Shanghai was our last destination while we were in China. We did a lot of walking around and exploring while we were in Shanghai, however we did not get as many pictures here as we could have. Being as it was the end of our trip and we wanted to get as much in as possible, I didn't stop to enjoy the view and take a picture nearly as often as I had on the rest of the trip. But, the pictures that we did get I will share with you here. First of all the pictures from arriving in Shanghai and our walk to the "Bund". The Bund is basically a walkway that follows a river and on the other side of the river is the business district with all the really cool buildings that you would see when you look up Shanghai on google. So here are those set of pictures.
This is the Hostel that we stayed in. It was actually really nice and had great accommodations. The restaurant that was in the hostel was also really great because they had traditionally american style food there! I had their french toast one morning and it was wonderful!
This is the Hostel that we stayed in. It was actually really nice and had great accommodations. The restaurant that was in the hostel was also really great because they had traditionally american style food there! I had their french toast one morning and it was wonderful!
We had to take 2 buses from the train station to get to our hostel and the tour guide was in the second set of buses so the first set of travelers had to stand guard over the luggage!
Walking through the main shopping district to the Bund.
There were lots of wires hanging above the streets directing their trolley system.
First sight of the Bund.
We got lunch in this section of the shopping district. While Matthew waited in line for what was promised to be the best dumplings in Shanghai, me and a few other tour members went to a small restaurant down the way and got some dumplings of our own. They may not have been 'the best' but we were in and out of there before the rest of them even got their dumplings (and we got to sit down and eat!)
My group even went to Starbucks after our lunch and people watched while sipping on tea!
Matthew and I went to a local (free) park to walk around while some of the rest of the group paid to get into a different park. We enjoyed some time in the sun without spending money for it.
Notice the bump getting bigger! I swear this trip was when I gained the most and really started to pop out.
And finally we took the metro for dummies (only called that because it is so labeled and easy to follow that a dummy could find their way around) and walked back down this street to our hostel. Their were apartment buildings like this all around packed into tight spaces. Lots of people in one small area.
The next set of pictures are just a few from our night out when we saw an acrobatics show. It was a pretty great show with a lot of local talent.
The last act was the scariest with 7 bikes making it into that caged ball and the fumes were starting to take over the small auditorium.
On our last full day in Shanghai we decided to go check out the Shanghai Zoo. I took a lot of pictures there so I won't post them all here. I will just pick out some of the ones that I really like! But the main thing that I wanted to say about the zoo is that it is really quite different from an American zoo. Some of the animals are put in cages but the majority of the animals have wide open ranges that they can roam around in and that the tourist can get literally feet from. There were points where I was just feet away from crocodiles, giraffes, zebras, hippos and so much more. Some of the monkeys were also so used to people feeding them (even though there were signs clearly stating not to, but no one around to enforce that rule) that they would stick their long arms out of the grates far enough that people could reach out and touch them!
First example of being so close that you could touch them. This ostrich was literally close enough to eat out of your hands.
Had to narrow down the bird pictures because there were a lot of them but this one was def my favorite. Such beautiful colors on them.
They had a penguin display (Matthew's favorite animal) but it was a little disappointing with the murky water and the inside section closed off.
I was very happy to get a good shot of the panther because he only came out for a shot time when were were looking at him.
This bear was just chilling playing with his sticks while laying down. Pretty funny.
They had a panda exhibit of course and that was a big attraction at this zoo. But there were only 2 pandas their and all they did was lay there the whole time! lol.
This one was really dirty!
Their outdoor habit was pretty neat with lots of things for them to climb and play on but they weren't having any of that when we rolled around. It was nap time.
These two bears were the highlight of the zoo for me! They were play fighting for a good 5 minutes! Running around, chasing and hiding from each other. It was awesome to watch.
This giraffe was literally leaning over his fence (that only went up to his thighs) and his neck as basically feet from tourist. It was crazy how close you could get to these things!
They had kangaroos! **Funny side story: The couple that we went to the zoo with were from Australia and wen we came upon the kangaroo exhibit Matthew and I were both really excited to see them but the couple was just like "oh we've seen plenty of those!".
**I put this picture up especially for my dad: Dad, this is about as good as the deer hunting would get in China!! This is as big as the deer get in China and they are tiny little things!
These hippos swam right under me, mere feet from me!
Baby monkeys are the cutest!
Ok final story from the zoo. Remember the couple from Australia that I mentioned earlier? Well this orangutan grew a special liking to the guy, Micheal. Micheal would walk in front of the enclosure back and forth and the orangutan would just follow him back and forth the whole time! It was hilarious! Seems the Chinese tourist aren't the only ones that are interested to see a white man around!
That was our last day in Shanghai and needless to say the trip to the zoo did take up almost the entire day. We ended up just grabbing some food and walking around a touristy shopping area a bit before heading back to the hostel to pack for our flight the next day.
We planned on going out and doing some last minute exploring around Shanghai in the morning before our afternoon flight but it was raining pretty hard all morning. We ended up just hanging out at the hostel and saying goodbye to all our new friends before heading to the metro station and off to the airport.
After many hours of flight time later we finally arrive back 'home' in Guam around 1am both wide awake and reeling from a great vacation. We are so glad that we were able to take this time before our baby girl was born to spend together traveling and seeing what the world has to offer. We hope to be able to do more traveling after kids as well but this 'babymoon' is one that we won't soon forget!
And that is it for the China trip blog post! Thanks for reading!!
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