Giggling Tree — Hotel in Guilin

We stayed at the Giggling Tree for 5 days in October, during Golden Week. The hotel is situated in what looks like old renovated farm buildings surrounding a cosy courtyard. Over time the hotel itself got surrounded by newer residential buildings and apartments, but from inside the courtyard these are barely noticeable. The hotel has beautiful views of the valley and surrounding mountains, especially from the terrace and pool, located adjacent to the courtyard.||Besides the outside space, there's also plenty of common space to sit inside, including a bookshelf with left behind books and a play area for kids. There's also a play area outside, next to the terrace and toys for kids to play with.||The courtyard invites social interaction with the other guests, who in our case were both foreigners and Chinese.||The hotel offered a variety of tours and activities, like bike and electric scooter rental.||The rooms were neat and equipped with good beds and a decent shower, charmingly decorated, though the fact that you're inside an old farm building is visible by the fact that floor, walls and ceiling are quite worn.||After 22:00/10pm everything is quiet, but before that it got quite noisy on some nights due to the surrounding residential buildings.||The restaurant offers a great selection of Chinese and Western dishes at reasonable prices. Last but not least, the staff was great. It seems the place was run by a group of young women who met the guest (and especially young children) with warm enthusiasm day after day and provided a near perfect service from serving food to advising guests on activities...

This is how you do hostels.

Built in a carefully renovated Chinese countryside building, the hostel is quaintly rustic, yet with a few modern comfort zones, like hip western bathrooms, a swimming pool or some actually useful furniture in the rooms (wardrobes, mosquito nets! - how rare in Chinese hostels).

The staff is attentive and nice, some even speak passable English (that is, until you happen to bump into the owners who are fluent - and super-kind btw).

They even have like a freaking manual for you with a number of neatly explained activities, hikes and rides that actually make sense and will get you acquainted with the surroundings before you get your feet under the table.

The restaurant is casual, with tables both inside and outside in the yard. There's a surprisingly wide selection of both Chinese and western meals, which may not be stellar but did the job for us. Both drinks and meals are reasonably priced.

You can rent a bike, let the staff arrange a kayak or rafting trip for you, have your clothes washed, borrow an umbrella... all that pampering.

In many ways you can see that the owners are still backpackers by heart - ones who know all too well what a worn traveller in southern China is looking for. Recommended.

BTW: Note that the position of the hostel showing up on Google Maps (at the bus station in west Yangshuo) is wrong. The street address seems to be...

EXCELLENT Staff, specially Alice. Very kind and always ready to help. Speak perfect English, also some of her staff (restaurant, house keeping).||Location is great with many activities and visits to do.|Hotel can help, recommend and arrange if you want.|Rented a scooter (Alice arranged for us), very useful to move around. Only takes 15 min to town (Yangshuo).||Restaurant and food great with many delicious options Chinese and Western dishes. ||Wonderful environment and pool.|We stayed on their new hotel (Wonderland Lodge) with a beautiful, clean and comfortable rooms.|Will recommend to anyone than wants to spend some days in Yangshuo or coming...