# Shanghai Surprise and Hong Kong Hospitality: A July 2018 China Family Trip Report - VIDEO ADDED p. 3



## CaptainCook

We are back! 48 hours ago, we came home from a two-week trip to China that was the culmination of years of dreaming and a ton of planning. It all paid off in a trip that was nearly flawless and definitely ranks among our best trips of all time. We are proof positive that you can go to China without speaking the language, travel the country on your own terms rather than being tied to a tour group, and live to tell the tale.

I will say up front that we spent one day in Shanghai Disneyland and one day in Hong Kong Disneyland, but the majority of our two weeks were spent seeing sights that have nothing at all to do with the parks. I'll provide detail about our Disney days here since that's the purpose of this message board, but be forewarned that I'll also summarize what else we saw and did in the country. Feel free to skip those parts if your only interest is the parks.

We are a family of 4 - me (Carrie), DH (Chad), and two kids, Liam (13) and Mallory (11). I think we nailed it with taking the trip at this time. Our kids were a great age for this trip.

We began planning our trip to China about four years ago. Traveling and trip planning is a significant hobby of ours, and we started stringing together a family-friendly itinerary full of exciting sights and activities. The Great Wall... pandas... acrobats, perfecting our chopstick skills, karst mountains. Maybe even a visit to that Disney park over there in Hong Kong. The trip would have to wait a few years though, until the kids were a little older.

In the meantime, a couple of things happened. First, Disney opened the new park in Shanghai in 2016. Shanghai wasn't part of our original itinerary, but with the park now open, we added it on when we got serious about making this trip happen a year or so ago.

Second, we traveled through a few European countries in 2017, and on that trip we spent a day at Disneyland Paris. That trip marked the halfway point in terms of us completing the Every Disney Park bucket list. It hadn't been a deliberate goal before then, but it's become a fun common purpose for our family in the time since. That gave us a bit more incentive to add Shanghai on to our China itinerary.

We knew July may not be considered optimal timing to go to China, due to the heat and due to summer holiday crowds. But our trip planning is also bound by the school calendar.

So we hoped for the best, braced for the worst, and set off.


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## KJTex

Glad you guys made it back. Can't wait to read all about your adventures.


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## Disney127

Can't wait to hear about your trip!


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## CaptainCook

*Saturday July 7/Sunday July 8 - Toronto to Shanghai*

We left home bright and early at 7 am for the 3 hour drive to Toronto. It's construction season in Ontario, Canada where we live, and we didn't know what to expect for highway closures. As we left home, we received notice of a 75 minute delay on highway 401 about 10 km away from the airport due to a spill of some sort. Luckily, it was cleaned up by the time we got there, and we had no major delays.

Our flight left pretty much on time at 1 pm, and despite it being 14 hours nonstop on Air Canada from Toronto to Shanghai... the flight was not as bad as I'd expected. We all watched several movies and tried to sleep. I found the seats to be quite comfortable, and my back didn't hurt at all. Usually it's killing me after just a few hours in most seats.

We were served a hot lunch shortly after takeoff, and an 'evening snack' of noodle cups and sandwiches. The noodle cups came with chopsticks, and the kids thought that was awesome - a great start to our China adventure.

One aspect of the flight that disappointed me was that rather than flying east or west to Shanghai, we took the polar route, up over Alaska and the Arctic circle into Russia - but the flight crew maintained a strict 'windows closed' policy on the aircraft so that passengers could sleep. I would have liked to look out over those parts of the world (especially since it was still daytime when we passed over them) but was unable to.

We landed around 3 pm on Sunday, and taxied to the gate, and everyone was up out of their seats - and then the pilot came over the PA system and announced that he had to back the plane up 1 foot to fit the apron lines, which had been freshly repainted. So we had to wait for everyone to re-stow their luggage and be seated again. Groan.

We finally got off the plane. It was easy enough to get through health check, finger printing, immigration and customs. Truthfully, it didn't feel all that different from the Toronto airport. Our driver from Mr. Orange was waiting for us with a sign. We had pre-booked most of our transfers from airport or train station to hotel with this car service in multiple cities across China. This saved a lot of time and confusion in getting on our way quickly after landing or disembarking, and was a great decision we had made in planning our trip.

It was an easy drive to Disneyland with no traffic - less than half an hour. We checked in at the Toy Story Hotel.






We had booked our hotel stay separately from our park tickets, and wanted to take advantage of an offer that gives guests who book both together through the Disney website. The advantage includes an extra Fastpass to use in the park, as well as access to the park through a separate entrance for hotel guests only that would be a great time saver. We had booked both parts of our package through the official Disney website, just not at the same time; but only because we booked our hotel stay back in February to ensure availability, and park tickets weren't released until June.

We knew Shanghai Disneyland was going to be crowded in July. We'd been watching attraction wait times online for the past few weeks, and knew that three-hour waits weren't uncommon, and that most Fastpasses would be gone early in the day. We wanted to take advantage of every little time saving trick that we could.

The moment of truth arrived: we inquired about the perks we were hoping for. The main desk clerk referred us to the concierge desk, and the concierge deferred to her supervisor, Sasa. After much runaround, the hotel told us that because we had not booked our hotel stay at the same time as our park tickets, we were not eligible for the extra Fastpass. This is something Disney definitely needs to change, because the only reason we didn't buy them together was because park tickets were not released early enough. We did book both parts of the deal through Disney's official site, which I'm sure is the behaviour they are trying to drive. We were incredibly disheartened not only to be faced with one less Fastpass in hand, but also to have to endure rope drop and paper ticket issuing at the main gate, which I've heard is a crowd-control nightmare.

Finally Sasa said that what she could do was to refund the park tickets we had purchased (even though they were marked as non refundable) and then allow us to re-purchase them through the hotel, which would get us the package deal. The refund is supposed to take up to a month to process; fingers crossed that it actually comes through sometime.

We were issued our park tickets, and I was disappointed to see that they were all Toy Story themed. I've kept a ticket from every Disney park we've visited, and they've all been blue Mickey Mouse themed tickets. I'm hoping to frame them all one day, and was hoping for consistency. Oh well.

We booked a mid-afternoon Roaring Rapids Fastpass with the concierge now that we were eligible for it. The hotel-arranged Fastpasses are not linked to the regular Fastpasses you book using the Shanghai Disneyland app once you're in the park, so you can hold one of each concurrently. It didn't take long for the hotel-arranged Fastpass to show up in our account on the app, which we had set up before leaving home. So that was a good sign that we would be ready to start booking more Fastpasses as soon as we got into the park the following morning.

We felt relatively good after our long flight, so we freshened up a bit in our room, and then walked over to Disneytown for something to eat. The walk took about 10-15 minutes. It was hot out, perhaps 85F, but nothing worse than what we'd left behind at home. We had checked out the Disneytown restaurant directory online ahead of time, and were planning to eat at Food Republic, but this was the first place that culture shock really kicked in for us. The food looked good but also foreign, and we were unsure of where to jump in. And the real kicker was how crowded and chaotic the restaurant was, how we couldn't read most of the signage, and that there were no free tables anywhere. Frankly, we found it a bit overwhelming. We decided to leave and look elsewhere instead. We settled on Kokio Noodles and Bar which was decidedly quieter, where we split a couple different bowls of noodles.





Before calling it a day, we shopped a bit at World of Disney.









Our key observations were that there were no Christmas ornaments for sale, which I'd pretty much expected, but hoped wouldn't be true because I like to collect one from every trip. There were also limited trading pins that say Shanghai on them, and there was lots and lots and LOTS of Duffy and friends merchandise. Before walking back to the hotel, we located the hotel guest Disneytown entry gate so that we'd know where to go in the morning. And with that, we called it a night.

(I really didn't take many photos on our first day, but not to worry - I will more than make up for it in the days to come.)


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## Simba001

CaptainCook said:


> We finally got off the plane. It was easy enough to get through health check, finger printing, immigration and customs. Truthfully, it didn't feel all that different from the Toronto airport. Our driver from Mr. Orange was waiting for us with a sign. We had pre-booked most of our transfers from airport or train station to hotel with this car service in multiple cities across China. This saved a lot of time and confusion in getting on our way quickly after landing or disembarking, and was a great decision we had made in planning our trip.



I hadn't heard about a health check.... could you explain what that entails?

I'm not familiar with Mr. Orange transfer services, but will now look into it.  I am not wanting to deal with the Pudong airport taxi situation.


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## CaptainCook

*Monday July 9 - Shanghai Disneyland - Part 1*

Everyone woke up 4:30 am from a combination of jet lag and being super excited for our day at the park. We went down for breakfast at the Sunnyside Market on the ground floor of the hotel. It opened promptly at 6:30 am. There are only 4 tables inside, but we were the only ones eating there; everyone else was heading for the sit-down Sunnyside Cafe next door.





There was an amazing assortment of cute pastry items at the Market, which made it hard to decide what to order. We were also riding the 'first day at Disneyland' high, and likely went a bit overboard! The doughnuts were ok, but looked better than they tasted. The pork moon cake was delicious. We finished up as quickly as possible and headed out the door to the park around 6:55 am.

The first shuttle bus to the park was scheduled to leave at 7:10 am and there were already several buses' worth of guests waiting in line for it.





We had planned to walk, figuring it would take 12 or so minutes to get to the Disneytown gate. We headed out and took the 'back way' to shorten the trip as much as possible. We arrived at the park entrance just steps ahead of the first busload of hotel guests. We weren't the first ones in the park, but we were pretty close!

Bag and ticket check only took a few minutes, and we were in the park at 7:20 am. Official park open would be at 8 am. We stopped in front of the castle to take a couple of quick photos while Chad tried logging into the app to book our first in-park Fastpass.





Unfortunately, the front of the castle is one of the places in the park with poor wifi. We couldn't get onto the app, so we continued on to to Peter Pan, our first planned ride of the day, while we kept trying to access it. There was no wait to ride Peter Pan so we did that, and enjoyed the modern version of the classic attraction.

We were able to log into the app successfully as we were coming out of the attraction. By then it was about 7:45 am and Fastpasses for Soarin' were already booking for 5:30 pm! We chose not to book one, since that would tie up our Fastpass availability for too long. Instead, we booked 7 Dwarfs Mine Train with a return window of 9:40-10:40 am, and headed over to Soarin' to ride standby before the queue got too long. The wait time was posted as 60 minutes, so we hopped in line.

I should perhaps say now that we knew heading into one day at Shanghai Disneyland that we would not have enough time to see and do everything. Our plan was to do the attractions that were unique to Shanghai, spend some time soaking up the park atmosphere, and not worry about the rides we've done many times before. Peter Pan was a good fit for this strategy, because it was interesting to see how much the updated technology added to the experience.

On the other hand, we had had the opportunity to ride Soarin' Around the World before, so this wasn't really new. However - we were surprised to see that the queue and pre-ride show were completely different here than they are elsewhere. They have a very Indiana Jones vibe to them in Shanghai. So that wound up being a good use of our time. We made it to the pre-ride show after 35 minutes, then boarded the ride, and enjoyed it immensely, as always - it really is one of my favourite attractions.





