We left Suzhou today on the 11.07 high speed train to shanghai and amazingly got there at about 11.48! This time we reached speeds of 302 km/h which is over 187 mp/h! The Chinese really do have the 'let the train take the strain' strap line (as used by British Rail) nailed.
Once outside the train station, we could see our Hotel - The Holiday Inn Downtown (The Great Wall Wing). It stands very tall looking down on the large square in front of the train station. Looking back at the station, I noticed a huge neon sign above the door that displays the numbers and times if the trains arriving and departing - easy for everyone to see and very accessible - how cool, [memo to self, must send photos of carriage led displaying train speed and huge neon timetable sign outside station to British Rail for review] :)

The hotel room is laid out almost identically to the Holiday Inn we stayed at in Hangzhou. For the rest of the day we took it easy in the room, watched a couple of films and had a Pizza in the room. Later on we took a brief stroll out to get a hot chocolate and had an early night ready for a busy day tomorrow.