A trip to sunshine sanctuary in Beihai, China's Guangxi (4)

（China Daily）  08:13, January 18, 2013  

The aroma of freshly brewed coffee leads us to Laodao Cafe where the atmosphere is very relaxing, with soft music playing in the background of the coffee shop, which retains a 1960s-look and the walls are scribbled with slogans from those days.

On the last day, we make a trip to a mangrove forest. Beihai has the best-developed and relatively well-preserved mangroves in China.

The Shankou Mangrove Reserve in Beihai covering an area of 8,000 hectares was listed in 2000 as one of UNESCO's World Network of Biosphere Reserves.

It was fun and exciting to enter the mangrove forest through a long floating raft bridge and to be surrounded by greenery in the unique ecosystem.

Before we leave the city, we stop by the Ocean Museum, where a unique collection of live corals and rare shells are on display. There are also pearls, of course.

Later, at a local pearl center, we not only admire some of Beihai's best quality pearls, known for their size and magnificent color, but the shop assistants also show us how pearls are harvested from their shells.