Shanghai Salvo Hotel

We left the Hyatt Regency Xian at about 1230 to make it to the airport in time to get on a 1440 flight to Shanghai. Our luggage had been taken to the airport at 0900 so it was checked in already. We found out in Shanghai that our group luggage was 100 kilos overweight. This tour office didn't handle it like Joe in Beijing handled our luggage so they had to pay the overweight charge, which we had to reimburse. Spread evenly around the group, we were about 5 kilos (or 11 pounds) each overweight...

31 floors up, we are nearly the height of most tall buildings around us. Somehow, I can see only for a mile. The skycover has infiltrated it's way below the buildings, weaving through them and not letting the expansiveness of the city to be seen. It has been this way since we arrived three days ago, including when we took a trip to their second highest tower, set up much like the empire state building. we literally could see nothing but the white/grey of the sky. Despite what might be a depre...

This is the last day in China for this trip. After our routine $1.00 breakfast appetizer, we are ready for our last adventure before we headed to the airport.

Wondering around the Shangdon North Street, we found this interesting restaurant, Xin Wang. Set up in an old news paper building with typical Shanghai traditional services, this place has one of the best congee. We also tries the duck chins which are very delicious as well if you don't think they were parts of ducks' heads.

This morning we went to a tea plantation in Guilin. It is actually a tea institute where they research tea in an effort to improve it. All the tea there is hand picked and organic, sponsored and certified by the government. When we arrived at the tea plantation we met our guide and tea expert, Kevin, who first took us right into the fields. Kevin showed us the various kinds of leaves and which ones are used for which types of teas (white, green, yellow, black). From the fields we moved into t...

Our itinerary only included a half-day sightseeing tour today and when we asked about an add-on, our guide said it would be an additional $100 CDN per person, just to visit an old town, so we decided we could probably do it ourselves for a lot cheaper and declined. Our morning tour started with a visit to Yu Yuan Garden, a traditional Chinese rock garden built by a very nice son for his parents. It was very pretty and also quite crowded with a large group of Korean tourists and a bunch of sma...

Ally and I walked to the closest metro station, about 15 minutes, and took a train out to the suburbs. From there we tried to find Qi Bao Old Town, but it seemed that there were too many highways in our way and you couldn't walk there. So we went back to the metro station where there were bike rickshaws, and due to the language barrier thought we were getting a ride to Qi Bao but instead got a ride to a bus stop. We waited for our bus but a lot of buses came by without numbers on them so then...