It turned out to be a 4 hour trip to get there, with all the bus stops in between, but a trip to the "Lake City" Hongzhou to the southwest of Shanghai was an educational experience.
I traveled with my materials course co-teacher's husband. Shangguan, who originally was going to accompany me, had her sister visiting for only one day from out of town and handed the baton to her husband, Tory. Yes, that's right Tory is his name. Nice guy. His English wasn't quite as good as his wife's but we got along fine. One stop was at the Buddist Temple in town. That is Tory and Tim in front of the Buddist Temple. The conversation between him and I about worshiping as a Buddist or Christian was very interesting. We don't realize how many similarites exist in religions until you try to explain yours to someone that is not familiar with it.
I toured a silk factory, tea plantation, and of course had a boatride on the famous lake. All with my Chinese touring companions, Chinese tour guide and Chinese fellow tourists. Needless to say I was a minority. Everyone was friendly and smiled a lot. I had help buying a silk scarf and some tea. No negotiations at these places though. The prices were set.
On the lake I saw a boat that "Tori's Tory" would die for. Take a look at that Dragon Boat.The day began at 6:00 am waiting for the bus and ended at 10:00 pm back "home." I definitely needed the next day off.
3 comments:
Hey, I spent a year just west of Hangzhou in a town called Changxing. Next to Guilin, Hangzhouis my favorite place in China. I kept a blog while I was in China too.
http://globaljimschinaadventure2.blogspot.com/
Have fun and watch out for the tea house scams in Shanghai!!
Global Jim
Wow - that is quite the boat
Wow...there are Torys all over the place!
That boat looks neat!
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