Exiting Soarin', we found a couple of park tickets, stamped with today's date, on the ground. I tried returning these to a cast member, thinking someone would be looking for them, needing them for Fastpass booking or room charging or some such use. Instead, the cast member acted like I was crazy for caring. As the day went on, we found more and more park tickets on the ground, and it became clear that this was just a case of littering. On the bright side, I did find several Mickey Mouse themed park tickets, and kept one of them to add to my colour- and character-coordinated park ticket series.

Just a few steps later, we found a 100 yuan note on the ground beside a snack cart. We picked it up and tried returning it to the cast member at the cart, who wouldn't accept it. I was starting to feel like returning things to their owners is simply not done in China. We pocketed the yuans (vowing to spend them at Disney; not hard to do) and moved on.

From Soarin' we went to the Camp Discovery Challenge Trails. They had opened right at 8 am (we had heard they usually open sometime later) and we knew that the line there builds quickly, but the wait time was still only 20 minutes. The trails were on my must-do list for the day, and they did not disappoint - they were a lot of fun. Note that you must wear closed-toe shoes to be allowed on, and that you can change between the easy, medium and difficult options at each challenge.





Chad and Liam attempted the difficult waterfall challenge and made it by the skin of their teeth; there were a few times I thought they were not going to finish. There is also a bypass option, so you can skip the waterfall altogether if you so choose.





Since we were close to Pirates of the Caribbean, we went over to check the wait time. It was posted at 70 minutes, so we opted instead to use our 7 Dwarfs Mine Train Fastpass. I'm glad we had the Fastpass, because the standby line was already a couple of hours long. With that done, we went online again to book another Fastpass. The only ones available were Pooh or Buzz Lightyear for 6:25 pm. We booked Pooh and moved on.

The sun was out and the day was starting to heat up, so we looked for a snack cart. I wanted to try the Donald Duckburg ice pop.





We had our refreshments as quickly as we could. It took no time at all for them to start melting in the blazing sun. As we ate, we walked back to Pirates. The wait time was now posted at 80 minutes, and we decided 'now or never' (since there are no Fastpasses for this ride) and got in the queue.






The Pirates queue was the low point of the day for us. It was hot and crowded. The line started out in the sun, and even when it wound its way under shelter, it wasn't the same icy cold queue we've come to expect at the Pirates attraction in Orlando. There was a lot of pushing in the queue - an aspect of the local culture that would take some getting used to - and a lot of litter, though to be fair, there weren't many trash bins. Another thing we remarked on was how lawless it seemed - after getting into the queue, we really didn't see another cast member again until we were in the boarding area.





This observation would turn out to be prophetic. Although the queue for the ride was long, not all of the corrals were in use. We had been in line for over an hour when suddenly something happened that we can only liken to a jailbreak. Hundreds and hundreds of people started running by in the corral beside us that previously hadn't been in use. We were bewildered for a bit until we surmised that they had likely opened the extra queue space without doing any crowd control to ensure those already in the queue had priority over the newcomers. It was disheartening to have been in line for so long, only to see so many people essentially get a Fastpass to the front. We were still quite a ways out from where the lines merge together. There was nothing we could do about it, so we smiled through gritted teeth and queued on.


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## CaptainCook

I am suddenly having all sorts of crazy formatting problems. Is there an issue with posting 10 or more photos in a single post? Perhaps that's it - I will have to break this up into multiple posts.

Bear with me!


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## CaptainCook

Simba001 said:


> I hadn't heard about a health check.... could you explain what that entails?
> 
> I'm not familiar with Mr. Orange transfer services, but will now look into it.  I am not wanting to deal with the Pudong airport taxi situation.



Health check is simply a walk-through if you don't have any illnesses to declare (there are laws for example about disclosing HIV positive status) and if you aren't coming in from a yellow fever area where you would need to provide proof of vaccination.

It may be relevant to you to know about our entry experience into Hong Kong though, if you will be traveling there. We took a private transfer vehicle across the border into Hong Kong from the border city of Shenzhen. Our driver rolled down the window and spoke to the border agents and handed over our passports. There was a health check agent there at a separate window, and she opened the door into the vehicle and waved what I assume was an infrared thermometer around inside, looking for signs of infection. Thankfully we passed.

Mr. Orange provided excellent service to us throughout China. Great drivers, nice vehicles, and easy to step off a plane or train and locate someone waving a sign with a smiling orange and your name on it!


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## CaptainCook

*Monday July 9 - Shanghai Disneyland - Part 2*

Finally we boarded the ride with a total wait time of about 90 minutes. There was a lot of trash in the boat that we picked our way over to get to our seats. But I do have to agree with everyone who says the ride is spectacular; it really is unlike anything else. I am certainly glad that we stuck it out and got to experience it.





After the marathon wait for Pirates, we were ready for some lunch. We chose the Wandering Moon tea house, since it had something that appealed to all of us. We had some meat and veggie skewers, corn on the cob, and watermelon, with some cold drinks to wash it down. (Fluid intake was critical in the heat. I had a refillable water bottle I had brought from home, and kept topping it up at the drinking water stations around the park. But again, I would liken the heat and humidity to what you'd experience in Florida at the same time of year, no worse.)

When we had finished eating, we realized that the next Tarzan stage show started in 11 minutes and that if we were quick, we could make it there before the show started. We booked it over and got seats near the top on the side that were still excellent view seats. The show was fun and we enjoyed it.

We used the bathroom nearby (good facilities, mix of western and squat toilets, toilet paper provided) and headed over to Roarin' Rapids to use our Fastpass. It was just after 2 pm and it was hot, and a water ride sounded like a great idea. We were surprised then to see that we were pretty much the only ones in the queue who elected not to purchase a rain poncho for 1 yuan to wear on the ride. (I shuddered to think of all that plastic hitting a landfill afterwards.) We actually thought it was quite funny to see so many people so keen on not getting wet on a water ride. The attraction was good fun and we did, of course, get soaked - though probably not as wet as we've been after riding Kali River Rapids. But we dried out very quickly in the sun afterwards.





We came around the front of the castle, and passed Dumbo. Mallory wanted to ride, so we joined the 30 minute queue. This was not a great use of time (I swear the ride was no more than 45 seconds), but it made her happy, so there you go. Coming off of Dumbo, the afternoon parade was going down Mickey Avenue, so we watched the last 3 or 4 floats pass us by. Luckily we were able to see the Mulan float, which felt very apropos in Shanghai.





We walked through the castle to admire the mosaics there...





...and came out by the Voyage to the Crystal Grotto, which had a 10 minute posted wait. We hopped in that queue, and enjoyed the ride. It gives some good views of the back side of the castle. Next up, Toy Story Land. We had seen Toy Story Land in Paris last year, and were content with making this a quick rather than extensive visit. We jumped on Woody's Roundup with a 10 minute wait, since that is not something they have in Paris.





And then we took a break at the Toy Box Cafe, and had some alien pizzas to eat. Again, not something they had in Paris.





We were starting to feel a bit of urgency to fit in our last few attractions. We did the Hunny Pot Spin with another 10 minute wait.





And wandered through the Alice in Wonderland maze.





And at 6:30 pm we headed over to the Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh to use our last Fastpass of the day.

We did a bit of pin trading (something we found to be not as widespread here as it has been on trips to other parks - but admittedly, our day was pretty packed with fitting in attractions). We checked on the wait time for Tron, which was posted at 75 minutes. Instead, we did the Buzz Lightyear Planet Rescue on standby with a 20 minute wait.

People were settling in for the castle projection and fireworks show, Ignite the Dream, and we made the call to skip it since we had seen Disney Illuminations in Paris and it's essentially the same show. The wait time for Tron dropped to 40 minutes. Chad and Liam got into the queue; Mallory did not want to ride it, so I stayed with her and we took some photos of Tron all lit up at night while we waited for the boys. By the time they were off the ride, the fireworks had just begun, and we were watching the side view from Tomorrowland. Liam enjoyed Tron so much that he wanted to ride it again, and the posted wait time had dropped to 20 minutes. This time I went with him, and Mallory and Chad stayed behind. To our great surprise it was a complete walk-on. The benefit of skipping the fireworks, I suppose! As we exited the ride, there were masses of people running to join the queue - a sure sign that the fireworks had just ended.









Chad and Mallory had done Buzz Lightyear two more times while Liam and I rode Tron. We had less than an hour to go until park close, and decided to try riding 7 Dwarfs Mine Train one more time. The wait time was posted as 50 minutes when we joined the queue, and we made it through in less than 30 minutes. Good thing too, because the queue was rather stinky. I thought it was BO, and Chad thought it was urine. Either way, it was kind of gross.

With our last ride done, we did some shopping on Mickey Avenue as we made our way out of the park. The kids each picked up a pin to add to their collections. We took the shuttle back to the hotel since we were pretty tired from walking all day. The Sunnyside Market was still open when we got there, and we picked up some snacks to take back to our room to enjoy. I got the Shellie May panna cotta, which was pretty cute. It was strawberry favoured. I thought the Gelatoni panna cotta was even cuter, but I didn't want matcha flavour.





Liam had to try the cucumber chips - cucumbers are his favourite.

And that was the end of our day at Shanghai Disneyland. A few more observations before I wrap this up:

Things we didn't get to do that we wanted to - very few. We didn't do the castle storybook walk through, and we didn't get to see Mickey Avenue during daylight hours.  The other things we didn't do were things we chose to skip based on past experience. We knew we would only see one stage show, and prioritized the Tarzan show over the Jack Sparrow show.

With a bit more time, we could have done the Pirate Cove playground area, the Jet Packs (similar to Astro Orbitor) or spent more time wandering taking photos (something only I would enjoy).





We only saw one character meet and greet all day. We don't usually seek these out, but would probably have jumped in line if we'd seen Mickey and Minnie in their traditional Chinese garb. I suppose we still have a chance to do this once we get to Hong Kong.

Further observations from our day:

People smoke everywhere.

People run everywhere. There are signs and announcements instructing guests not to, but no enforcement.





We could count the number of Westerners we saw all day on one hand. This truly is a Chinese park.

I'm surprised there is so much English spoken and signage in English given the very small non-Chinese attendance. Many cast members do not speak English per se, but they do know the few key words they need to know to assist an English-speaking visitor. ("Fastpass", "how long", "how much" etc.)





The lack of a queuing mentality is surprising. Even when you know to expect it, it's something else to actually experience it. We'll need to work on doing as the Chinese do if we want to keep up during our time in China.

The use of umbrellas drove me crazy. Many, many people used umbrellas to shield themselves from the sun, which isn't a problem when everyone gets enough personal space. But in China, you don't have that. We would be packed into an attraction queue like sardines, and people would have their umbrellas up, and not only did we keep getting poked in the face by them, but it also made it difficult to move or to see.





(If I thought the umbrellas were bad on a sunny day, they got exponentially worse during the rainy periods we experienced on our trip. It became a running joke on our trip that Mom thought that the Chinese were insufferable with their umbrellas.)

