World Trade Center Grand Hotel Hangzhou

... with us. <br><br>That pretty much ended the day. I&#8217;m writing this on a 3 hour bus ride to Hongzhou. It&#8217;s raining outside, the windows are fogged up, and there isn&#8217;t much we can see. It&#8217;s actually a nice break. I think I&#8217;ll hit the health facility tonight after dinner instead of spending a couple of hours working on the blog!<br><br>PS &#8211; Dave, did you know that I.M. Pei is from Suzhou?

As is the case with many sequels - see Caddyshack 2, Slapshot 2, the unbelievably terrible Batman and Robin - we almost find ourselves wishing that the second installment of Tour Group Hell never happened (for the record, Caddyshack 2 didn't happen and how in the hell George Clooney still has a career after B&amp;R is beyond me). From the little we got to see, Hangzhou is a beautiful, transit-challenged city with some lovely areas ...

... to make sure we'd get a good view. We had a couple of beers and gradually we were joined by more people from the hostel with the same idea. We were excited: A firework display in China is sure to be mind blowing! <br><br>As the crowd gathered and the time drew near we anticipated the flash and bang of the first firework. Suddenly we heard the bangs, and fizzles of the fireworks, and 'oooh's and 'ahhh's of the ticket holding crowds on the lakeside. Then, a huge gasp from ...

... Peak which means Flying from Afar. The hill is filled with over 300 ancient Buddhist Carvings. Once i got my ticket I had to walk a little while to get to the peak, about fifteen minutes. The area is very beautiful and filled with trees, Buddhist Statues, and flowers. It is beautifully manicured and maintained. The Peak itself is not very large and is filled with caves. The carvings ...

... br><br>After lunch we journeyed onto the West Lake area and a cruise on the lake. West Lake covers over 8 square kilometres and is situated at the heart of Hangzhou. Originally the lake was an inlet off the estuary of the Qiantang River, becoming a lake when the river began to silt up in the 4th century. The lake had a tendency to flood, so several dykes were ...

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.

... pelting rain that cools you down a little and leaves you feeling like a wet cat. And there is lots to laugh about here too.<br><br>Al was trying to make his way in China, this is his story. I was standing in line to get tickets to take a boat to an island on the lake. There was one person in front of me at the ticket window buying tickets so I kept a respectable distance of a couple of feet behind the person like we normally would in Canada. I turned ...

... park and by this time the sun was beating down so much that I was getting exhausted. Sue and Ken continued to walk down the valley while I sat at a teahouse in the village to wait for them. It was a good chance for me to rest to have a bite to eat and some local tea. It turned out to be a fantastic find. Not only was the food great - homecooked braised pork in herbs with rice, but the family running the place ...

... because I didn't have my passport with me. After picking my jaw up off the counter I gently enquired as to why I needed my passport when I had not travelled overseas. "What the **** do I need one of those for?" "It's really important, you can't stay without one,'' the young man responded calmly, oblivious to the steam eminating out from beneath my collar. "But whyyyyyyy" I implored, like Shane Warne wanting to know why a batsman has not been given ...