China Guilin and train to shanghai

Left ping an at about 12 on the local bus to longshen, got the bus from longshen to guilin about a minute after i arived.When i got into guilin I was at the wrong bus station so needed to get a taxi to the correct one for 2 quid. This was the main bus station in the center of town.This was the third station i was dropped at in guilin. First was the coach storrage area for the main station, I think the second was the station for local busses (for trips less than about 200k).The third and final was the main station which i found out was about a 15 minute walk from the bus storage station that i was first dropped at. It was quite confusing and annoying. The Main station was next to a shopping area and some touristy type stuff. I booked a bus back to guangzhou for 22:40 so i could spare a nights accomadation. This gave time to wander around guilin. It is actualy quite a niceplace when youre in the right area of the city. I found two towers and a park with a zoo, caves, waterfalls and some other bits. It cost 5 quid for entry, but then another 4-8 pounds to get into the zoo or cave or waterfalls. It was a little cheeky for them to charge just to get into the park. it was a nice park, but it was only a park, the one in hongkong was 10x better and totaly free. I only paid for entry and refused to pay for anything else. It helped me kill my time though. The landscape of guilin is fairly crazy, it is mostly flat but with mountains that look like swords sticking out the ground all through the city. Buildings built around them. I climed to the peak of one of them in the park (while carrying my whole rucksack).
I got into guangzhou at about 5:30am, I looked for an ATM that took visa cards, this took 40 minutes, which is fairly crazy considering its next to the major bus and rail station in a huge city. Again, there were many banks, but none took anything other than the banks own cards. I had heard you need to book tickets for overnight trains about 3 days in advance to get a bed rather than a seat. I hadnt booked one, and managed to get a hard bed (didnt ask for a soft as they cost more) for only two hours after I booked the ticket. It was 35 quid, blowing my daily budget, but its not like i can choose not to spend money on transport. Guangzhou to shanghai seems like a fairly huge distance for 35 pounds, without looking at a map i would assume its about the same as getting a train from the uk to italy? Anyway its a 21 hour trip. I then went for breakfast at Mr.Lee.