Went on a trip to Suzhou, near Shanghai, today. Took us less than 25 minutes to reach it by train (apx. 50 km from Shanghai on a 250 km/h train). Suzhou itself is build on canals (same as Venice). While we didn't end up taking a mini-cruise on the canals, we saw some of them and they were ok. The main reason we went to Suzhou was to visit "The Humble Admininistrator Garden", which is considered one of the finet in China. Well, it is, sort of. :) The garden's colo...

Leaving good ol' Nanjing behind was a piece of cake. We took a 350 km/h train from Nanjing to Shanghai, which took just over an hour. It was awesome. We arrived to our hotel in Shanghai, which is beautifully located on Nanjing road, the best place to be in Shanghai. To add to this, we got upgraded twice - from a superior Club room to a luxury Club room and then to a Club suite. Sweet! :) We went to the famous Bund to watch the amazing Pudong skyline and later wal...

Well, after an "interesting" evening yesterday, when we realized the lowest temperature on our room's a/c is 27 degrees (!!!), and after a rather dull dinner, we woke up to a beautiful morning in Nanjing, had breakfast at Club Sofitel and went to the business center to purchase train tickets to Shanghai for tomorrow (38$ for a 1st class ticket - 301 Km in 75 minutes - pretty good). We then started our day, only to return in 5 minutes and get warmer clothes - it w...

Woke up early this morning (in our standarts, that is) - at 8:30AM, had breakfast at the lounge, checked out, took a train to the airport and flew a 1.5 hour flight from Beijing to Nanjing, where we took a bus to the central bus station and from there - a cab to the hotel. This Sofitel hotel is far less luxurious than the previous one, plus they tried to make us buy an upgrade, but worry not - I came prepared and we got it complimentary. Yay! :) Our room is on th...

After a rather good night sleep and a great breakfast, we're soon off to Badaling for the Wall. We need to take the underground, change a line or two and catch a 1.5 hour train to the site. Hope we make it... . :) More updates - this evening. 22:30 update: Back from Badaling aftr doing the Great Wall. Well, it IS great and certainly challenging. :) We arrived there at apx. 15:00 after having taken the 13:20 train. We spent about an hour and a half climbing the wa...