Travels around Shanghai

My second week in Shanghai was of course spent with work and travel, and this

week was to Hangzhou!

Hangzhou is only a an hour bullet train ride away from Shanghai, and with

tickets only costing around 100rmb it was a no brainer so I booked my tickets

and was off to Hangzhou Friday night right after I got off work. Coming straight

from Japan I had previous experience with taking bullet trains, but in China is

was just a totally different experience. After buying my ticket online I had to pick

it up from the railway ticket office, which was easy enough, but I was completely

blown away by the sheer size of the railway station:

This was taken around 3pm and it was absolutely packed, people

everywhere. There are around 20+ gates that lead to the bullet trains

underground and there are a variety of stores to browse or eat at while waiting

for your train. Sadly I had a 5 hour wait here, so I became pretty well accustomed

to the layout.

Hangzhou is a very beautiful city known for more for its natural landmarks such

as the West lake, mountains or the tea fields, so with this knowledge I set out to

explore as much as I could in my short weekend trip. First thing on my itinerary

was checking out the West Lake, and despite the gloomy weather it was still

amazing. Even though West Lake was packed with locals and tourists alike I felt

it added to the charm and atmosphere of the natural beauty, the tranquillity of

the lake was in fact further emphasised with the bleak skies, which was then

juxtaposed with the bustling tourists and boats on the lake. I probably spent

around a good hour or so just walking around the lake pondering life and the

future because of how nostalgic it felt.

Out on the West lake, very gloomy but still a sight to see.

Found this stoned dude just chilling at the lake.

One of the many themed boats floating around the lake.

Next up was the tea field, which was a decent half hour drive away from the lake,

and even though it was tea season the tea fields were still a breathtaking sight to

behold. We decided to trek up to the top of the fields/mountain (or at least try

to), however our bravado and motivation soon died down when we realised how

far up it went up, and being content with the good photos we took and the view

was satisfied to call it a day and spent the rest of the night exploring Hangzhou.

Here are a few of the pictures I did get whilst in the fields though:

I would like to think this was shot from near the top, but nope this was

taken I’d optimistically assume from halfway to the top, but it was still an

amazing view.

Even though we didn’t go during the right season, it was still a nice

scenic stroll.

Now I saved the best section for last, the food. Being in Hangzhou I instantly

knew the place I had to try, and you could probably guess it was Grandma’s, the

staple of Hangzhounese cuisine. HOWEVER, today was not my day as I learnt the

wait was insanely long and I was already starving I settled for a place right

around the corner, “Steam Young”. This restaurant specialised in steaming their

dishes and had an amazing selection of dishes, combined with their English

friendly menu and their sleek modern interior design I was sold, and after the

meal I definitely had no regrets. I ended up ordering waaaaay too

much(thankfully the waitress stopped me from trying to order two massive

share dishes) but it was definitely worth it.

The interior décor of Steam Young.

These massive steam baskets had smaller baskets inside that would

steam everything; it was interesting to sit right in front of them while you ate.

One of their signatures was the boiled/steamed pork (sorry I don’t

remember the name) but it was absolutely delicious, the flavour, texture and

tenderness really hit it out of the park.

This was my absolute favourite dish of the day. They are steamed

custard buns shaped like pigs, almost too cute to eat.

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