Everything happening to China today is happening in Yangshuo, and it seems far removed from the provincial and rural life of a generation ago. This small, sprawling community is experiencing an influx of new residents as well as tourists, drawn by job growth, the brisk trade in home building, and the growing number of hotels, trade stores and boutique shops. It could be any rapidly developing Chinese city, in miniature, but Yangshuo is different - it has retained its sedentary appeal. And where overcrowding in other cities can be frustrating, here it's only a slight inconvenience as you head out of town on your bicycle.

This port town, on the west bank of the Li River, was once a sleepy, easy-going place occupied by traders, farmers, and fishermen who docked their bamboo rafts and fishing boats along the wide river that snakes through town. First discovered as a tourist destination by Western travelers in the 1980s, the town has grown steadily. It has been transformed into a tourist haven, with new apartment blocks, an underground shopping center, hotels and guesthouses, small and inexpensive eateries with Western-style menus, local snack food outlets, and streets lined with souvenir shops.

Arriving by night in a sleeper bus from the relatively flat eastern provinces, unusual shapes outside the window rise ominously against the skyline - dense shadows where the senses tell you no shadows ought to be. At first light the view from the hotel window is slightly surreal: a bustling town dwarfed by the nearby hills. But the initially disoriented visitor easily gains his bearings in the town.

Yangshuo is small by Chinese standards, with a resident population of just 150,000. But the town has always drawn visitors, thanks to the odd rock formations of the surrounding countryside. These limestone pinnacles were created over 300 million years ago, when the whole region emerged from the seabed, exposing the rock to intense erosion from wind and rain.

During a holiday week, the crowds along West Street - the main pedestrian thoroughfare curving through the center of town - can get quite dense. Tour groups mill behind waving flags while backpack-laden university students search for rooms, undeterred by the many guesthouses with "no vacancy" signs. Once outside the town though, past the concrete shells of new apartment blocks and away from the gridlock of tour buses, the charm of the place becomes apparent.