Asian Adventure: Cathay Pacific B777-300ER Business Class San Francisco to Hong Kong
Asian Adventure: Cathay Pacific Lounge Review: The Cabin at HKG
Asian Adventure: Cathay Dragon A330-300 Business Class Hong Kong to Beijing
Asian Adventure: Regent Beijing Hotel
Asian Adventure: Beijing - Dongcheng District
Asian Adventure: Beijing - The Great Wall
Asian Adventure: Beijing - Run-ze Jade Garden
Asian Adventure: Beijing - The Sacred Way of the Ming Tombs
Asian Adventure: Beijing - The Legend of Kung Fu
Asian Adventure: Beijing - Tiananmen Square
Asian Adventure: Beijing - The Forbidden City
Asian Adventure: Beijing - Hutong Tour via Rickshaw, Tea Tasting, Flying to Xi’an
Asian Adventure: Hotel Shangri-La Xi’an
Asian Adventure: Xi’an - Qing Dynasty Terra Cotta Warriors
Asian Adventure: Xi’an - Tang Dynasty Dinner and Show
Asian Adventure: Xi’an Wrap-Up, Flying to Lhasa, Lhasa Home Visit
Asian Adventure: Shangri-La Hotel Lhasa
Asian Adventure: Lhasa - Jokhang Temple and Barkhor Market
Asian Adventure: Lhasa - Canggu Nunnery and Sera Monastery
Asian Adventure: Lhasa - Potala Palace
Asian Adventure: Leaving Lhasa and Flying to Chongqing
Asian Adventure: Viking Emerald
Asian Adventure: Shibaozhai Temple
Asian Adventure: Cruising the Three Gorges
Asian Adventure: Three Gorges Dam
Asian Adventure: Jingzhou City Walls Tour
Asian Adventure: Wuhan - Hubei Bells Performance and Provincial Museum
Asian Adventure: Shanghai - Shanghai Museum
Asian Adventure: Fairmont Peace Hotel, Shanghai
Asian Adventure: Shanghai - Old Shanghai and Yuyan Gardens
Asian Adventure: The New Otani Tokyo Hotel
Asian Adventure: Tokyo - City Tour
Asian Adventure: Mt. Fuji and Hakone Tour Returning by Shinkansen
Asian Adventure: ANA Suites Lounge Review, Tokyo Narita
Asian Adventure: All Nippon Airways B777-300ER First Class Tokyo Narita to Houston
In some ways it was hard to believe we'd reached the final day of the main part of the Roof of the World tour. The tour had officially begun 15 days prior, on a Sunday evening, and it was now Monday. Our morning and early afternoon were spent at the Yuyuan Garden and the nearby Yuyuan Tourist Mart, followed by lunch and a visit to a local carpet and art store. We had the rest of the afternoon free before our evening activity.
Yuyuan Garden
This garden (pronounced you-you-ahn) was first built in 1559, during the Ming Dynasty, as a retirement gift from son to father. However, before it could be completed the son was promoted to governor of Sichuan and further construction was postponed until 1577. It's about 5 acres in size and at the time of its construction was the largest and most prestigious garden in the city. However the expense of creating and maintaining it eventually financially ruined the family that built it.
The gardens had fallen into disrepair by the 1700s. Eventually a group of merchants purchased it and the West Garden was opened to the public in 1780. Over the course of the next two hundred years some of the buildings inside the garden walls were used as headquarters by invaders or leaders of rebellions and the original structures were nearly destroyed. The government appointed someone to restore the buildings in the late 1950s. In 1961 the gardens were fully re-opened to the public and in 1982 they were declared a national monument.
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| Main entrance to the garden |
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| One of the pagodas on the grounds |
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| One of the ornaments on top of the pagoda |
Shanghai is a massive city and even with this being a tourist site it was very peaceful inside the garden, despite it being so close to the tourist mart. Lots of greenery, some rockeries and ponds stocked with koi.
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| A deer, representing the Empress, looks over the garden |
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| A mosaic in the walkway |
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| Rockery Panorama |
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| Koi in the pond |
I liked the dragons that decorated the top of the walls and wonder if they're meant to keep bad things outside the walls so that peace can be enjoyed within.
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| Dragon on top of the walls |
Yuyuan Tourist Mart
The exit of the Garden leads right into one of the aisles of the Yuyuan Tourist Mart, which is a bit of a combination of old-school architecture and new-school mall. The buildings may have been shaped like ancient pagodas, but the majority of items sold were decidedly modern - though there were some arts and crafts created the old way.
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| Yuyuan Tourist Mart |
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| Yuyuan Tourist Mart |
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| Yuyuan Tourist Mart |
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| Artwork for sale at the Yuyuan Tourist Mart |
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| We saw several of these signs. We think they were pointing to exits but they just made us laugh. |
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| Gotta love street names like this! |
Like good malls everywhere, food was for sale. Unlike other malls this one had freshly-made dumplings.
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| Food for sale |
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| Tropical drinks |
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| Freshly made dumplings |
After Lunch
Our lunch location was in a different, modern mall, which also had a store where carpets were hand-made and sold, along with artwork. Shanghai may be 5000 miles from Istanbul, but the making of carpets looked the same in both cities.
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| Making carpets by hand |
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| Hand-stitched embroidery |
After Dinner
That night we got to see the Shanghai Acrobatic Troupe perform. This is an amazing show and the performers were just fantastic. For once I was determined to sit back and enjoy the show so I don't have photos. But if you're ever in town, it's definitely worth seeing.
And that was it for the Roof of the World tour! Of our small group of 12, nine were heading back home the next morning. Three of us who were taking the extension to Tokyo were up early to catch our flight. We joined up with about 25 other folks from the Viking Emerald for the next three days.
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