Guilin Saturday March 8

We rose early (well early for some) and caught our two flights to Guilin. Guilin is a small city in southern China less than an hour's flight from Hong Kong.

We stayed at the Sheraton right on the Li River. There's a beautiful tree-lined explanade along the river where you can see boats going by. We explored the esplanade on foot and walked at least a dozen blocks of the city. Like Shanghai, it also has granite streets for pedestrian use only. This one was full of little open shops and the usual aggressive Chinese sales people. We also noticed that they tend to make underpasses for pedestians at busy, wide intersections. We found a place to buy our tickets for the Li River boat trip to Yangshuo. Like most things, the trip was cheaper to book outside the hotel.

Maps of China and trip to Ningbo

On Thursday, 3/6 we accomplished one of our objectives. In Shanghai's largest bookstore, we found a decent wall map of China and we arranged to ship it and some other things back to Charlotte. It looked to us as though Shanghai did not have a map shop.

We woke up at 4:15a Friday morning. Lucky, because the power went off in the middle of the night for the second day in a row. So our clock radio did not wake us up. We caught the 6am train to Ningbo. We came out of the Marriott so early that we didn't have anybody to translate our destination to the cab driver. Luckily, we ended up at the right station. The weather is cold and gray today and the countryside looked kind of grim.

When we got to Ningbo and vendor Antonio picked us up at the station. We went directly to the globe factory. These globes are plastic and the raw globe balls & factory are pictured above. They will come in two colors which will enhance our offering. After touring the factory, Antonio and Mr. Chen took us to an authentic Chinese restaurant for lunch. We weren't sure what we were eating but it was delicious!

Serendipity

Today was full of fun surprises. The original idea was to look for an inxpensive digital camera at a marketplace recommended by John's Chinese friend, Kevin. The place resembled a mall, but with dozens (hundreds?) of tiny shops, one after another. Walking a narrow aisle, they're on both sides and the owners jump in your path, urging you to enter. "Come, lady, take a look - you need watch, belt,scarf..."?
We stopped to look at one thing and found ourselves being wisked into a scarf shop. (we were not looking for scarves) We went to the back wall where he pulled aside some scarves and revealed a small, hidden door. We followed him into this hidden tiny room and were surprised to see 2 Germans in there negotiating with the guy's brother!

After shopping, we set out again to explore the French Concession neighborhood. We had lunch in a wonderful French restaurant called Parkside Bistro on YanDang Rd.
We loved this part of Shanghai . It has a peaceful and friendly neighborhood feel to it, more European. We walked down alley ways and the people said, "Hello" in English. nobody was juming in our face or spraying anything on our shoes.

We saw a sign that said "Artist", "Atelier", "Oil Painting" and a red arrow pointing into an old dilapitated building. We ventured in and the artist came out to greet us and bring up into his studio. Ted was extremely reluctant to go too far into the building because it was very creepy... like something out of a spy movie. Anyway, he had a lot of large paintings, some very nice but nothing we could lug home. It was fascinating to see inside the old house though.

We found a tiny tea shop where the family was sitting at a table drinking tea. They spoke on English, but the woman brought out a can of jasmin tea and we bought some of that. the 2 men were shouing us tai chi-type moves and showed us a brochure. We think they were inviting us to take a class, but we weren't sure! They seemed genuinely happy to see us though.

In the evening, we met John at a bar at the top of the Jin Mao builing. It's in Pudongm on the east side of the river. We were on the 87th floorm a spectacular spot to see the Shanghai skyline all lit up. John knows the sous chef at the restaurant there. We had a fabulous meal that we were not allowed to pay for. Next John took us to his apartment which overlooks the water and has a great view. On the way back to our hotel the taxi driver suddenly pulled over to the side of the road, said something in Mandarin and jumped out of the car. We thought we were going to be stuck in the middle of the city, late at night and no cab! It turns out he was apparently answering a urgent call of nature. We were soon back to our hotel safely. We Just chaulk it up to our Shanghai experience.

Attack of the Shoe Shine Lady

We covered a little over 3 miles on foot today. We fleft the Marriott and haded east on Nanjing Rd toward the river. About a mile later it became a purely pedestrian walk. Since crossing the street can be taking your life in your hands, strolling down this wide stretch without cars was a real dream. Sometimes kids would recognize us a westerners and say "hello". As the day worn on, it was usally "do you want to buy a watch".

The Peri Plus map of Shanghai we used was pretty good with 2 exceptions. First, it would be a better walking map if it showed where the under-street tunnels were. Some streets are so wide the only way to cross is an under-street tunnel. Second, they have restaurants listed that are purely just a counter and not a valid destination. This makes us question the validity of it being on the map at all.

We worked ourselves south along the river to "The Old City". There we saw the temple and teahouse of the Yuyuan Garden, pictured above. At that point we did some souvenir shopping and caught a cab back to the hotel. A 3 mile ride for just 3 bucks! Just outside the hotel, an old lady squirted white goo on my foot and said "Shoe Shine"? Before I could stop her she was wiping it down. While she had me, another guy came up and quirted it on my other foot! Four bucks later, I had my shoes shined. Kinda reminds me of the NYC windshield cleaning scam, but on foot.

Streets of Shanghai

They vary from this back alley where some ladies are swapping gossip while their laundry is drying.... to cars and bikes zooming all around.

Getting to Shanghai

On the way to Shanghai, Mom got kidnapped and put to work as a Janitor. Just kidding. Seriously though, we are shocked at the size of the Shanghai terminal.

It is hard to find the words to describe Shanghai. It is certainly not what was expected. The density and the pollution is something I have never seen before. Still, it something I would not want to miss. As Patrice described the train ride from airport was exhilarating and very smooth. But what a juxtaposition. Get off the most hi-tech train in the world and see a guy peddling a three-wheel bike 5 minutes later. Here is Patrice and our friend John who was kind enough to meet us at the airport....

Here in Shanghai

Wow! 6 hrs. Charlotte-San Francicsco, a 5 hr. layover, 15 1/2 hrs. in the air, a 2 hr. layover in Hong Kong, 2 more hrs. in the air and we made it to Shanghai! Our friend, John, met us at the airport and were we glad to see him! He helped us navigate the MagLev. It's a superfast train (@300 miles/hr.) that took us to Pudong. Then a taxi to the Marriott. It's a nice place to crash. We did have lunch with John though and walked back about 2 1/2 miles to the hotel. The weather is great - about 58 degrees F.
A weird phenomenon we experienced - about 15 hrs. of darkness on the way over the Pacific. We kept flying away from the rising sun in the east.
-PN