I LOVE Shanghai!!

Today was our first full day in Shanghai, and after a day of exploring, all I can say is that I love this city!!!

I started the day a little late since we didn't get settled into our hotel until about 1:15am last night. After taking a shower and planning out my day, I headed out. My first stop was the Jade Buddha Temple, which was totally awesome. Well, the Buddha statue itself was only so-so (I've seen so many amazing Buddha statues in Thailand that it takes a lot for a statue to impress me at this point), but the grounds of the temple were amazing. There were tons of bonzai shaped trees and wandering alleyways, and the whole place was decorated with red lanterns and ribbons for the upcoming new year.

It was a little crowded, but nowhere near as bad as it would be if we went during the real tourist season. Most of the crowd was actually Chinese people going to worship there - there were very few tourists, so it still had a relaxing feel. I just love going to temples of all kind. It's just such a spiritual feeling for me.

There were of course the usual pushy sales people there, but it didn't seem to be quite as bad as at the places we went in Beijing.

After I finished there, I walked around for a while in that area and saw something that I haven't seen at all since I've arrived in China: blue skys!! It is also much warmer here than in Beijing so it was much more enjoyable to explore here. I probably didn't even need a jacket - just a sweater would have been fine.

The area was full of little shops and restaurants, and I ended up eating at a noodle place that had pretty good food. I ate soo much!! (it's hard to tell what things I'm ordering are side dishes and what are main dishes, so I am constantly ordering way too much) After that, I found a grocery store and bought some cool snacks and food items, and then took a cab to the Yuyuan park/shopping area.

This place was just awesome! It's part shopping mall and part park. But the shopping area was just amazing to walk around in, as it was all constructed to appear like a Chinese temple. The park was even more breathtaking and was pretty free from tourists which made it quite relaxing. I took a ton of pictures!!

After that, I walked around some more. I won't say I got lost, since you can't get lost if you don't have a destination in mind. But I definately had no idea where I was haha. After a while though, I was able to get a general idea of where I was and decided to walk down to this area called the Bund near the river for dinner and sight seeing.

Somehow however, I ended up at the docks. And since I was there, I decided to take a cruise of the river. It was so awesome! The sun had already set, so all of the buildings in the bund and the skyscrapers were lit up, including the famous Pearl TV Tower. It was pretty breathtaking, and I felt really lucky to have accidentally stumbled upon this opportunity. Once again, I took a ton of pictures! (302 to be exact haha)

After the cruise was over, I realized that the boat dropped us off at a totally different spot than where I had got on it. I really had no idea of where I was and tried unsucessfully to get a taxi. So, I got out my map and realized that I wasn't really that far from my hotel, so I decided to walk and grab something to eat on the way back.

Well, not only did I find the hotel, but I also found this Las Vegas Strip-esque street just a block away that is essentially a huge neon light-filled open air shopping market. There were so many neon sights that I thought I was in Tokyo haha. I walked around there, grabbed something to eat, and then came back to the hotel to have a swim and a steam. I am so relaxed now!

Today was probably my favorite day of the trip so far. Not only did I see some pretty amazing things, but I also travelled by myself all day, so I got to do exactly what I wanted to do and at my own pace - I am totally a solo traveller! Shanghai is so different than Beijing (or at the least the parts that I saw of it). Parts are wildly modern, but other parts right next door seem centuries old and full of tradition and history. Things seem more orderly here, the driving is less insane, and there is definately less polution. I like this place a lot!

What a great day!

(Tomorrow, I will explore some more in Shanghai and then fly to Chengdu in the evening. I only hope that tomorrow is half as good as today was!)