The kids were asked to pose for photos a few times, and I was asked once. It was kind of fun, and didn't happen enough to be annoying.

Overall we felt very welcome, and had a great time.


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## Simba001

CaptainCook said:


> Health check is simply a walk-through if you don't have any illnesses to declare (there are laws for example about disclosing HIV positive status) and if you aren't coming in from a yellow fever area where you would need to provide proof of vaccination.
> 
> It may be relevant to you to know about our entry experience into Hong Kong though, if you will be traveling there. We took a private transfer vehicle across the border into Hong Kong from the border city of Shenzhen. Our driver rolled down the window and spoke to the border agents and handed over our passports. There was a health check agent there at a separate window, and she opened the door into the vehicle and waved what I assume was an infrared thermometer around inside, looking for signs of infection. Thankfully we passed.
> 
> Mr. Orange provided excellent service to us throughout China. Great drivers, nice vehicles, and easy to step off a plane or train and locate someone waving a sign with a smiling orange and your name on it!


Thank you


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## Disney127

Enjoy reading your trip report, love the photos.  We leave for Shanghai DL (hitting all 3 Disney parks in Asia) in 2 weeks and I am trying to prepare myself for the heat and people.  We can usually handle the heat and humidity when we visit Asia but I am kind of worried about the crowd culture.  The one and only time we visited China, I had to stand my ground when people started pushing and shoving my young daughters around.

Looking forward to the rest of your trip report


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## KJTex

Thanks for the information.   I have a couple of questions if you do not mind: Did you have any issue using the app inside the park?  I know you mentioned that wifi in front of the castle was bad -but eventually you got on right?  I have read reports where you need a China phone number to get onto the app and book fastpasses???  Also, will the Disney photopass photograpers take your picture if you give them your own camera to use?  For Tron, did you use the lockers to store your bags?


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## CaptainCook

KJTex said:


> Thanks for the information.   I have a couple of questions if you do not mind: Did you have any issue using the app inside the park?  I know you mentioned that wifi in front of the castle was bad -but eventually you got on right?  I have read reports where you need a China phone number to get onto the app and book fastpasses???  Also, will the Disney photopass photograpers take your picture if you give them your own camera to use?  For Tron, did you use the lockers to store your bags?



We set the app up before we left home. It sends you a text to confirm your registration. We were able to access and respond to that text from home while we still had cell service to do so. After we purchased our park tickets at the hotel, they automatically showed up in our account on the app as well. So we didn’t have any trouble with the app aside from the wifi availability. Typically it did not work inside any attraction, or in certain outdoor areas in the park. We did get on after we got out of the dead zone in front of the castle.

We didn’t make use of any photo pass photographers, so I can’t answer that question. I recall seeing them at least once, but I don’t recall seeing them as often as we do in the US parks. But, we didn’t come up Disney Avenue when we entered the park in the morning (where they are usually most noticeable at home), because the Disneytown entrance brings you in the side of the park. Maybe they were around and I just didn’t notice them.

We were on Tron at the end of the day when it wasn’t busy, and the CMs were directing us away from the lockers and directly into the attraction queue. They had us put our bags in something like a shopping cart as we boarded the ride, and they wheeled it out to meet us as we disembarked. It did occur to me as I dropped my bag in that this was the first day of my trip and it would suck really bad if all my camera gear disappeared on the first day! But of course it was fine. I will admit that I am not a particularly risk averse person when it comes to Disney security, though. I’ve also left my camera bag unattended at Blizzard Beach and on Castaway Cay without too much concern.


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## BecBennett

I'm enjoying reading along. Looks like we're heading to a seminar in October not far from Shanghai, so I'm hoping to hit up both Shanghai and Hong Kong while we're over there. So I really don't have much time to plan


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## CaptainCook

*Tuesday July 10 - Shanghai*

We slept in until 8 am, which felt luxurious after a couple of long days. After getting ready and packing up, we had breakfast at the Sunnyside Market again. One of the other tables was occupied. This morning's breakfast consisted of muffins for the kids, a pork moon cake for me, and an egg tart and sausage roll for Chad.

We were due to meet our Mr. Orange driver in the hotel lobby, and he was there a few minutes before 10 am. He did not speak English, but we communicated pretty well using a translation app on his phone that all of our Mr. Orange drivers used. He would speak into his phone and the words would pop up in English on the screen. Not grammatically correct, but clear enough that we could discern the meaning.

We loaded our bags into his minivan, and set out for downtown Shanghai. There was some traffic, and the trip took nearly an hour. The first stop we had requested was The Bund, and the
driver dropped us off at the Peninsula Hotel since he could not stop right on the road. As we pulled into the hotel driveway, we were met by an employee asking if we needed assistance with checkin. We told him no, we were only being dropped off to do some sightseeing. That did not deter him in the least, and he went on to interpret with our driver regarding our pickup location, allow us into the hotel to use the bathroom, and then offered us cold water before we set out for our walk. Lovely service for people who weren't even hotel guests!

We were literally steps from The Bund, so we crossed the street and climbed up the steps to get a good view across the river into Pudong.





We took many photos of the iconic skyline, and then walked the length of The Bund. The kids were approached here again for a photo and obliged.





We then took a detour inland to find Old Shanghai and Yu Garden. It took a couple of tries, but eventually we found our way.

Old Shanghai was chaotic and crowded with tourists and a bit overwhelming. We made our way across the zigzag bridge amidst throngs of people, and passed the famous steamed bun restaurant (we'd hoped to eat there, but knew it would be closed for renovations).





Instead, we picked up soup dumplings and drinks at a nearby takeout window...





...and took them to the entrance to Yu Garden where we purchased tickets and went inside looking for someplace shady and cool to eat. The dumplings were ok, but not great. We then toured the garden with the rest of our available time, and poked our heads into a couple of souvenir stalls back in the bazaar area before our driver met us in Old Shanghai at 2 pm.





I was a bit surprised by Yu Garden. It had less garden, and more buildings and hardscape, than I expected. It was still lovely, just not quite what I expected.

Right before we got picked up, I noticed Chad's backpack was hanging half open, and we figured out that we had been the target of an attempted pickpocketing. Luckily nothing went missing. This part of town is packed with people and has a high concentration of tourists, so I'm sure it's a haven for this sort of thing - beware and be aware.

From Yu Garden, we were driven to our last destination of the day, Tianzifang. This is a maze of alleyways in the French Concession that have been converted into shops and art galleries and restaurants.





It was touristy but beautiful, and still populated by way more Chinese than foreigners. Our first stop here was at Tono's Palace, a cat cafe we had found online. Mallory is a major cat lover, so this was a real treat for her.





The majority of the cats hang out on the first floor, so we waited until we could get a table there. The cats were mostly friendly and quite lazy. They all wear sports jerseys, and the one we spent the most time with was also wearing a pearl necklace.





The cleanliness of the cafe left a bit to be desired, as it probably does for most cat cafes. It was also expensive, as cat cafes are, because you're paying to support the cats, as well as for the food. We split one plate of waffles that came with fruit and ice cream, and each of us had a fresh fruit juice or smoothie, and our bill was about 280 yuan or close to $60 CDN.





We had an hour or so left to do some shopping. There are lots of interesting little shops to browse and the prices, while likely higher than elsewhere in China, were still very reasonable by the standard set at home.





I wanted a ceramic birdhouse and a large beautifully painted flask, but questioned how I would carry both of those around China for another two weeks, and so I left them both behind.





Interestingly, Tianzifang was the place where I saw someone (a child) peeing in the street for the first time.

Our driver met us again promptly at 4:30 pm, and we set off for the Shanghai Main Railway station. It took about 40 minutes with traffic. Once there, he escorted us to the ticket window to help collect our tickets. However, he was more confused about the process than we were. DIYChina, our train ticket travel agent, had given us excellent instructions (including links to a few YouTube videos to watch) that spelled the process out. First our driver tried pointing us to a self service kiosk, not knowing that foreigners can't use them and must go to a ticket window. Then he led us to the ticket window around the back of the station, rather than the one that was closer. But eventually we got there, and had our tickets printed - not just for our trip to Beijing, but for all four legs of our rail journey. This is supposed to cost 5 yuan per ticket for the trips not originating from the station where you have them printed, but they did not charge us the extra fee.

With tickets in hand, going through security to get into the station was very quick and easy, and we also quickly found our waiting room. We then had more than an hour to kill in a hot and stuffy standing room only environment (there are seats, but not nearly enough for the number of passengers being processed). We killed the time buying snacks to eat on the train, and using the bathroom, since we figured it would be a better, cleaner bathroom than the one on the train. The bathroom had one western toilet compared to about 19 squat toilets, no toilet tissue, and no soap to wash up. We were definitely outside of the Disney bubble now.

Our train boarding began 20 minutes before departure. You can tell when you're boarding because your train number on the electronic board turns green - and also because there's a noticeable stampede toward the platform.

Our compartment on the D class sleeper train was nice and new, small but comfortable, and with 4 berths in each compartment, we had one all to ourselves.





The bathroom situation on the train was decent, with one western toilet per car, toilet paper included. We each had storage space and an electrical outlet in our berth. We ate our snacks, played several rounds of Heads Up, and did a bit of web browsing and reading before bed.





The trip to Beijing would take about 11 hours.

(We rented a mifi unit from 3G Solutions for our trip. It came with 10GB of data and a VPN for about $78 US for the 12 days of our trip on mainland China. It was occasionally spotty, but overall it worked well. We used hotel wifi when it was available to cut down on our mifi usage. At the end of our trip, we'd used just over 5 GB.)

Next up: Beijing!


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## BecBennett

Do they feed you on the train?


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## CaptainCook

BecBennett said:


> Do they feed you on the train?


No, they don’t. There is a dining car on the overnight train with food you can purchase, and there’s a snack cart that makes the rounds on the shorter haul trains. The trains have hot water spouts on them - cup o’ noodles is very popular train fare. You can buy the noodles in the train stations, too.


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## CaptainCook

*Wednesday July 11 - Beijing *

I didn't sleep well on the train last night, and I am not sure why. It was quiet enough and comfortable enough. But I felt like I drank a big caffeinated drink before bed, and I was still wide awake at 2 am.

We were all up for the day at 6 am. Everyone washed up as best they could on a train (there is a large sink area where everyone brushed teeth, combed hair etc. before disembarking). We packed up and got off the train on schedule at 7:07 am. We were due to meet a new Mr. Orange driver in Beijing, but nobody was there to meet us when we came into the arrival hall. We started to head out the west exit to look for him before having a change of heart and going back to the arrival hall again - and this time he was there waiting. We must have just missed him. After this false start, we quickly learned that our drivers would meet us inside inside the train stations, not outside.

It was 7:30 am by the time we pulled away from the train station, and those precious minutes counted, because now we were in the thick of morning rush hour traffic. It took about two hours to get out of the city from the Beijing South railway station to the Mutianyu section of the Great Wall, and unfortunately, it rained the whole time, and only rained harder as time went on. When we got there, we were disappointed but not surprised to learn that the toboggan down from the wall was closed due to the rain. Womp womp - riding the toboggan was half the reason we had chosen to visit this section of wall. We purchased round-trip cable car tickets instead.





