Shangri-La Hotel Hangzhou

The Holiday Inn in Beijing had one great amenity: free internet. Other than that, it wasn't anything like our stay at the Crowne Plaza in Beijing. The beds were smaller, the pillows lumpier, and the breakfast was a poor imitation of the varied and delicious spread in Beijing. In short, it was a lot more what we are used to when we travel!<br><br>The first stop of the day was at the silk factory to see how silk ...

... bird? No one could explain this to us and from what we could see, no one else seemed to find these questions even the slightest bit relevant. Highly irrational. <br><br>My personal low of the trip was a 5 hour (FIVE HOUR) karaoke session that nearly drained me of the will to live. I can honestly say that I enjoyed myself for the first hour or two - the Stellas and Coronas were cheap, everyone was having a great time together and ...

... on. We were going to head to the tropical island of Hainan, but changed our minds last minute and are now heading to the Buddhist island of PutuoShan.<br><br>Oh yeah, before I forget. We went to the Korean restaurant one last time to find out what Kimchi was. This time they weren't out of tofu! It was the last of our dishes to arrive. We looked at it. There were 4 rolls of tofu with a red sauce poured over them. Dave asked me, 'What is it?!'. I tasted it.<br><br>'Ketchup', I replied.

... visit the 18 Imperial Dragon Well Tea Trees which are located in Dragon Well Village nearby to the plantation. I had to pay 10rmb to see them, but I would have gladly paid much more. There are many reasons for this. First, I love Qing Dynasty history as well as tea history, secondly because the area around the trees has been turned into a beautiful garden area. There are many buildings and paths located on the hillside and there ...

... including the Bai and Su Causeways.<br><br>Our next stop was the Six Harmonies Pagoda, first built in 970 AD to placate the tidal bore, a massive wall of water that rushes upstream during high tide. Over 60 metres high, it served as a lighthouse up until the Ming Dynasty.<br><br>Our Guide next takes us to a freshwater pearl shop before dropping us back at the Hotel.

Departed Suzhou at 9am for a 2 and a half hour drive to Hangzhou, we said goodbye to Grace our Local Guide for the past two days but we keep our driver Mr John. On arrival we meet our new Guide Rain and we are taken to the restaurant for lunch, then onto a local market area where we visited some Chinese medicine shops and an art gallery with bronze sculptures.<br>Arrived at the Hotel at 2pm and did nothing much, went walking and later found a Subway so that was dinner.

We are sweating it up in China. It is hot and humid.<br><br>We have taken the train to Hangzhou, a city just south of Suzhou. We took the bullet train which was great. The trip took a little over 2 hours, fast and smooth. Altogether for 4 round trip tickets it was about $80 Canadian. Very cheap. The train is modern, clean and very comfortable. The top speed we reached was 180km/hr. I'm not sure why it didn't go any faster<br>but we were cruising along ...

... nd Tim yelled out, "The Ultim*te Ride!" which I guess is * P*trick Sw*yze quote from th*t movie wh**e people rob b*nks with President m*sks on. I he*ded b*ck without them bec*use I w*s kind of bored of the be*ch. I w*s just joy riding *round town *nd I r*ndomly got stopped by some cop. He w*s being * pretty ******** but *s soon *s I st*rted to pretend not to und**st*nd wh*t he w*s s*ying (combined with genuinely not und**st*nding most of wh*t he w*s s*ying ...

... middle, sort of like a tart. They sound weird and look kind of weird but are very nice.<br><br>We ended up going out for dinner at a Hot Pot/BBQ Buffet which basically is a table with a bbq and big pot of broth in the middle. You then go and help yourself to the raw cuts of meat, vegetables and everything else and cook it at your table. It was really cool and a fun experience and i've since found one of these ...

... we left the lake, our journey started up into the mountainous region known as Mai Lei Village. This wealthy village has the largest production of Chinese tea. Our group leader takes us to a tea ceremony where we learn interesting information about the different varieties of tea (Best is known as Emperor and the poorest quality known as Mother in Law), the cultivation and the different seasons for production. After ...