Guilin City on Foot

Rong & Shan Lakes (2h) → Sun and Moon Pagodas (evening) → East-West Lanes (2h)

Guilin's centre is compact enough to citywalk: the twin lakes ringed by banyans, the Sun and Moon Pagodas (the copper one holds three world records, and they're a night sight — lit and doubled in the water), and the restored East-West Lanes at the foot of Solitary Beauty Peak for street food and first impressions. The Two Rivers, Four Lakes night cruise threads all of it plus a dozen floodlit peaks from the water — a strong first-evening move. Base yourself around the central square/Shizi Jie area: walkable to everything, buses to Elephant Trunk Hill and Seven Star Park at the door.

The Longji Rice Terraces

Longji terraces — Jinkeng/Dazhai section (full day)

Two to three hours northwest of the city, the Dragon's Backbone terraces cascade down entire mountainsides — and Jinkeng (Dazhai) is the section with the cable car, which buys you the summit Golden Buddha Peak panorama without the two-hour climb. Ride up, walk down through the terraces and the Yao villages, and you'll have done it right.

Two things the standard day-trip framing undersells:

• The seasons make or break the photograph. Late May–June the terraces are flooded and mirror the sky; late September–October they're gold before harvest. Winter is bare; midsummer is uniformly green. If your dates can flex, flex them.
• Overnighting beats day-tripping. The wooden guesthouses in Dazhai and Ping'an villages put you on the terraces for sunrise, after the day crowds leave. If your four days can bend, sleep here and fold Day 1's city sights into Day 4.

No public transport goes direct: take the Guilin–Longsheng bus and the scenic-area transfer, or simpler, a pre-booked round-trip driver (easily split between travellers).

Yangshuo — the ¥20-Note Day

Xingping (2h) → Li River boat (2h) → Shanshui Park (1h) → Ten-Mile Gallery (2h) → Yulong River raft (2h)

The region's headline day: the short Li River cruise from Xingping's pier straight into the karst bend on the back of the ¥20 note, the town's flagstone lanes, then south of Yangshuo town for the Ten-Mile Gallery by rental bike and a poled bamboo raft on the quiet Yulong River as the light goes gold. The full hour-by-hour version of this day, including evening options on West Street, is its own page: Yangshuo 1-day itinerary. Sleep in Yangshuo — West Street for nightlife, the Moon Hill guesthouse belt for countryside quiet.

Caves and the City Emblem

Reed Flute Cave (2h) → Elephant Trunk Hill (2h)

Back to Guilin for the two classics: Reed Flute Cave, the vast karst cavern whose stalactite chambers are lit like a science-fiction set — the colours are kitsch and the geology is genuinely spectacular, and both facts are true at once — and Elephant Trunk Hill, the river-drinking elephant that is Guilin's city emblem, best from the park's riverbank angles. Both sit minutes from the centre; an easy half-day before an evening train out.