One benefit of the rain was that it likely kept the crowd levels low. We were able to catch a shuttle bus pretty quickly to the start of the cable car. We waited in line for a cable car for perhaps 15 minutes before getting one.





It's a quick 4 minute ride to the top, and then you walk a bit further to the start of the wall, and access the wall itself via a ladder-like set of steps.





Unfortunately, visibility at the top of the wall was close to zero. It continued to pour rain, and there was thick fog to boot. We turned left from the wall entry point and started to walk. The crowds thinned out pretty quickly, and eventually we got to sections of the wall that had few other people. But we still couldn't see much, and it was raining so hard that I wasn't even comfortable taking out my camera unless we were in the shelter of a watch tower. We tried very hard to enjoy ourselves and wait the rain out for a couple of hours, but overall it was a pretty disappointing experience, and around noon we threw in the towel and came back down.









We stopped at a Subway at the base of the cable car to buy sandwiches for lunch, and then because there was no seating available there, we took the bus back to the visitor centre to find a place to sit and eat them. Mallory in the meantime picked up a souvenir magnet from one of the hawkers along the way.

Our driver was waiting where we had left him, so we started the trip back into Beijing. Traffic was better in this direction, so it didn't take long to get to our neighbourhood. We we staying at the Hotel Palace in the hutong district, and it did take a while due to various street closures to get to the hotel.





Our driver attempted to drop us right at the door, and manoeuvred his minivan into the narrow alley where the hotel is located, only to encounter a car approaching from the other direction. We wound up reversing back out, which was an amazing feat of driving! Finally we got to the hotel and checked in.





I loved the hotel's location and the chance to see inside of an old hutong. The central courtyard area, now roofed in and serving as the hotel's common room, was beautiful. Our room was traditionally styled and was a bit rough around the edges (think of loose bathroom tiles being duct taped back into place), but it was clean and comfortable. We could see the Forbidden City nearby from the rooftop terrace.

By now it was about 3 pm, and we had tickets to the Chaoyang Acrobat show at 5:30 pm. We inquired with the hotel staff member who spoke English as to how to get to the theatre. First he said they would call us a taxi for 4:15 pm, but at 4:15 pm when we asked for it, he said that it would be too difficult to get one due to the rainy day and rush hour combination, and that we should take the subway. This was a bit disconcerting, since we now felt like we were at risk of being late for the show. But as soon as we left the hutong and hit the main street in our neighbourhood, we were able to flag down a taxi on the street quite easily. His price of 100 yuan was definitely inflated, but it was still raining and now it was starting to feel like we were running late, so we sucked it up.

We arrived at the theatre right at 5 pm when the box office opened. We had purchased the cheapest class of tickets available, but individual seats are not assigned until you pick them up from the box office. We wound up getting second row seats with nobody in the first row. (I'm not sure what made these 'cheap seats' unless it was the fact that we had to crane our necks back to watch the one performer who balanced on top of a stack of chairs. The seats were excellent though, and I would buy them again.)





We purchased popcorn and a drink to enjoy with the show, and entered the theatre.





There was a no photography rule, but the number of people with iPads and selfie sticks was nuts, so I didn't feel bad taking some photos of my own. I would certainly recommend no flash though. All of the performers were amazing, and I would highly recommend the show. The girls on the bikes were awesome.





The show lasted about an hour, and when we came back outside again, it was (of course) raining heavily. We spent about half an hour in the rain trying to hail a taxi, to no avail. During that time about 30 taxis passed us, some with passengers and some without, but none would take us, and we couldn't figure out why. Finally, we decided to try to decipher the subway system, and in hindsight we should have done that from the get go. It was $2.40 for the 4 of us, quick and easy. The first train we got on was unbelievably crowded, but people just kept getting on - I suppose the motto in China is that there is always room for one more!





We took the subway to Wangfujing, and went in search of the famous weird and wonderful snack street, stopping off at McDonald's first to get Mallory something familiar to eat and use the bathroom. (As of this point in the trip - still no need to use a squat toilet yet.) We wanted so much to enjoy the snack street, but the rain was coming down hard, and navigating around crowds of people all carrying umbrellas was making me claustrophobic.





We picked a few things to try for our dinner - a shrimp and quail egg combo for the boys, some fried dumplings for me - but it was wearing on us and finally we decided to call it quits and head out.





But Liam looked disappointed, and asked if we could try one last thing. He really wanted to try eating a scorpion while we had the chance.





So we bought one skewer with 3 scorpions on it, and each had one (Mallory passed), likening them very much in taste and texture to the tip of a chicken wing.









We washed those down with a fruit skewer full of grapes, and then walked back to our hotel, happy that we'd stuck around long enough to try something exotic.

Arriving back at the hotel, we filled out cards indicating what time we'd like to have breakfast and what we'd like to eat (Chinese or Western option). Back in our room, we did some reading and went to sleep.


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## CaptainCook

*Thursday, July 12 - Beijing *

We slept well at the hotel. We had a room right off the main dining room and lounge area, and had expected it to be noisy. Instead, we woke up wondering if we were the only guests in the hotel, a question that was reinforced when we were the only ones to show up for the 7:30 am breakfast seating. The meal was actually served closer to 8, and we had two Western breakfasts, one meat dumplings and one vegetable dumplings between the 4 of us, and shared them all. I only had the dumplings, and they were delicious.

We packed up our bags and left them with the hotel while we went out for the day. Thankfully, it was overcast (or perhaps just smoggy) and dry outside. We began by taking the subway to Tiantandongmen, and purchased tickets to enter the Temple of Heaven park. There are two price points for tickets here, and you need the more expensive ticket to access some of the sites, including the Hall of Prayer for Good Harvests.

We started off by going to the area in the park where Beijingers congregate to exercise.





We thought we might be on the late side for this, arriving around 9:30 am,  but there were plenty of people there. We started out by watching a group of men playing something like hackey sack with an oversized shuttlecock, and it took no time at all for them to invite us to join them.





That went on for quite a while and was good fun. Eventually they did of course try to sell us a shuttlecock of our own, and for 10 yuan/$2 CDN we did buy it.





(This guy insisted I take his picture with Liam!)

From there, we moved on to a guy who invited us to play something like badminton, but with paddles instead of racquets. He was impressed by Liam's skill (he plays on the school badminton team) and kept saying "Wonderful! Wonderful!" We also bought a badminton set from him for 30 yuan/$6 CDN.

All around us, there was exercise equipment, and people doing chin ups and pull ups and swinging around on monkey bars and stretching. Most of them were elderly, and they looked like a very fit bunch. They were playing traditional music on portable radios, a group of women were chanting and playing a clapping game, a couple were doing tai chi, and overall it looked like a very fun and relaxing way to spend their day.





We moved on through the park, through the Long Corridor, which was beautiful, and on to the Hall of Prayer for Good Harvests. This was pretty spectacular to see in person, and definitely checked an item off the bucket list. We exited from a different direction than where we came in from, and wandered through a bit more of the park and the gift shop before deciding to head out.





We took the subway back to our home station, Tiananmen East, and headed to the Forbidden City. It was around noon when we arrived. The kiosk for foreigners to buy tickets is surprisingly far inside the complex; we were sure we'd missed it. Finally we purchased our tickets, and headed into the 'real' Forbidden City.





(The kids getting asked to pose for pictures again!)

It too was pretty spectacular, though we were content to wander through the complex without going into all of the buildings themselves. It wasn't unbearably crowded, but it certainly was busy.





We came out the north end of the Forbidden City, and crossed the road to enter Jingshan Park. This only cost 2 yuan/40 cents per person to climb up the hill to the pavilion at the top that offers a spectacular view out over the golden rooftops of the Forbidden City and reminds you of how large the complex really is. The climb looks imposing, but is not too bad. It took us around 15 minutes, and the staircase goes through a cool and shaded  bamboo forest.





Done now with the Forbidden City, we headed back to our hotel, which was only a short walk away. We took a brief break there before heading across the street to Siji Minfu, also known as "Mass Foodie's Roast Duck" on the big red neon sign.





We had scoped this out as one of the city's popular spots for an excellent Peking duck dinner; outside the restaurant they have posted a number of awards that they have won. We arrived after 2 pm, hoping that a mid-afternoon meal would mean good seating availability, and were shocked to be told there was a 2 hour wait. We put our names in, but were a bit dejected as we headed back across the street to the hotel. We had Mr. Orange picking us up at 5 pm to head to the train station, and we were not at all sure that we'd have time to eat before leaving.

Back at the hotel, Chad used a translation app to let a member of the hotel staff know about our conundrum, and asked for a recommendation for another nearby Peking duck restaurant. The staff member did not speak English, but seemed to indicate that he could help us, and indicated to follow him. We went back across the street to the restaurant, past the hordes of people waiting out front, through the dining room, up the stairs to another dining room, and directly to a table! He spoke a few words to a waitress and left us to enjoy our meal.





We ordered a full duck and (after much confusion) the condiments and pancakes to accompany it; it wasn't clear to us whether these would be included or not. We also ordered some drinks and a bowl of plain rice for Mallory, who is a picky eater. The waitress brought out a huge bowl of grapes on ice as a starter. We were not expecting that, but they were nice, especially since we hadn't ordered any sides with our meal, not knowing exactly how much food it would entail. After the grapes, the duck came out, and was presented to us at the table before it was taken to a nearby counter for carving.





(Initially I felt a bit silly about wanting to watch the carving, but other tables filled with locals were doing the same.) It came back to our table in a beautiful presentation with the condiments and pancakes on the side (good thing we had ordered these).





The duck was delicious, and even Mallory had some and liked it. This meal was a fabulous experience and well worth the cost at 300 yuan/$60 CDN  including our drinks.





By now it was about 4:30 pm, and it was time to go back to the hotel to collect our bags and catch our ride to the train station for our 6:50 pm train. Our driver came a few minutes early and we set off for the Beijing West train station. Because we had already printed all of our tickets, it was quick and easy to enter the station through security, and locate our waiting room on the second floor. We picked up a few snacks for the trip from the shops in the train station, and boarded the train. This was a T class train, and not nearly as nice as the first overnight train we rode. We still had soft sleeper tickets, but the train was much older. There were no electrical outlets at each berth, just one out in the hall for the whole car to share. There was a lot of noise from the train itself, and a whole lot of smoking happening, despite the no smoking signs. I also witnessed an argument that stopped just short of a brawl between a passenger and an attendant who was managing the snack cart. It looked like it might be a long night.


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## BecBennett

I love pekin duck was it enough for a proper meal?


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## BLTtinkerbell

Welcome back! I am following along and looking forward to reading more.....

I will be flying from Toronto to Hong Kong on Air Canada (15 hours). I am happy to hear your flight was better than expected.  Did you have Economy seats or upgraded?


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## CaptainCook

BecBennett said:


> I love pekin duck was it enough for a proper meal?



