Yangshuo is awesome, I was there in April but there are more foreigners than Chinese there. It's a nice break from getting stared and and halllooooooed all the time. They have all the fast food chains now amongst other western restaurants.

Yangshou was a tacky tourist capital full of crap 9 years ago, I doubt it's improved and from what I hear it now has the biggest open brothel of Asia award to add to it's low quality crap award.

I've always liked going to Yangshou. I take a raft ride, never a big boat, and then bus or truck into Yangshou and spend my days touring the country side around it. I rent motorcycles and scooters. The river rides are great. I like the touristy town. The circus just adds to the fun. I've only seen the Lui Sanjie show once from on top of a mountain. This was supposed to be the best seat, it was too high and far to see details or take pictures. The stairs etc climbing to the top were typical and not really safe like you find in China. I never noticed any beauty parlours etc there.