Day 35 - A Day of Travel

An old Chinese proverb says that 'When the crescent moon rises you should travel far distances without reaching your intended destination'. Ok, maybe it does not say this as I just made it up but it could say this and would fit well for today. ;)

To get to Xiamen was a bit of a mission and I had to take three trains, I guess if I would have planned it better I would have stayed in Suzhou first and after in Hangzhou as there are more direct trains to Xiamen from Hangzhou. But anyway, after taking the train from Suzhou to Shanghai Hongqiao, then onwards to Hangzhou East and from there to Xiamen, I arrived here at 18:50.

Now, while this was close it should still give me plenty of time to get the 20:00 ferry, especially after waiting only 10 minutes for a taxi and making it to the port by 19:25.
This looked all very promising and I was certain to make it until I got into the departure lounge.

Well, it was deserted and nobody was there. After finding someone hidden behind a desk I tried to find out what the situation was. After a bit of a struggle, she understood that I was after the Taiwan ferry but said that contrary to the website, it leaves at 19:00 so there is no ferry till Thursday.

This means I now have two days to see Xiamen so I did what I always do when plans change unexpectedly, I was looking for a bar with wifi to get a beer (earlier in the day it would have been a coffee). After consulting my Fonepad I found a few bars in a park nearby according to the maps app I use so I was headed in this direction.

Once I found a bar and I had a cold pint in front of me, I began looking for a place to stay and for things to do in Xiamen. The nice thing was that they also had a really good band playing so this made it even nicer.
If I learned one thing during my travels is that no matter what happens, always stay cool and get a coffee or beer as things will look much better with one in front of you and it will give you time to sort things out.

After enjoying the drink and live music, I set out to the hostel, it was quite far out but was really cheap and got good reviews. Unfortunately the taxi driver did not know how to get there and just left me out in a small side street to try and find the hostel.
After wandering for a while, I ended up at a different hotel where they were nice enough to phone the hostel and have the owner pick me up.
Finding places is quite a challenge at times but it's always interesting and a challenge.

Tomorrow, I will have time to explore Xiamen and see some more of the place but so far it has a different feel to the other cities and feels a bit more like Hong Kong.

In case you started to miss my pictures out of a train window, this post should have you covered. ;)

Day 34 - The Lingering Shantan Tiger

The weather finally improved and while looking out the window in the morning I could see some blue in the sky. It was certainly promising and I might get some decent light again for photography.

The sun was out indeed and while it was hazy, it worked out much better than the past days for photography. The downside of this was that it was really hot and stuffy so walking outside was not as pleasant as the past days but I don't want to complain.

I set out to walk to the 'Lingering Garden' and then Shantang Street and Tiger Hill to take pictures. On my was there  almost got distracted a few times to go off and take pictures of other things but I managed to stay on track and get to my destinations as planned.

The Lingering Garden is a smaller but overall very nice garden and in some ways I think my favourite in Suzhou as it has a bit of everything the other gardens have but in a more compact form. This being Monday meant there were a lot less people visiting so it meant I cold really enjoy the garden without having hundreds of people around me at all times with tour guides blaring information out of their loudspeakers. After lingering long enough in the garden, I set out to walk to Tiger Hill.

Tiger Hill was one of the things I managed to see in 2006 so was looking forward to revisit it again. Tiger Hill is quite a nice park to wander in but I do find the layout somewhat crammed as most of the main sights are all next to each other in the centre and the remaining parts are not very interesting but actually make for a nice walk and provide some quiet to sit and relax. It is kind of an island surrounded by a canal and the leaning pagoda in the middle is the feature you will see immediately before even entering the park.

After spending some time walking around the park and visiting most of the different halls there with their sometimes poetic names, I decided to head back and walk along Shantang Street, the street is quite long and follows one of the canals, it's south end is a tourist attraction while the rest is simply houses and shops.

It's definitely worth walking it either all the way to or after visiting Tiger Hill as the touristy part, while nice, does not give such a good insight of people's lives there as the rest of it so I find it more interesting.

Once I reached the end of Shantang Street, the sun began to set so I headed back to get my train tickets for tomorrow.
It should be fun as I don't have the ferry ticket to Taiwan yet and I couldn't get the earlier train to Xiamen so have to go from Suzhou to Shanghai Hongqiao, from there to Hangzhou East and from there to Xiamen. Arrival in Xiamen will be at 18:50 and the ferry for Taiwan leaves at 20:00 so it will be a challenge to nit only get to the ferry terminal on time but to find the ticket office, make myself understood what ticket I want and hope there will be one available for me before they close the check-in.
Should this fail, I will have two days to spend in Xiamen before the next ferry to Taiwan departs.

Day 33 - Lion Grove and Evening at the Canals

I started off the morning with a visit to the 'Lion Grove Garden', which was a expected packed with tourists and tour groups so it was at times very difficult to find a quiet spot and enjoy the garden. It was still a mostly grey day so again not ideal for photography but one has to work with what's available.

Afterwards I headed to meet a Friend for lunch, we had a late lunch but were at the restaurant eating and chatting almost till the Chinese dinner time. Thanks John for the great lunch and for your help with everything  before and during my China visit!
It was great to catch up and have a very nice lunch, his meant that I did not do that much photography though.

After the extended lunch, I did head back to Pingjian Street to take some more pictures and try some long exposures at night.

Tomorrow will be my last full day in Suzhou and depending my train schedule might see the last pictures from Suzhou.