10/9 – Shanghai

Taking another tour in Shanghai – what were we thinking???? Well, we really wanted to go see some real Chinese villages/towns, and not another huge city. So we booked the Zhujiajiao tour, which takes you to a silk factory (joy) and to an old village along the lower Yangtze River that has 36 bridges over the river. They call it the Chinese Venice.

Again – holed up in the ship – this time in Club Fusion. But this time it wasn’t too long of a wait until we were called. 1 hour ride to the Silk factory ended up only being ½ hour because the traffic was so surprisingly light. Again – on the way the construction is just astonishing! Had the obligatory tour of the factory – it was interesting to see the gestation of the silk worm and then the weird very old fashion (think I Love Lucy) machines used to extract the silk from the worm’s cocoon. Then on to the comforter section where we watched how they made the comforters and listened to the pitch to by $100 comforters with silk covers that cost an additional $500 to $1000. thanks, we think we’ll pass!

Then we had to put up with the Fashion show – where they got these hugely tall Chinese women, we’ll never know – then it was on to the clothing store. The whole thing is now into about 45 minutes or an hour and we’re getting antsy, but our tour leader says we have to wait there another ½ hour. This is why we hate going on tour! We’re bored, we don’t want to waste time or money at the “approved” (read rip off) store, we want to see the culture, the environment, the real thing. As it turned out, the delay wasn’t necessarily a revenue generator, it was because we were so early, the restaurant wasn’t ready for us.

Lunch today was very good – tons of variety, excellent food, tasted great – some odd things, but mostly Szechuan food that was tasty. Even sweet and sour fish – the whole thing on the plate. Very good.

Finally we are off to the old town – there we got to use the restrooms at KFC if we needed them again (the only bonus of the revenue generating silk factory were the western restrooms – very nice!). Then we are off walking through the old village of Z-whatever (we’re calling it Ziua – like Ziuatenejo in Mexico because it’s the only thing we can pronounce!). It’s actually a cool little town – with lots of Ming and Quing architectural examples (Ming has black roof tiles with white walls, Quing – not so sure – think I napped through that explanation!).

At any rate, we got to walk through the town – and shop a little in the many shops that lined every lane/alley we walked. We visited the Farm museum (well the tour did – we stayed out side and bought stuff with our remaining yuan we were trying to get rid of!), the Post office where we got some great shots of Pietro trying to mail himself home (aw, he’s ok, he’s just not into this bowing, noodle, chop stick kind of thing….we’re hoping he’ll enjoy Thailand more). After following the lollipop around for about 45 minutes, we were able to spend some time on our own (thank heavens!).

We left the group and made our way to the first place we could find with a table, chairs and beer. Ordered two beers – and talked our way through the price, no food (although the precious owner kept trying to get us to order the fresh crab – sitting there in their little crates full of water – and the toilet). Talk about a local joint in the middle of tourist land! A family was right next to us eating,  we were drinking HUGE beers for $1 each…..sitting right next to the river with a covered bridge across from us. Doesn’t get much better than that!

After our libations, we went shopping and spent our remaining Yuan. You’d think it’d be easy – but everything is so darn cheap over here that it gets really hard to spend all that dough. We managed though and got some cool things – that don’t weigh a lot (yeah, yeah, Ed) and will pack nicely!

We ended our tour with a sampan ride down the river. How cool is that? So the ship tour did end well even though it started out pretty bad.

So – the shopping…..OK, so they were selling the comforters for $100+ at the factory, but the savvy shoppers waited until the ancient town and bought the same thing (same packaging and everything) for $25! Oh, and yes, Mark, we succumbed to the Genuine, Authentic, Fake Rolex watches. How could we not? 3 for $10- we’re in! Tried to get a fourth – but that didn’t work – it was a Breitling that I really wanted, but the guy just wouldn’t give in. Oh well. Our Rolex’s will just have to do!

Back on the bus – nap time for an hour on the ride back. Then hanging around the ship until we sailed. Hot and hazy (polluted) skies. So we stayed in inside pretty much trying to make the darn internet work! Sometimes it does, most times it doesn’t. This is really beyond frustrating, but we are hopeful (ha!) that it will be fixed soon. Not just for our sake – but for Koos, the poor internet manager – he’s getting a whipping this trip – that’s for sure!

Exercise, dinner, day’s done! Sea day for relaxing tomorrow.