Rainy Day in Shanghai
This morning our meet time wasn’t until 9:30, which was nice to sleep in a little bit longer. Our first stop was to Yu Gardens. It was built in 1559 as the private
garden of Pan Yunduan, the administration commissioner of Sichuan Province. It was still raining/misting, so we all walked along with our umbrellas and rain coats and looked at a number of buildings, trees and rocks. The gardens were beautiful and quite large.
Outside the Gardens area was a large shopping area where we were given a couple of hours to shop and for Tom to take pictures. It was nice not to be rushed. This was a perfect area to pick up some souvenirs, especially for those who were leaving us after Shanghai. We enjoyed the shopping and thought we had the perfect amount of time. Tom discovered how much he like to take “people” photos.
From here we went to another traditional Chinese lunch. Lunch was good, but not as good as some of the other Chinese meals that we’ve had. Our tour guide, Heidi, asked if any of us wanted to take an optional tour through a tram through a tunnel that went under the river and had a light show that cost an additional 70 RMB each. It sounded interesting to us, so Tom and I and Sheila decided to do it while the others walked along the Bund area of the river. It was foggy and you really couldn’t see to the other side of the river anyway.
The tunnel experience could be described as Willy Wonka’s Chocolate River ride. Kind of weird, trippy, and lame. It took 4 minutes to cross to the other side where we got out went to the street level, took a couple of pictures and then took the ride back. Tom said that no matter how much it sucked, we would tell everybody else that it was the most amazing experience ever. He had Jeff hook, line, and sinker. He didn’t let the story go on too long, and once we showed them the video, they knew they made the right decision not to spend the money. We were not upset about it as it is something we experienced together that no matter how lame the experience, it certainly was memorable.
From the Bund are we went to the Xintiandi dining and shopping district. These stores were more like what you would find in a regular shopping mall. We saw the Gap, Apple Store, Forever 21, etc. Heidi said that she knew a place where we could schedule foot or body massages. Since we had a couple of hours to kill before dinner, almost all of us said we wanted one. So we walked with her to the place to make appointments, only to find out that they didn’t have anything available until after 7:00p.m. That wasn’t going to work for us, so we all went off to wonder our separate ways.
A few of us went on the hunt for a Haagen-Daaz, and Becky had mentioned she had seen
one back the way we came. So we walked down the street for several blocks, and
after not finding one, Tom and I decided (well lets be honest, I decided) I wanted
to go to the Gap. I went and browsed the Gap and discovered that there was a whole
mall on the other side of the store. When I peaked my head out I found a Haagen-
Daaz across the way. We enjoyed some ice cream and continued to stroll along the
pedestrian street stopping in a few stores and malls, but not buying anything. We
eventually got back to where we started and continued to go down the other way just
to find a Haagen-Daaz two stores down from where we originally started. Isn’t that
the way that it would go?
We stopped in the M&M store and saw a group of 6 girls that were being filmed by three camera guys and some other people taking pictures. We have no idea if they were anyone famous (they looked really young), but just in case they were, Tom took a picture. 
After leaving the M&M store we had finally killed enough time (again it was nice not to be rushed), that it was time to meet our group for our farewell dinner. We had a traditioanl Chinese meal at an old restaraunt in Shanghai. Unfortunately I think
most of us were still full from lunch and ice cream, as we left a lot of food on the table.
I can’t believe that after tonight our group will get smaller once again. Westarted the trip with 42 people in Beijing, went to 21 in Xian, 15 in Shanghai, and 5 moving on to Hong Kong. We’ve met so many great people that it’s hard to say goodbye.
