The Emperor Guizhou Libo

I stayed for a couple of nights in May 2018 at this hotel. Alas, the lavender is gone, as is the vanilla forest they apparently used to have. Now the grounds are filled with roses and coreopsis and verbena, with lovely paved paths so that you can walk among them at your ease. It is just a few minutes away from the nearby national park. The hotel has the air of something that was grand and modern 30 years ago but has now settled into a sort of aged gentility (which, since it is apparently only four years old, is kind of odd). The rooms are spacious and 70's modern, well-lit, with spectacular views. The staff are very helpful and friendly. The food in the restaurant was delicious and the wine selection was unexpectedly good (one of the guys with me is a wine person and he was impressed). The lobby, lounge, bar, karaoke, game rooms, and other common rooms of the hotel were beautiful but entirely unused, since we were apparently the only guests. It is hard to describe this hotel and do it justice. We called it the Sad Hotel because it has so obviously been forgotten in China's rush to build bigger, modern hotels next to the national park, but if you are in this area i cannot impress upon you how much you want to stay here. Of all the hotels I stayed at in this lovely country this was my favorite. Perhaps it was the roses. Perhaps it was the beautiful views. Perhaps it was because I could wake before dawn, raise the blinds on the windows, go back to sleep and let the sun wake me to another beautiful day in the karst.