We got into Shanghai last night late, but this city is like New York. It does not sleep. The number of high-rises astounded us. Chuck says it reminded him of New York on steroids.
When we finally got to our hotel, which is the Hilton Shanghai, we were even more amazed at the number of high-rises we could see from our window on the 30th floor. We went up to the 39th floor to have a drink at the Penthouse Bar.
The view is awesome from our room both night and day.
Many knew Shanghai as the Paris of the East during its hey day before the communist revolution. A guide met us at the airport and told us about the city as we drove to our hotel.
She even explained to us where the term shanghaied came from. It came from the number of kidnappings that happened in the city during the last century–around mid century.
Chuck and I woke up late this morning, but we tried to meet up with our group at the Yu Yuan Gardens in the Old City. We took a cab, and finally found our way through the crowded old city streets to the entrance of the gardens.
I am so glad we did this. The gardens were absolutely beautiful.
My favorite was the dragon on the wall,
And the rock features.
As always the pagodas were special, too.
We looked hard for our group, who should have been in the gardens following a guide with a yellow parasol; but the gardens were super crowded. We never found them.
So we finally took a cab back to the hotel and waited for a call from Ping our host.
While in the gardens Chuck got a little dehydrated and light headed, so we decided to sit out the afternoon. After lunch at the hotel, we took a walk down several canopied streets. Our hotel is in the French Concession area.
We both love Shanghai a lot.
After dinner, we all went to see the Shanghai Acrobatic School Troupe perform at a nearby theatre. They were amazing, especially the contortionist.
We are captivated by this city. I guess we were shanghaied after all. ?
Looks like a great trip. Wondering about if all of the cab drivers are trained enough in English to always know what you are saying.
The answer is ‘no’. The hotel gives you a card that has several ‘most visited’ sites, and the card has the addresses for each in both English and Chinese. Plus there is a little map on it, too, showing where our hotel is. We had no problem going to the gardens as our cab driver was given instructions by a bell man. coming back, though, it was just us and the cab driver; and he spoke no English. We gave him the card, and I’m not sure he could read and write. He paid no attention to the written part but instead studied the little map on the back of the card. The cab fare for about 20 minutes of driving was less than $4.