Shanghai, PRC - Oct 18, 2014

A city of contrasts, from buildings and architecture to the people, from the young, to old and all points in between. From the locals to the international and domestic tourists, Shanghai has something for everyone, in fact it is bigger than that, it has everything for everyone, in short, we love Shanghai.

Shanghai is a city of superlatives: the world's biggest city and its most populous with 13 million residents, the world's biggest port as well as the world's tallest observation tower at 492 meters with the observation deck at 100th floor, yikes. Some have said that Shanghai is also the world's most modern city as most of the Financial area in the Pudong area was only developed since the 1990's. Once a small market town, Shanghai grew to be major trading port and in the early nineteenth century was the site of the Opium Wars with England. After the treaty of Nanjing, British merchants were granted a part of the city, and soon thereafter the French, then the Americans and Germans had "concessions" or business districts here in Shanghai. These communities flourished until the second World War when the Japanese took them over sending the foreign residents into camps. Fast forward to today and the economic boom from the 1990s, Shanghai has become one of the world's leading financial centres and home to expatriates from around the world. This fact-paced city is home to skyscrapers and high speed trains but still preserves much of its old architecture in the Bund district which is all very well displayed at night with its amazing lights.

We had three nights and three amazing full days here, some more fuller than others. Will catch you up on day one now and then the next two days while we are sea - so nice to able to have a few sea days to kind of back off the sightseeing gas peddle and take in the scenery, although there is still a somewhat full schedule of activities on board. Did I say we are having an amazing time...

Day 1, we were off on our two day adventure with Lorraine from SAT China, we includes our table mates, Jeff, Ellie, Brad, Gloria, Harry and Margo. On time and off we went for a two hour drive out of Shanghai as our two day tour included two major water towns, Suzhou and Hangzhou. Suzhou was founded in the 5th century BC and inspired a famous Chinese proverb "In heaven there is paradise; on Earth Suzhou and Hangzhou". Could this be true well all I can say that this will probably be my largest upload of four parts ever as every where you looked there was a picture. This includes the wonderful and friendly people we saw and met as well as the amazing architecture, much of which is still intact since the 5th century BC. We started at the 5th Century BC Pan gate and then the day just visually exploded from there. From here to the West Garden Temple then to the Lingering Gardens and finally to a boat ride along the water ways of water village tongli. We only had time for a quick lunch at the KFC - Lorraine our guide loves the KFC. So an amazing day organized once again by Jeff and Ellie - great job.