It was enough for us, though my daughter is a pretty light eater. If you had 4 adults I would probably order a side dish or two to round it out.


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## CaptainCook

BLTtinkerbell said:


> Welcome back! I am following along and looking forward to reading more.....
> 
> I will be flying from Toronto to Hong Kong on Air Canada (15 hours). I am happy to hear your flight was better than expected.  Did you have Economy seats or upgraded?



Plain old economy seats. We're cheap that way! It was still a relief to get off the plane, but it wasn't the nightmare I thought it would be.


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## CaptainCook

*Friday, July 13 - Xi'an*

We woke up on the sleeper train shortly before pulling into Xi'an. The other passengers had settled down nicely overnight, and it hadn't been as noisy as I'd feared. But by morning, the bathroom was in pretty bad shape, the smoke haze had reappeared, and we were ready to get off that train.

Our new Mr. Orange driver was waiting for us as we came out of the station. We loaded up our luggage, and set off for the Terra Cotta Warriors, about an hour's drive away. We got there just after 9 am and agreed to meet our driver again in a couple of hours. Then we purchased our entry tickets, declined numerous offers for guiding services, and followed the throngs of people already heading to the pits.





We decided to start with Pit 1, which is by far the most spectacular. We briefly debated going in reverse order and leaving Pit 1 for last, but thought that the crowds were only going to get worse, and that we should see the best of the best with the least amount of jockeying for position possible.





The warriors were pretty cool to see in person, but there were no surprises. If you've seen photos from this site then you pretty much know what to expect.





We went on to the next two pits - I'm not sure if we went in numerical order or not - which had way fewer full soldiers, and showed more of the excavation and restoration process.





The most interesting part to me was to see an area with workers in the pits with the warriors, painstakingly trying to piece them together and using little toothbrushes to clean off the shards.





It was much too dark in these areas to take any decent pictures, at least with my camera equipment.





Coming out of the last pit, we did debate going back to Pit 1 again. But with the crowds of people continuing to pour in, we decided we had accomplished what we wanted to do, and would be satisfied to leave. We had some time to kill before meeting our driver, so we had some ice cream and browsed in a few shops. There is a huge complex of shops and restaurants set up at the exit from the site.

With that, we headed back into Xi'an to our hotel, the Grand Park. Our rooms were ready for checkin when we arrived a little past noon. We got a great deal on two connecting rooms, with breakfast included. (Some places we stayed in China had family suites available and we rented those when we could, but some places maxed out at 3 people per room, likely a holdover from the old One Child Policy days. We rented two adjoining rooms when we couldn't fit 4 people into a single room.) The hotel is well appointed, and coming off a night in a sleeper train - it felt like heaven. It's got great views of the old city wall, and was within walking distance of the other places we wanted to see.

After we freshened up a bit, we headed out for lunch. Knowing we'd be eating dinner at the Muslim Street market, we catered to our picky eater by going to McDonald's for lunch. This was actually quite fun to see how different the menu items are from what's at home. I love a Filet o' Fish, and the ones in China are totally different (and not very good). The sweet taro pie, on the other hand, was a pleasant surprise.

I used the McDonald's bathroom after our meal and it was go time - they only had squat toilets, I sucked it up and used one, and lived to tell the tale!





After lunch, we went up on the city wall and rented bikes.





We then took a couple of hours to do a complete loop around the wall, which is 8 miles/14 km. We stopped at nearly every cafe on top to buy bottled water - the sun was coming out and it was pretty hot, maybe around 90F.





It was very uncrowded on top of the wall with the exception of the area right around the south gate where the tour buses park and people climb up for a look-see. Once you get away from the south gate, the crowds really thin out.





Finally we made it the whole way around. Hot and tired, we headed back to our hotel for a shower and a break. Around 7 pm, we headed out again. This time, our destination was Muslim Street. We planned to eat dinner there (though after our greasy fast food lunch, none of us were all that hungry), and in particular we were hoping to find a cotton candy vendor whose creations we had seen online before our trip.

Muslim Street as it turns out is not just one street, but a whole complex of side streets as well.





We walked over to Muslim Street and started there, but then we got sucked into the Muslim Mosque, which is not what I think of when I think of a mosque, but is actually more like a bazaar. (EDIT: trying to find more information about this after coming home, I don't see anything online referring to the bazaar as a mosque; perhaps the signage instead referred to the mosque being accessible through the bazaar? I'm not sure.)





Coming out of there, we wove up and down numerous side alleys in search of the elusive cotton candy. We saw lots of flatbreads for sale...





And we saw these everywhere. Oh, let's get one!, we said; a pineapple spear would be delicious right now. Ha ha. These are actually glutinous rice cake with date sauce. And they aren't very good, IMHO. We didn't finish it.





We eventually decided to throw in the towel on searching any further for the cotton candy, and were going to simply head back to our hotel via the main road, when we finally found it!





Mallory chose a design and they spun her a lovely creation, which she shared with the rest of us. Good thing, too; it was huge.





Happy that we'd accomplished our goal, and all growing very tired, we started to head back to our hotel. Chad and Liam had to make one last purchase when we passed "the tentacle stall". No idea what sort of tentacles these were, but they really liked them.








On the way back to our hotel, we encountered several bits of entertainment; the city really comes alive at night. First, there was a show featuring beautiful traditional costumes and music and lights happening between the the outer and inner city walls. We also saw a few groups of (mostly) ladies line dancing on the sidewalk closer to our hotel.





And finally, the Drum Tower and Bell Tower and city wall were all lit up beautifully too.





We could have chosen to stay out much later to enjoy these, but the desire to sleep won out, and we headed back to our room.


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## CaptainCook

*Saturday, July 14 - Chengdu*

Today was our trip midpoint, and something of a scheduled rest day. Our Mr. Orange transfer was scheduled to pick us up at the hotel at 8 am. We headed to the extensive hotel breakfast buffet at 7 am, and enjoyed some tastes of home while also having the option to try a few new things. We came down to the hotel lobby with our baggage shortly before 8 am to find our driver waiting for us. We loaded up and set out for the Xi'an North train station. This was a different station than the one we'd arrived on - much nicer and newer. It took perhaps 45 minutes to drive to the train station. 




(This photo was taken while driving to the train station - but we saw people driving like this everywhere. It made my stomach flip every time.)

Checkin was quick and easy, and in no time we found ourselves in a spacious waiting area that had enough seating for us - that was a first for a Chinese train station.





Our train boarded 20 minutes before departure. We had two pairs of comfortable seats in a second class compartment for our 4 hour trip. The seats had lots of legroom, and a power outlet to share between them. Across the aisle, seats were 3 across. I think the main difference between these tickets and first class tickets are that the first class compartment seating configuration is 2 and 2, I.e. 4 across rather than 5.

The ride was smooth and comfortable. The high speed rail line between Xi'an and Chengdu was completed just a few months ago. It was a scenic trip - well, half of it, anyway. The scenic half passes mountainous countryside that flattens out into terraced agricultural fields near the tracks - and the occasional smoke belching power plant that explains why the sun has been buried behind smog all week. 





The other half of the trip took us through dark tunnels bored into the mountains, and made our ears pop.

We disembarked in Chengdu, and found our next Mr. Orange driver waiting for us. We were on our way in the minivan less than 14 minutes after the train had arrived in the station. The drive to our hotel, the Chengdu Panda Garden Crowne Plaza, took about half an hour. It's outside of the city, just a couple of kilometres from the panda research centre. We were able to check into our rooms right away, and again had two adjoining rooms, though this time they did not connect. 

We went down to the pool area for a bit before dinner. Chengdu was quite warm, probably around 95F, and this was the first hotel we'd stayed at that had a pool. However, when we got down to the pool, we were surprised to learn that there is a mandate that all bathers wear a swim cap. I'm not sure if this is a cultural thing everywhere in China, or if it is specific to this hotel. We don't normally wear swim caps at home for leisure swimming, so this caught us by surprise. Luckily, we were able to rent a cap from the recreation desk for 20 yuan/$4 CDN and still go for a swim. 

For dinner, we elected to stay in at the hotel. They had an elaborate dinner buffet that contained a good mix of eastern and western dishes. After a week of nonstop travel and sightseeing, it was nice to have a quiet afternoon and evening, rest, and do some reading. On this trip I'm reading J. Maarten Troost's "Lost on Planet China" and I find myself laughing and nodding along with it.

After dinner, we spent some more time reading and relaxing in our rooms. Chad went off in search of an ATM to withdraw more cash; China is definitely a cash-based society, and credit cards are not widely accepted. I went down to a public patio a couple of minutes away from our hotel for a bit. There were lots of people dancing there, and kids on a rollerblade course. Watching them all made for some good entertainment.


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## CaptainCook

*Sunday July 15 - Chengdu*

Today was panda day! We had all been looking forward to it very much. The weather forecast was calling for possible rain late in the morning, and clearing skies in the afternoon.

We went down for breakfast right at 6:30 am when the buffet opened. Again, it was a lavish east-meets-west buffet, and we all got plenty to eat. The Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding, our destination for the day, opens at 7:30 am, and so we had requested a taxi for 7:15 am. Multiple staff members at the hotel tried to talk us out of this, because the hotel has a free shuttle that departs at 8:15 am. They acted like going any earlier than that would be unnecessary, but we took the taxi anyway. At 30 yuan/$6 CDN, it was overpriced for the distance travelled, but would turn out to be money well spent.





We got to the centre around 7:25 am and the taxi dropped us off right out front. We were immediately accosted by hawkers outside the park gates who were peddling all sorts of panda headbands, hats, stuffed animals, etc. Chad hopped into line to buy entrance tickets, and the rest of us hopped into the queue to get in, which had already started to build. Chad came over with our tickets right as we were approaching the turnstiles. In we went.

It was misty and damp, but not raining. By the time we got inside, there were already lines for the trams that will take you to the back of the park. We bypassed those and started walking.





There are lots of signs posted around the park telling you where to go. We didn't have much of a game plan, other than to see some pandas.

However, as we passed enclosure after enclosure, they were all empty. This was kind of befuddling, and we were beginning to wonder if perhaps the hotel staff were correct in telling us not to go so early. We did see a couple of pandas behind glass in one area, but they were sleeping and it wasn't a great sighting.





Eventually we happened upon a building and entered it, not knowing what was inside. We walked along a mostly empty hall that had a row of windows covered in curtains. We had just set off down the hall when an employee appeared on the other side of the glass as she drew back the curtains. Lo and behold, we were in the panda nursery!





Window after window opened, and we saw panda cubs of all ages, from the very smallest pink hairless ones, up to fuzzier babies, and finally some cubs that actually looked like pandas.





We were simply lucky to be in the right place at the right time to enjoy this experience with hardly anyone else around.





It was probably still before 8 am. We were able to walk back and forth from window to window and spend as long as we pleased at each one.





After we'd had our fill of panda babies, we went back outside to the panda enclosures, and now the bears were out.





And we were lucky to have some pretty awesome sightings.





Pandas in groups, pandas on their own, pandas climbing trees, and lots and lots of pandas stuffing their faces with bamboo.





