China Hospitality News ran an article about the Tourism Department of Guilin Government opening the “the first tourist public service management body in China”:
“An official of the administration said that it will devise a plan for Guilin to build a public tourist system, establish tourist service centers and tourist distribution centers in downtown areas, promote a self-drive service system and the hire of recreational vehicles, and build a first class tourist public information service platform.”
While this is certainly a laudable effort to make Guilin, eh, … “better”, some open question remain:
First, we would really like to know how a “self-drive service system” is going to work if foreign driving licenses are still not accepted here. It is unlikely that this system is meant to be for bicycles only.
Second, we are a bit worried about the “distributing free promotional materials to tourists directly” part. It is not that we don’t like freebies but we don’t think that the Government should get involved into the daily turf wars between beggars, hawkers, “massaggi-ladies” and tricycle drivers for the last tourists that couldn’t escape into a nearby coffee shop.
Still, an improvement of the current situation in the Tourist Information (hardly anybody speaks English, no information material) will definitely benefit those visitors that want to explore Guilin and surrounding by themselves.
At this point we would like to point towards our partner page “Guilin Hiking” which will soon start to organize hiking trips again.
