Shanghai

Date: February 3, 2019 – February 7, 2019
Location: Shanghai, China

Our cruise on the Celebrity Constellation ended in Baoshan, China about 15 miles north of Shanghai. Shanghai is one of the 3 cities in China where Untied States citizens are eligible for up to 144 hours of visa free transit. This allowed us to stay in Shanghai for up to 144 hours without needing a visa. If we had needed a visa for China, we would not have done the cruise. The reason is that we are traveling for the year and cannot be without our passport for the time it takes to get a Chinese visa.

Getting off the ship and through immigration took a very long time. Normally we are off a cruise ship by 9 am. This time we got off the ship at around 11:15 am and then it was another 1.5 hours before the immigration process was complete. By that time, the free shuttle bus the port provides to the subway was not running, or at least no one around could tell us where to get it and kept pointing to the taxis.

The taxis only took cash and we didn’t have any; there was an ATM on the other side of the terminal. But who wants to pay a transaction fee to withdraw money from an ATM if it can be avoided? There was free WiFi at the port and we were able to download the Didi app, the ride-sharing app (like Uber or Lyft) that is used in China. The ride-sharing apps in various countries are great as you can pay with a credit card, and then enter in the app where you want to go. So you don’t need to deal with the language barrier with the driver or bartering with taxis. On Didi, our 30 minute ride to the center of Shanghai was about $13USD.

Finding our Airbnb was an adventure as it was down a side walkway, up a small staircase, and through a kitchen.  We first thought the kitchen was part of a women’s apartment but it actually was a kitchen in the walkway. When we made it inside the Airbnb it was as we expected – a newly remodeled small apartment in an old building.

On February 4, 2019, we walked to Tianzifang, a group of small streets with shops and small restaurants.

We walked through Yanzhong Park.

In the evening we took a croissant making class. The class showed up on Airbnb for activities in the area. The dough was made the night before and provided to us chilled.

We added butter, and were shown how to roll out and fold the dough to get perfect croissants. Before being cooked we added an egg wash to the croissants.

I made traditional croissants and Brian made passion fruit croissants.

I was surprised by how many layers my croissants had. They were really good! We had a lot of fun in the class and it was nice to meet a few people from the area. I also then had breakfast for our remaining days in Shanghai.

February 5, 2019

We walked to the Bund and saw the wall of flowers before going up on the promenade.

On the promenade you could see the skyline of the Pudong district of Shanghai. The tower on the left is the Oriental Pearl TV Tower that was completed in 1994 and is 468 meters high, around 1,535 feet. The tall building on the right is the Shanghai Tower. Completed in 2015, it is the second tallest building in the world at 632 meters or around 2,073 feet.

We then walked along the Nanjing pedestrian street. It is the main shopping street in Shanghai. It was very busy and also Chinese New Year, or Lunar New Year.

February 6, 2019

We started the day by going to the Shanghai Museum. We tried to go the day before but when we arrived the line to get in was very long. We arrived just before the opening and the line was fairly long, but moved along quickly.

The museum is free but we needed to get through a security check to get inside, so that was what caused the line.

Some areas were interesting while others seemed like a similar item over and over again. In the ceramics gallery it was interesting to see 1,000 year old bowls and plates that look very similar to ones sold today. I liked this vase with all of the deer on it. It is named 100-Deer Vase.

Outside the museum was a display for the Chinese New Year.

We walked towards the City God Temple that is near Yu Garden. At one intersection we saw a lot of people cross the road and down the road we were going to take. As we continued walking there continued to be more and more people.

Soon we saw barriers set up and just decided to go with the flow of people to see where everyone was going.

We went through a security check that had a very small line and then were on a smaller street with shops on each side. We continued going with the crowd of people.

We turned a corner and saw some Chinese New Year decorations.

We realized that everyone was going to where we had planned to go.

We arrived at a place where a line formed on one side and there was a sign saying it was a 90-minute wait to cross the bridge. We decided not to wait.

We were able to walk by and see the Jiuqu Bridge.

This is the street leading out after people had gone into Yu Garden or gone past it to the shops.

The majority of places only accepted a Chinese bank credit card, so we got cash from an ATM. Meals were cheaper than we expected so our calculation of how much we thought we would need was too high. We had a lot of cash left over. In order to use the cash for our last dinner in China we went to a nicer sit-down restaurant and had appetizers, multiple entrees that we shared, dessert and a bottle of wine. The picture below doesn’t show all the food we had and the bill was still only $50USD. We tried to spend the rest of the cash we had in the airport.

We booked the cruise from Singapore to Shanghai because it was a really good deal at $133.48 a day for both of us, all-inclusive on taxes, fees, gratuities, meals, lodging, and transportation (not including excursions). It wasn’t until weeks after the cruise was booked and we started looking for flights out of Shanghai that we realized the cruise ended just a couple days before the Lunar New Year.

We became familiar with travel during the Lunar New Year last year when we went to South Korea for the winter Olympics. The Lunar New Year was during one of the weekends we were there. Most people travel to stay with family so all modes of transportation are very busy. Many shops and restaurants close during that time. In Shanghai we did see restaurants that were closed but there were plenty that were open so that wasn’t a huge issue for us.

Flights leaving Shanghai after our cruise were very expensive because of the Lunar New Year. We stayed in Shanghai for as long as the 144 hour visa exemption allowed us so we could get slightly cheaper flights. We then decided to book a flight to the closest (cheapest) place out of China, which was Taipei, Taiwan, and stay there for a few days before going on to New Zealand.

I won’t forget to look at when the Lunar New Year is in the future. The date changes every year. The next few dates are:

• January 25, 2020
• February 12, 2021
• February 1, 2022
• January 22, 2023