It was still early, and the park was still peaceful and relatively empty. This was exactly what we had hoped for.











We toured around the enclosures to see all of the bears (the centre is home to 83 of them), and we went to the red panda enclosure, too.








We also stopped in at a couple of gift shops that are sprinkled throughout the park.

After a couple of hours, the crowds had grown to a level that was starting to make our visit decidedly less enjoyable. It was getting tough to navigate the narrow walkways around the enclosures due to the sheer number of people in the park, especially in the locations where the pandas were present. We passed by the nursery again, and I noted an impossibly long line of folks waiting to get in.





People were being fed through in a non-stop one-direction single-file line; no stopping to take a photo, or doubling back to see something again.

Also, most of the pandas had by now finished feeding, and had gone to lie down. Time to go back to sleep.

Shortly after 10 am, it started to rain. And not just any rain; buckets and buckets of rain that surpassed even what we experienced at the Great Wall. In no time at all, we were soaked right through, despite having rain jackets and umbrellas with us. It felt like every single patron in that park put up an umbrella, and if we thought it was tough manoeuvring before, it was now ten times worse.

We had planned to eat lunch in the park at the Bamboo Restaurant before leaving, but this felt like the universe was pointing us in a different direction. Our hotel was running a free shuttle back to the property at 11 am. We decided to jump on it, even though the rain was starting to let up. We had accomplished some great sightseeing in the first few hours of our visit, and anything more would be of considerably less quality. None of us felt like sitting through lunch in our wet clothes. They literally needed to be wrung out.





So we made our way to the front of the park, where guests were continuing to stream in through the gate.





Tour buses were still dropping them off in droves. We had five minutes to find our hotel shuttle in the midst of all the chaos, and we got lucky and found it. We jumped on and headed back to the hotel, where our first order of business was changing our clothes and hanging our things up to dry.

We had a 2 pm late checkout time, so we went down to the hotel restaurant for lunch and ordered off the menu. Pork and prawn wonton noodles for me, a spicy Sichuan bowl for Chad, a club sandwich for Liam and plain noodles for Mallory.





The food was great. Over our lunch hour, Chad tried contacting Mr. Orange via WeChat to see if we could be picked up earlier than our scheduled 2:30 pm meeting time.

The day before, we had received an email from Air China notifying us that our flight time was changed and would now be departing 90 minutes earlier. We had planned to spend a few hours wandering on Jinli Street in Chengdu before heading to the airport.

Unfortunately, not only did we not hear back from the Mr. Orange office to confirm an earlier pickup time, but our driver was actually 20 minutes late based on the original pickup time, having been slowed down due to a major accident on his route. He called ahead to let the hotel staff know so they could notify us. This was one of those grin and bear it moments, and the only time Mr. Orange let us down. 

Finally we were picked up and driven to Jinli Street. Based on our flight departure time, we had about 75 minutes to wander.(Jinli Street turned out to be our favourite of all the markets we visited in China, and would have been worth more time if we could have squeezed it in.)





So it was a rushed visit, but in that time we sought out one of the local candy makers who makes animal-shaped lollipops right in front of you, and bought some;





...we sampled the sticky pineapple rice we had heard about;





...we tried a cute panda-themed dim sum; and we browsed in several shops.





We would have liked to watch a short face-changing show, but simply didn't have time for that. Our driver met us back at the appointed place and time, and we were off to the airport.

Checkin at the airport was pretty quick and easy. We shopped in a few stores, and grabbed dinner inside the airport.

Despite all the negative reviews we'd heard about Air China (not to mention our own scheduling difficulties - they canceled our original flight about two weeks before our trip started, which necessitated some scheduling changes on our end with regards to hotels and transfers) - our flight boarded and left on time, and was smooth as can be. We landed in Guilin, collected our luggage and met the driver who was waiting for us. This was a driver arranged by our hotel in Guilin, and not through Mr. Orange.

I was not at all impressed by this driver, which made me realize how good we'd had it with Mr. Orange. This driver's van was full of garbage, and he drove recklessly, weaving in and out of traffic excessively (even by Chinese standards) and traveling much faster than the other vehicles on the road. I tried not to think about the fact that China has the highest per capita traffic fatality rate in the world as we sped through the city.

Finally we arrived at our hotel, the Secret Courtyard. It's a cute boutique hotel, and I think it promises some stunning views, which we'll have to wait until tomorrow to see.

For now I am off to bed. I have had a very sore throat building all day today. I don't feel like I am otherwise sick, and am wondering if China's air quality (or lack thereof) is starting to affect me. Hoping that the fresh air of rural China over the next few days helps to clear it up quickly.


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## BLTtinkerbell

CaptainCook said:


> Plain old economy seats. We're cheap that way! It was still a relief to get off the plane, but it wasn't the nightmare I thought it would be.



We also booked economy seats. Too many other things to spend money on. I am happy to hear it was do able. It is one part of our upcoming trip we have been concerned about. We have been taking advice from others and purchased compression socks & leg sleeves (I think I like the sleeves better), downloaded a few tv series, we have travel pillows, know we have to get up & walk around & stretch, drink plenty of water..... 

Please let me know if think of anything else.


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## CaptainCook

*Monday, July 16 - Longsheng Rice Terraces*

Today was a planned late start. We had a driver picking us up from the Secret Courtyard at 10 am, so we had some leisurely time to get up, have breakfast, and stroll around the village where the hotel was located. It did indeed boast some pretty views of the karst mountains. This was the first time we'd seen the sun in a week - it's amazing what getting out from under the smog of the Chinese supercities can do to improve your outlook on life! 

Breakfast at the hotel was a much more modest buffet than what we've had for the past few days, but certainly adequate. Our driver met us on time, and we set off for the Longsheng Rice Terraces.

The first hour or so of this trip was on highways. The mountainous scenery was attractive. We passed the ticketing gate for the terraces about 75 minutes into the trip. Our driver purchased our tickets for us. "Oh, we've arrived," we thought. Nope. The journey to the base of the cable car took us another hour on a road that grew increasingly smaller and increasingly more windy, yet was now clogged with tour buses. And our driver was insane. He passed every other vehicle on the road, passed on blind mountain corners, passed with oncoming vehicles present - he did it all.

In hindsight, I should have given the kids some Gravol before the trip. By the time we arrived, they were definitely green around the gills. But we made it in one piece, and that's what mattered.





We decided to grab something to eat before heading up to the rice terraces. There were several places to eat and buy souvenirs.





We found a table at one of the local restaurants, and ordered the local specialty, bamboo rice, as well as some plain rice and fried cucumbers (which turned out to be a stir fry) and drinks.





It came to 71 yuan/$15 CDN and it was all tasty. Stomachs full, we headed over to the cable car. Of course, there is never not a wait in China - so we queued up for about 45 minutes to get a car.

Finally on our way, we rode the cable car to the top of the terraces.









It was busy at the top, but definitely not as busy as some of the attractions we'd recently visited.





There is an extended viewing area at the top of the terraces that gives you several excellent vantage points, but the real fun is hiking down into the terraces themselves and seeing them up close, include the irrigation systems that have been put in place to service them.









It's pretty impressive how these mountain villagers have made the treacherous terrain work for them. In addition to the rice terraces, here and there we would see terraces growing corn and other crops as well.





Back up on the main viewing platform, we bought some ice cream before taking a return cable car down the mountain (thankfully with a shorter line this time). There are lots of places to buy food and drink and souvenirs at the top of the terraces. You can even rent a traditional costume and dress up to take a photo of yourself.

Back at the bottom of the hill, we met up again with our driver, who was sleeping in the restaurant where we had eaten lunch. The restaurant staff came out and spoke to us, telling us we had been undercharged for lunch. We knew this wasn't true, because we had ordered items from an English menu with prices listed alongside. We think that our driver had lunch after we left, and told the restaurant that we would cover his bill. That was definitely not part of our arrangement, and didn't improve our opinion of him. We did not pay any more.

Before driving back, I did give Liam some Gravol at his request. The road did not seem quite so bad going back down, or maybe I was just desensitized to it. We knew it would be a longer drive going back, because we were going all the way to Yangshuo; however we did not expect it to take more than 3 hours like it did. To make matters worse, our driver stopped for a smoke break when we were 20 minutes away from the hotel. His agency will definitely not get a favourable review from us.

As we got closer to our destination, we were amazed by the karst mountains that started to crop up in the landscape. They are surreal. It was twilight, and almost too dark to see them by the time we pulled into Yangshuo Mountain Retreat. This is our home for the next 3 nights, and it is gorgeous. We know we'll love it by the light of day.





We were exhausted from our hiking and the drive, and we went down to the on site restaurant for a quick bite to eat. The menu is pretty extensive and features lots of western dishes as well as local dishes. Prices are higher than some places we have eaten, but inexpensive compared to home, with meals in the $5-10 range. I had a plate of spring rolls and a coconut juice for a total of $8 and both were delicious. Chad had the Longzhou style fried rice, which he said was good, but the heat blew his head off.

We retired early. More adventures to come tomorrow.


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## CaptainCook

BLTtinkerbell said:


> We also booked economy seats. Too many other things to spend money on. I am happy to hear it was do able. It is one part of our upcoming trip we have been concerned about. We have been taking advice from others and purchased compression socks & leg sleeves (I think I like the sleeves better), downloaded a few tv series, we have travel pillows, know we have to get up & walk around & stretch, drink plenty of water.....
> 
> Please let me know if think of anything else.



I think you've got it covered.

I was pretty conscious about getting up and walking around before we boarded, and then when the time came, I wasn't very diligent about it. The aisles were often blocked and it was just easier to stay seated. But I was diligent about doing ankle circles, calf raises etc. while in my seat. When we got off the plane I noticed that I had some 'cankles', i.e. fluid accumulation in my feet, that I'd never had before, not even when pregnant. But it went away pretty quickly.


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## Shock13

I'm curious...did people want to take pictures with your kids because of their red hair or did they take pictures with other 'westerners'? Btw, I love your pictures!


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## cschaaf

Great report so far. Can't wait to see your Guilin photos and comments.



Shock13 said:


> I'm curious...did people want to take pictures with your kids because of their red hair or did they take pictures with other 'westerners'? Btw, I love your pictures!


We did a Viking trip through China last year. Just about everyone in our group got stopped and asked for photos. There was one family with two guys well over 6' tall, they got stopped the most. At the Forbidden City, there was a line of young girls waiting to take pictures with them.


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## CaptainCook

Shock13 said:


> I'm curious...did people want to take pictures with your kids because of their red hair or did they take pictures with other 'westerners'? Btw, I love your pictures!





cschaaf said:


> We did a Viking trip through China last year. Just about everyone in our group got stopped and asked for photos. There was one family with two guys well over 6' tall, they got stopped the most. At the Forbidden City, there was a line of young girls waiting to take pictures with them.



I agree that it's Westerners in general who draw attention - even my husband and I were approached for pictures - but generally speaking, the more exotic you look to those asking, the more likely you will be asked! I do think the kids got asked a lot because of their red hair and freckles. I've heard that blondes and tall folks are also very popular.

