Chinese New Year on the Bund

My trip to Shanghai went fairly smoothly for the most part. The Airport Express subway took longer than expected so I actually only arrived with a few minutes to spare for checking in and all that. I forgot how fantastic domestic travel is since I've only done it once before. I went through security one time and then just wandered in the airport waiting for my flight and was able to grab my bag and walk right out with no disturbances. I arrived about 15 minutes before my friends so I waited for them in the arrival hall and then we took a taxi to our hostel. We had no plans for the trip only that we had a few things that we wanted to see at some point. The first night was new year's eve so we walked around Nanjing road and got some Yoshinoya take-out and then went to see the fireworks and the Pudong skyline on the Bund.





One day we took the Bund Sightseeing Tunnel over to the Pudong side which was a totally cheesey experience but I loved it. There isn't much in Pudong but we went over to see the Jinmao building. We were there in the afternoon so the bar on the top floor (87th) wasn't open but there was a restaurant on the 86th floor in the Hyatt so we got some wonton soup and steamed buns.

One night we wandered around the French Concession area and then went to see an acrobatic show. I definitely liked it better than the one in Beijing since it wasn't nearly as cheesey. The costumes and the staging were much simpler which allowed the acrobatics to be the focus instead of the strange bird costumes and awkward poses in the Beijing show.

Another day we went to the YuYuan bazaar and garden. This was by far the best part of the trip and really the only thing that excited me in three days.

The bazaar was a labyrinth of small alleyways with food stalls (soup buns!) and other vendors that was so hard to navigate because it was completely packed with people.



The garden was really stunning with little ponds and fish and all kinds of interesting architecture and rock gardens.