Shanghai city tour

  Shanghai, Shanghai, China
Friday, July 4, 2008

At 8:30AM I left my hotel and took a 40 minute walk to meet up with my Shaghai city tour.  I met a woman named Catherine from Australia on my tour today.  She has been traveling on her own all over the world for the last 6 months.  She was a lot of fun to talk to on the tour.

walking in Shanghai 1

boy in Shanghai

sites in Shanghai 1

Our first stop was the Yu Yuan Garden.  This garden was about 450 years old and had lovely views of ponds and large decorative rocks.

Yu Garden 1

Yu Garden 2

Yu Garden 3

Yu Garden 4

Yu Garden 5

Yu Garden 6

Yu Garden 8

Yu Garden 9

Yu Garden, Shanghai

Yu Garden 7

Yu Garden, Shanghai 1

Yu Garden, Shanghai 2

Yu Garden, Shanghai 4

Yu Garden, Shanghai 5

Yu Garden, Shanghai 6

Yu Garden, Shanghai 7

Yu Garden, Shanghai 8

Next we drove to the Bund which I had visited last night.  I had another nice view though.

tour to The Bund

On the Bund we visited a tea house and tried a variety of different teas.  In the end I not only bought tea byut also a beautiful Chinese tea set.

tea house 1

Later in the day we visited the Shanghai Museum.  Unfortunately, the guide did not give me too much time but I enjoyed what I saw.  They had a fabulous display of Chinese coins in each and every dynasty.  There was even a collection of coins used on the Silk Road.  On the bottom floor I viewed some bronze works done during the Shang and Zhou dynasties.

Shanghai Museum

Shanghai Museum 1

Shanghai Museum 7

Shanghai Museum 90

Shanghai Museum 91

Shanghai Museum 92

Next we stopped at Xintiandi which is a bar and restaurant area.

Xintiandi 1

Xintiandi 2

Our last stop of the day was at the Jade Buddha Temple.  Guess what I saw?  That is correct...a large Jade Buddha.  In 1882, an old temple was built to keep two jade Buddha statues which had been brought from Burma by a monk named Huigen. The temple was destroyed during the revolution that overthrew the Qing Dynasty. Fortunately the jade Buddha statues were saved and a new temple was built on the present site in 1928. It was named the Jade Buddha Temple.

Jade Buddha Temple

Jade Buddha Temple, Shanghai 96

Jade Buddha Temple, Shanghai 95

Jade Buddha Temple, Shanghai 92

Jade Buddha Temple, Shanghai 90

Jade Buddha Temple, Shanghai 1

Jade Buddha Temple, Shanghai 94

Jade Buddha Temple, Shanghai 91

Jade Buddha Temple, Shanghai 9

Jade Buddha Temple 7

Jade Buddha Temple in Shanghai

Jade Buddha Temple, Shanghai

Jade Buddha Temple 2

Jade Buddha Temple 1

Jade Buddha Temple 3

When the tour was over, the guide took Catherine, and myself to a secret illegal warehouse.  We walked in and it was pitch black but they turned on the lights and there were knockoffs of  all kinds of deisgner purses and watches and so much more!