What surprised me was that all of the attention we got was received in the big cities - Shanghai, Beijing, Chengdu. It was not as prevalent when we made our way to the countryside, and by the time we hit Hong Kong, which has a much more multicultural feel, it was gone altogether.


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## CaptainCook

Sorry, formatting trouble. Will try again.


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## CaptainCook

*Tuesday, July 17 - Yangshuo*

I woke up early this morning and got out of bed right away. I was keen to see outside and potentially catch the sunrise. Our room (which is actually a family suite containing a large main room with a king bed, a smaller room with bunks for the kids, and the bathroom) faces onto the river and the view was spectacular, though the sun was rising to our backs.





I read for a while, and eventually we woke the kids up. We were planning to take a bamboo rafting trip on the river, and wanted to beat the rush. Rafting opened at 8 am and the hotel staff had told us that the starting point was a ten minute walk upriver along a waterfront path.




[/url

We ate breakfast at a table down by the river, during which time we saw the first couple of rafts of the day go by. By the time we finished eating and walked upriver, it was probably 8:45 am. Rafts were starting to set off regularly, but it was not at all crowded yet.

We rented two rafts, and our guides led us down to the water where we boarded.

[url=https://flic.kr/p/29tUujo]
	


I had elected to bring my good camera along for the trip, taking the chance that our raft would not flip and that I (and it) would stay dry. Most rafters we saw throughout the day had their phones out, so this seemed to be a fairly safe bet.





The half hour we spent on the river was delightful and well worth the 100 yuan/$20 CDN per person. The mountains were gorgeous, the rafting was fun, and the whole thing was just so bucolic. We could see a few rafts ahead of us on the water, but at no time did it feel like we were part of a flotilla of rafters. We floated by the Yangshuo Mountain Retreat around the halfway mark and continued on. There are 3 or 4 small drops over a little dam that make for some good fun and a splash, but overall it is a very tame float trip.





After half an hour, we came to a bridge by the Big Banyan Tree. This was the take-out spot unless you paid more to continue further on downriver. The guide pulled us over to the opposite bank and we disembarked. Then he swung back to the original bank where the rafts were being loaded into trucks and driven back to the starting point.





Over the course of the day as the rafting got busier, we would see the rafts come down the river toward our resort in waves. We hypothesized that there would be lineups for the rafts and that as truckloads of rafts were returned to the starting  point, rafters would set of off together in groups.





After our rafting trip, we walked back to our hotel along the road. It was not yet 11 am, but the temperature was soaring. It hit 99F today, and was quite humid. Back in our room, we cooled off in the strong, icy air conditioning for a bit, before the boys donned swimsuits and walked a ways back upriver to drop into the river on inner tubes. I went with them to see them off, and then Mallory and I both watched them float into our resort area, where there is a dock they could use to get out.





When we were looking for places to stay in Yangshuo, the first few hotels we considered were not on the river. How lucky we were to eventually choose a hotel that was waterfront. Having access to the water added immensely to our enjoyment of the area.





The Li River is the larger, more popular river in the area, and the Yulong River where we were situated is a smaller tributary of it. However, the Yulong is reportedly much cleaner than the Li, something to keep in mind if you plan to swim.

We played some badminton using the resort net and the paddles and birdie we'd bought in the park in Beijing. Soon enough we were hungry, and headed into the restaurant around 12:30 pm for lunch. Unfortunately we got there right as a large tour bus was arriving to dine. This made the restaurant a bit crowded and noisy, and the hotel staff apologized and said our food would take longer to prepare. But it was still served much more quickly than I would have thought possible. We shared the fried noodles with vegetables and the fried rice with egg, and it was all amazing. Mallory ordered macaroni and cheese and couldn't finish it so we helped her, and that was fantastic, too. Unlike mac and cheese at home, but better. We rounded the meal out by sharing a fruit plate, and the kids had ice cream. We chatted a bit with one of the tour bus guests, who told us his group was Belgian (we'd been trying to guess).

We inquired with the hotel staff about seeing the cormorant fishing demonstration we'd heard of. It does not run every night of the week, but they called to find out for us and told us it would be running tonight, so we put our names in for spots. We'd be picked up by cab at the hotel at 7:40 pm to take us to the 8:00 pm show.

After lunch the heat of the day really hit, and we did our best to beat it. For a couple of hours, the kids goofed around in the river on inner tubes. Steady streams of rafters were passing by, and many of them were taking photos of the kids. Liam and Mallory thought this was funny, and did their best to entertain the rafters by balancing on the tubes, doing belly flops, etc. I sat at a table in the shade to watch them, and did a bit of reading. 





Around 3:30 pm, I set out on a bike ride. I wanted to see more of the countryside around the area. The resort has about 50 bikes in seemingly excellent repair for guest use. I headed back upriver on the walking path. There are multiple signs posted on the path telling cyclists and scooters to stay off, but the path was used mostly by cyclists and scooter riders anyway. There are some spots with a few steps up or down where I had to get off and carry the bike, but it wasn't too bad. I passed lots of farm fields, gardens, rice paddies, a couple of oxen chained out in a field, a pond filled with water lilies. All the sorts of things you'd expect to see in rural China. I also passed multiple spots on the river where folks were in the water cooling off.





I only planned to be gone for an hour (and it was too hot for more than that anyway) so I turned around when I came to the end of the pedestrian path. I am still curious about what more is out there to see.

Back at the hotel, Liam and I jumped in the river for another quick float around to cool off before having a shower and cleaning up for dinner. We were the first ones in the dining room when we went in around 6 pm. We ordered the pineapple chicken and local style fried rice that was made with ham and peanuts in it. Again, both were amazing. We really love the onsite restaurant here.








At 7:40 pm we caught our cab into town to see the cormorant fishing demo. As we were leaving, a hotel staff member saw my camera with me and asked if i am a photographer. I said yes (a hobbyist counts right?), and she said that there is another cormorant fishing show in XingPing that is popular with photographers that we might want to try another night. Hmmm. We didn't know there was more than one show, and we thought we were seeing 'the show' - the one where the fisherman is dressed traditionally and uses the birds and a lantern on an old bamboo raft to catch fish.





So leaving the hotel, we were not confident in the quality of the show we were about to see. We were dropped off by the taxi at an old boat ramp into the river in downtown Yangshuo, behind the main road. Several other families were also there to see the show. By now it was dark, and I wondered what, if anything, we would see. The show started without warning. It consisted of a fisherman, yes, on a bamboo raft, yes, with birds, yes, and they caught fish, yes. But no fancy costume on the fisherman, and he had a generator-powered floodlight rather than a quaint lantern.





 And as I said, we essentially watched from a parking lot - so much for a scenic riverside locale. But we did see the birds catch fish, and he did pose for pictures after the show. So for 50 yuan/$10 CDN per person, it was ok. I would call it more of a demonstration than a show (there was no narrative to accompany it), and I would still give the hotel staff feedback that it should be made clearer that there are multiple shows on offer.





We had asked our taxi driver to give us an hour after the show so we could check out the infamous West Street. This turned out to be about 55 minutes too long. West Street was crowded, noisy, tacky, and totally not our vibe. It was our least favourite of all the markets we visited in China.





We went to a KFC to have an egg tart and kill time in an air conditioned environment before our trip back out to the peaceful countryside. 

And with that, another day is done. It was a great day overall - this is the best hotel of the trip, and we have fallen in love with Yangshuo.[/url]


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## CaptainCook

*Wednesday, July 18 - Yangshuo*

We thought we'd start out early today, but needed some sleep. We went for breakfast around 8 am, again eating on the riverbank. It was a little more overcast than yesterday, and had a bit of a breeze, but promised to be just as hot (forecast high of 97F).



[

After breakfast, we jumped on some bikes and rode to Moon Hill. The ride was only about 20 minutes. The first part of the ride, on our hotel road, was the worst. It's supposedly closed to traffic from 7 am to 7 pm as part of the 'Yangshuo River Scenic Area', but we can't see evidence of that. There is a steady stream of vehicles on it all day. The main road was actually better for biking, because it has a wide shoulder for bike and scooter traffic.





Moon Hill Scenic Area costs 14 yuan/$2.75 CDN per person to enter. We locked up our bikes and bought some cold water from an elderly lady who approached us.





The hike up only took 20 minutes, but it was the sweatiest 20 minutes of our lives. Chad had to wring his shirt out. The trail consists of 880 steps to the top and is not for the faint of heart on a 97 degree day. But we made it! There are some nice views of the mountains from the top, but we didn't linger long before heading back down.





At the bottom we bought some more water from the other elderly lady who had been hounding us, to make it fair. Then we hopped back on our bikes, rode the 20 minutes back to the resort, and collapsed in our igloo of a room.





Luckily the Yangshuo Mountain Retreat has some strong air conditioning.

We popped into the restaurant for a quick bowl of ice cream that Chad had promised the kids in exchange for their labour. Then the boys jumped into the river to cool off for a bit, and Mallory and I both did some reading, before going back to the restaurant for lunch.

For lunch we split some spring rolls and chicken curry rice. Again - cheap, delicious, and no need to go off property to eat.

After lunch, the kids wanted to stay cool for a bit. I was itching to get out on a bike again, and Chad wanted to come with me. We left the kids with explicit instructions not to go in the water, and set out for a ride. (Mallory spent the whole time reading, and Liam on his iPad, in the room.)





Chad and I rode down the pedestrian path to the end and then onto some local roads. We were hoping to make it to Yulong bridge, but owing to a couple of wrong turns, we didn't quite make it before deciding to turn back so as not to keep the kids waiting too long. Unfortunately, that is right about the time I got a flat tire on my bike. At first I thought I was just getting tired because the bike felt like it was getting more and more difficult to move. In hindsight, I understood why! Chad chivalrously took the flat tire bike and let me ride the good one home.





We were back after 90 hot and sweaty minutes, totally parched despite drinking 4 bottles of liquids on our ride. Chad and Liam went out to the river with inner tubes. Mallory was still reading in the cool indoors, and I took my book out to the riverbank. We whiled away the last couple of hours before dinner in this fashion before showering and going down to the dining room.

Dinner was the shrimp specialty, egg fried rice, and a fried broccoli with garlic dish that was perhaps the best thing I'd eaten yet on this trip. We also shared a fruit plate. We were ready at 7 pm to meet our taxi driver for the trip into town, because we had tickets for the 8 pm Impression Sanji Liu show.





I expected good things from the show, particularly after finding our seats and seeing the way the natural amphitheater was set up. We'd heard that the show uses the water and the surrounding mountains as part of the show.





But we all agreed afterwards that we were a bit disappointed by it. I expected more lights on the surrounding mountains, and Mallory thought she would see water fountains.













It turned out to very much be a stage show, focused on the actors. There were a large number of them (around 600), which I suppose was impressive, but it fell a bit short to my mind. Then again, they run 3 performances nightly and it often sells out, so what do I know?

After the show, we met up with our taxi driver again for the return trip, stopping at an ATM to pick up enough cash to settle with the hotel. Then we came back to the room and packed up in anticipation of checking out early in the morning.


