailong.

SOUVENIRS

Zhuang Brocade: A famous product woven by ethnic Zhuang women using silk velvet and fine cotton yarn of different colours in patterns that are exquisite, and craftsmanship that is ingenious. Zhuang brocade comes in a variety of products, like bags, tablecloth, and wall hangings.

Coloured Silk Balls: The balls, which young men and women of the ethnic Zhuang minority keep as betrothal gifts, are made of dyed silk. Filled with beans or sand, each ball is about 6 in diameter and 150 gram in weight, with a dozen or so ribbons attached to its bottom and a 60-cm-long string tied to its top. During a singing festival, a young woman would toss a coloured silk ball to the man she loves as a token of her affection to him.

Hepu Pearls: Hepu, a place that embraces present-day Beihai, Qinzhou and Fangcheng Harbour, has abounded in pearls since ancient times. The Hepu pearls, also called "south China pearls", marked for their high quality. They are large and perfectly round, solid in texture, and glistening with a eye-pleasing sheen. As the saying goes, "Western pearls are inferior to eastern pearls, and eastern pearls are inferior to southern pearls."