Shanghai

It's was very easy to get a bus from the airport. The bus dropped us off at Zhongzan Park and then we went looking for the Subway station. The hostel was pretty close to the subway station and we checked in. We met our room mates and went for dinner.


Day 8:

Our first day in Shanghai naturally got started off with a nice brekkie at the hostel. After breakfast we took the subway to Nanjing Road, which is the shopping street and our first stop of the day was Madame Toussauds. It was Salome's first trip to the museum and it was great, except for the million people inside. We had so much fun and played around with all the wax celebrities. I even proposed to Prince William. I'm still waiting for an answer...











After playing around we went to The Bund. That area is known for it's architecture and is home to the Oriental Pearl TV Tower. One of the regulations for building sky scrapers in Shanghai is that your building has to have a interesting design right at the top. Shanghai has a beautiful sky line! We took a ferry across the river and went to the Pearl Tower. After seeing the very long line to go up the tower we decided to rather go for lunch. We found a delicious slice of cheese cake right by the river side. Eventually we look the ferry back again and came across a Subway sandwich place. We got some sandwiches and stumbled across a park to eat them.


Right next to the park was the Yu Fashion Garden. As we've been looking for the Yu garden, we thought this might be a good place to continue the search. The fashion garden was really nice, it's was old China and had lanterns hanging from every roof. We bought some goodies and then went looking for a massage place.

Now before I tell you about the massage I must tell you that Shanghai was more of what we expected China to be. Lights and action. Everywhere you go in China you hear about scams. Scams to catch tourists and make them pay lots of money. A guy we met in Beijing got caught in one of these. They are normally Tea scams. Students or anyone with relatively good english will approach you and invite you for tea to practice their English. Then when it's time to pay they give you the bill and it will be massive. His bill was something in the thousands and they charged him for the room. Eventually he just ran out. :)

Ok so the massage place: So as we were walking down Nanjing road a guy approached us about a massage board we were reading. He lured us in (in not a very dodgy manner) and took us to the fifth floor of the building. It looked safe cause there were a lot of tourists and this building was in the middle of this very famous road. Luckily when the lift doors opened it was a legit spa. Not up to our standards, but legit. We went into our room that looked more like a chamber than anything else. haha! Two guys entered all of a sudden with the guy from the street and they all had kettles... We immediately got our shoes and bags and said that we are leaving. The street guy got the message and asked if we were uncomfortable. Naturally we said yes and then we asked for girls. We got them and the massages was really good!! Off course we couldn't really relax because then we got paranoid about the bill. We were so scared that they will charge us for the room as well. When it was time to pay we just had to pay for the massages and all was good. All worries for nothing.



Day 9:

Expo day. Shanghai hosts the World Expo this year and we decided to check it out. When we got there we were really glad that their weren't very long lines and that we could get in relatively quickly. We thought that if we were on the expo grounds we were be able to go into all the expo buildings. Wrong!! Each building had a separate line, but luckily our room mate told us the previous evening that if you take your passport you can get into your country's building without waiting in line. We felt like celebrities walking into 'our' building. I must be honest we expected a lot more. The building was covered in pictures and a few beaded art pieces and that was it. They had a wine bar with imported wines but that didn't open till 6 o' clock at night. We were there at 12 :(



We didn't do much else at the expo except for eating jummy greek ice cream and walking around browsing at all the buildings. O and we had a little time to tan as well. Always make time to tan!




By the time we got back to the hostel we met our new room mates. A chinese dude and a swiss italian dude. We spent the rest of the night playing Jin Rummy and dining!

Day 10:

Search of the Yu garden continues. We were expecting a lovely garden with grass where we can chill and read. Instead we found a rock place/garden/temple vibe. It was beautiful but not what we expected. We walked around and then went for sushi for lunch. We walked around for a bit and did some shopping then went home to get changed for the evening. We headed out the Ritz Carlton hotel to go and watch a Chinese Acrobatic show. Before the show we went to the starbucks for some coffee and discovered that they had delicious chicken and mushroom pies. Another thing I have been craving! The show was absolutely amazing!! You can't believe what those guys are able to do!


Day 11:

Last day in Shanghai and China. The previous night we got a tip that you can pay 150 yuan to tan and swim at the Marriott hotel. So that's exactly what we did. We spent the whole day by the pool drinking expensive cocktails and soaking up the sun.

Our last evening we spent at the hostel having dinner and getting ready to leave the next day.



Last day:

Early start once again and off to the airport we went. An hour and half later we were home in Busan.

It was a great holiday - not the relaxing one - but very much fun! x