4-Day Trip to Liuzhou

If I had to describe Liuzhou in one word, I would use 'small'.

This 'small' doesn’t refer to the city’s size, even though I had no preconceptions before going; Liuzhou felt large and bustling to me.

The 'small' actually comes from two aspects:

**City of 'Small' Cars**

Half the cars on Liuzhou’s streets are tiny ones like the Wuling Mini, with only two seats or an extremely cramped back row, no front hood or trunk, and a length roughly equal to the width of a regular car.

Liuzhou has dedicated parking spaces for these small cars everywhere, with entire rows parked along the curb—adorable, I must say.

To experience it, we registered for a car-sharing account and drove for about ten minutes. Apart from having trouble getting onto the curb, it was incredibly convenient for getting around the city, which isn’t fast anyway.

**Capital of 'Small' Eats**

Liuzhou has an incredible number of food stalls!

Forget about the packed night markets; any pedestrian street or central plaza is filled with all kinds of stalls selling snacks from all over China. It’s absolutely overwhelming.

We didn’t have a single proper meal in Liuzhou (there are few sit-down restaurants anyway); we just filled up on street food. Of course, that was also because two girls can’t eat that much.

That’s the general intro. Now let me introduce Liuzhou’s attractions and food.

Liuzhou has unique terrain, with the Liujiang River dividing the city into two sides in a U-shape. The sights are scattered along both banks, so we spent those days constantly crossing bridges—over and over.

**Liuzhou Museum**: Not large, but with plenty of artifacts. They’re not national treasures, but you can still learn a lot about Liuzhou’s history.

**Liuzhou Industrial Museum**: Very worth a visit. The curation is excellent, and before even entering, we took photos at the vintage green train outside. You don’t realize until you go how developed Liuzhou’s industry is, especially automobile manufacturing. There are private cars from different eras and brands, plus super cool tractors and the legendary Wuling vehicles in my memory.

**Liuzhou Bailiandong Site Museum**: Worth visiting. The Bailiandong site contains remains of human life from 100,000 years ago. The museum explains the origins and evolution of life and humans. For an extra 10 yuan, you can tour the karst cave for about 30 minutes with a guide.

**Water Bus**: If not for the long wait, the water bus would be incredibly good value. But you need to check the routes—some are short, others long. We probably picked the longest one. For 3 yuan, you get the breeze on the Liujiang River, passing several man-made waterfall sights—very beautiful. PS: Only sightseeing cruises and water buses operate on the Liujiang; no cargo ships, so the water is clear and green.

**Yaobu Ancient Town**: Actually quite small and not much to see. They say it’s pretty at night, but we went during the day, wandered around, had some fried ice, and left. Most tourists come here to take photos; the town is full of costume rental shops with ethnic, exotic, and Korean styles. For a few hundred yuan, you get makeup and photography, and the streets are full of young women in costume taking pictures.

**Longtan Park**: Scenery is nice, a good place for residents to relax, with a large lawn.

**Confucian Temple**: Large and impressive, and not crowded, great for photos. On the day I went, I saw two couples taking ancient-style wedding photos.

**Musical Fountain**: I haven’t seen this kind of old-school tourist attraction in ages. After so many years, it felt nice to watch. After the fountain, you can walk to Fengqinggang Night Market.

**Liuhou Park**: Just an ordinary city park. The Liuhou Temple required an extra fee, so we didn’t go in.

**Ma’anshan Peak**: We didn’t make it. Here’s our experience: we went around 4 p.m., but the cable car was closed and the hiking entrance was also closed. The security guard said it would reopen at 8 p.m. When we went back near 8, there was an extremely long line, so we gave up.

Speaking of Liuzhou, I’m sure everyone first thinks of river snail rice noodles. In my taste ranking of noodle dishes, rice noodles in snail soup come first.

For river snail rice noodles, you have to go to the old-established shops. Even though the queues are long, the chain stores taste very average. Even good shops aren’t much different from what you can get in Guangzhou.

**Feiluo Zhuang**’s family combo is super tasty—the taro, steak, duck feet, and snails are all excellent.

**Qingyun Road Market**: We went twice for breakfast. Zhuoheji’s pork jerky is cheap and delicious; the rolled rice noodles look similar to Guangzhou’s cheung fun, but the skin is extremely smooth and the sauce is very flavorful; we had the crushed ice tofu pudding twice; the corn juice is super thick.

**Gubu Market** (hope I got the name right): We also went there once for breakfast. It’s much less crowded than Qingyun Road, and naturally has fewer food options. The wontons are good; the five-color sticky rice is quite bland in taste, just looks special.

**Fengqinggang Night Market**: Very lively, packed with people. I wanted to try the taro paste ice but was discouraged by the long line. In the end, I tried some snail soup (no waiting needed; the stir-fried version required at least an hour). It was okay for a first try.

**Shengli Night Market**: Mostly restaurants. We bought some fried ice and stir-fried snails—average.

**Zhang Fei Cassava Dessert**: Every time I opened a review app, I saw it. It’s on Goldfish Lane. I noticed that Liuzhou’s sweet soups are all sticky—cassava is sticky, and corn sweet soup is sticky too.

**Beef Offal**: In Liuzhou, you first go to the counter to order raw parts, then the restaurant makes it into hotpot or cold mix. It’s just a novelty; I didn’t find it particularly tasty. Later, a taxi driver uncle said that every place’s beef offal tastes about the same.

Finally, before boarding the high-speed train, I wanted to pack some Shanghai Home-style Chicken, but the line was too long—a bit of regret.