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## BecBennett

I think I squealed when I saw your baby panda photos! They're adorable!

I can't believe your driver! The scary driving is bad enough, but he honestly stopped for a smoke break? Surely he could have dropped you off first!


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## CaptainCook

BecBennett said:


> I think I squealed when I saw your baby panda photos! They're adorable!
> 
> I can't believe your driver! The scary driving is bad enough, but he honestly stopped for a smoke break? Surely he could have dropped you off first!



He was THE WORST. It made me realize how fabulous our experience with all of our Mr. Orange drivers was. But I also try to keep in mind cultural differences; lots of drivers were driving more aggressively than I would, and maybe punctuality isn't a big deal in China, either? Hard to say. Luckily, this was the only leg of the trip we had with this driver.


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## CaptainCook

*Thursday, July 19 - Yangshuo to XingPing to Hong Kong*

This morning we woke up early, and sadly packed up our things. We checked out of Yangshuo Mountain Retreat, and the taxi we had arranged through the hotel arrived on time at 6:30 am. We had a 10 am train to catch, but we had a couple of other stops to make first.

We drove to XingPing, where the train station is located, about 40 minutes away. First up, we wanted to stop at the famous 20 yuan note spot. It's easy to find, and there's a sign posted there confirming it's the right place. There were a couple of other parties there taking photos when we arrived, so we waited a few minutes to get our own.





Next up, our driver took us to Laozhai Hill.





We wanted to do one hike to a high vantage point over karst mountains, and this one was conveniently located. It's not for the faint of heart though; it's 1169 or 1189 steps to the top (I can't quite make it out in the picture), including one place where there's just a ladder.













 If we thought we were sweaty after hiking Moon Hill, we were even worse after this one. But the view from the top was worth it.









We asked our driver to give us an hour to complete the hike, and we were about 6-7 minutes late meeting him afterwards.

Finally, he dropped us off at the train station around 9 am. The XingPing train station is much smaller than any of the others we'd been to, and very easy to navigate. We bought some snacks and drinks while we waited.




(More egg tarts for me - I couldn't get enough of them!)

We had purchased tickets for the full route from Liuzhou to Shenzhen, but we were getting on the train mid-route in XingPing at a point where the train number switched. (They don't release tickets for segments of a route until the tickets for the full route have been released for a period of time, and we were worried that the full route could sell out and leave us stranded; not worth the risk when our itinerary had no flexibility built in.) Regardless of all that, everything ran smoothly.





The trip to Shenzhen was about 2.5 hours and although I had an engrossing book to read, I spent most of the trip looking out the window at mountains, villages, and farmers working in their fields.









Arriving in the border city of Shenzhen, we had a driver from Delight Car waiting for us (who turned out to be another good driver). Exiting the train station, the first thing we noticed was the abundance of English language signage that made easy work of finding our rendezvous point. We met up with our driver, loaded up our luggage, and set out for Hong Kong.

The border crossing was simple. We had our China departure cards saved from our flight in, and our driver gave us Hong Kong immigration cards to fill out. As we drove through the border, he passed those cards and our passports on to the border agents. I think we saw a total of three border agents and one health officer. All of them took a look in the van to match up passports to faces, but it was a quick process overall, and we didn't have to get out of the vehicle. The health officer did take a temperature reading inside the car to check for infection, and we passed. China let us out, Hong Kong let us in, and we set out for Disney's Explorers Lodge.













We arrived here around 2:30 pm and checked in. Our room was ready,  and we were able to pick up our park tickets for tomorrow. Sadly, our park tickets are all Iron Man and Star Wars themed; no Mickey tickets to be had here. On the bright side, we were pleasantly surprised to be given three sets of Fastpasses since we are staying at the hotel for 3 nights - despite the fact that we only have one park day.

We dropped our luggage in our room and immediately headed downstairs to the quick service restaurant to get something to eat. Mallory kicked her Disney trip off with Mickey Waffles, I had an avocado chicken flatbread, Chad had spare ribs, and Liam had nachos. My flatbread was accompanied by a bowl of soup, as was Chad's meal, which seemed like an odd side dish to serve in a tropical climate in July. It was really good though! Food is expensive here - my meal was 140 HKD or about $23 CDN. I also couldn't resist getting a Cookie cupcake - Cookie being the new Duffy friend who was just introduced at Hong Kong Disneyland. It was another 70 HKD. Yegads! It was mango and caramel mousse flavoured, and also happened to have blueberries inside. It was also really good.





We spent the rest of the afternoon and evening wandering around all 3 Hong Kong Disneyland resorts to see the properties, check out the gift shops and restaurants, etc.





On the agenda for tomorrow: Hong Kong Disneyland!!


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## Disney127

Still following along - love reading your trip report!  What a great adventure!  Heading off to Asia next week - flying from Calgary, can't wait for our stay at the Toy Story Hotel and Disney's Explorer Lodge.  We usually stay off site when we are at California's Disneyland but we do stay onsite at WDW.  Even though, we could have found less expensive accomodations, we decided to splurge  for this trip.


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## CaptainCook

*Friday, July 20 - Hong Kong Disneyland*

We were up at 7 am with plans to leave the room at 8 am. We chose to spend our first full day in Hong Kong at the park so as to avoid visiting on a weekend. We had breakfast at the Chart Room Cafe on the ground floor again. They offer about half a dozen different breakfast combos. I chose one that included congee, fruit, and 2 BBQ pork buns that were quite adorable!









(We had discussed the idea of doing the Disney-themed dim sum lunch at Crystal Lotus, and ultimately decided not to. Mostly because of the limited time we had; but I'll say it was also nice to save the $200+ it would have cost us. I thought this breakfast combo was a great low-cost way to still have the fun of sampling some fun dim sum. I've heard the dim sum lunch looks better than it tastes (and that can also be said of these pork buns; they were OK, but nothing special.))

Another note from this photo - I stopped wearing makeup completely about two days into the trip. With the heat and humidity melting it off my face, there was no point.

We left the hotel about 8:55 am and walked to the park, which took 20 minutes.





The first half of the walk is along the waterfront. Then you turn inland and pass through Disney grounds with theme music and gardens. We got to the gate at 9:15 am and were behind 6 other people in our line.





After our experience in Shanghai, coming through a side entrance, I was happy to get to the front of the park again in Hong Kong and get to experience the walk down Main Street, etc. The Disneytown entrance in Shanghai definitely lacks that magical feeling. There is no separate hotel guest entrance in Hong Kong, for better or for worse.

The official park opening time today was 10 am. At 9:30 am they did the Family of the Day ceremony, and then opened the gate immediately after.





I was also pleased that the Main Street view of the castle did not suffer too much from the ongoing construction. You still got the spires peeking over the top of the construction wall, and that was good enough for me. It is definitely a change of pace to see a Disney castle with mountains behind it. I know I posted this photo at the start of the report, but this is where it fits into things. Here I am again, repping my #ParkGoals. (And note how uncrowded Main Street is!)





We were able to shop and eat on Main Street until 10 am when they dropped the rope in front of the castle. Here is what that looked like. The crowd size is not bad at all, though those awful umbrellas are out in full force again.





Some of the attractions had a 10:30 am opening time, and it wasn't clear to us what we should attempt to do first. We had 3 Fastpasses from the hotel that were valid for 5 attractions (Hyperspace Mountain, Runaway Mine Cars, Ironman Experience, Mystic Manor, Philharmagic) and you can also pull paper legacy Fastpasses inside the park for the Adventures of Pooh, Ironman and Hyperspace Mountain.





We started with Pooh, which was walk on, then did Ironman as a walk on before heading over to Mystic Manor.





This was the ride I was most excited to ride, and it was fantastic. The whole family enjoyed it.





We immediately followed it up with the Runaway Mine Cars, and then declared THAT to be the best attraction in Hong Kong. It's more thrilling than Big Thunder Mountain, while still being a smooth ride that's not too scary.




(More evidence of construction: the turquoise wall runs around the castle and right into Adventureland.)

We headed to Toy Story Land next, and wanted to do the parachute drop, but there was a technical malfunction with it.





We jumped into line for a photo with cowboy Mickey since we were passing by and it was short.





The irony that we had come 13,000 km in order to see Mickey dressed in his American garb was not lost on me!

Then we headed into the theatre to see Festival of the Lion King, which has some differences from other versions we've seen, and is really well done.





We were able to get good seats for the 12 pm show by arriving only 5 or 6 minutes ahead of time.









When we came out from the show, crowds had built a bit. We did Jungle Cruise with a 10 minute wait and Mystic Manor (again) with a 10 minute wait.





Then we went for lunch at the Explorers Club. Meals here were all in the 150 HKD ($25 CDN) range, very expensive compare to the US parks, though they are big meals. My Hainanese chicken combo included chicken, vegetables, rice, a bowl of soup and a drink.

Following lunch, we took another spin on the Runaway Mine Cars, and then on our way into Fantasyland, we stumbled upon a pin trading event that happens one day each month.









There were several cast members present trading their own pins, and a large bulletin board set up with other pins to trade. One cast member also had a blind pin board you could choose from, and of course some of those pins were lucky finds. We saw a lot of pins at the event that we hadn't seen before, and did some serious trading.

We waited 30 minutes in line for It's A Small World,  which would prove to be our longest wait of the day.









Love to see Canada represented on IASW at the international Disney parks! (It's not part of the original attraction in WDW.)

We went back over to the pin trading area as they were packing up to get one last look and trade once more. We rode Hyperspace Mountain using one of our Fastpasses,  and then found a spot for the Pixar Water Play street party. This parade was much shorter than I expected, and we didn't get all that wet from it; honestly it was a bit of a letdown and definitely not a must-do.

We went back to Toy Story Land and split up. The boys rode RC Racer and the girls did Slinky Dog spin. Both were posted 30 minute waits, and both waits were about half of that. We grabbed an egg tart and some drinks, and went for a spin on the teacups before trying to get into the 6 pm showing of Mickey and the Wondrous Book. Unfortunately, we cut it too close and by the time we got there, 6 minutes before showtime, it was already full. Instead, we did Philharmagic on standby, then did one last walk on visit to Mystic Manor, before coming back to the last Wondrous Book showing of the day at 7:15 pm. This time we got there 22 minutes before showtime, and had no trouble getting seats.









This was a great show and it's unique to this park (I think), so it's well worth seeing.

The show let out at 7:43 pm, and many attractions were scheduled to close at 8 pm. So we walked (quickly) back to Grizzly Gulch and took one last ride on the Runaway Mine Cars for good measure. The "We Love Mickey" light show was happening on Main Street at 8 pm, so we ran over to catch the tail end of that. Then we bought a few souvenirs and some snacks on Main Street (t shirts and pineapple breads and a Pooh shaped doughnut) before settling in to watch the Paint the Night parade at 9 pm. We got there a few minutes after 9 pm (but before the parade made its way that far) owing to some long queues in the park stores, and were still able to find good second or third row spots for the parade. Most front-row folks stayed seated, which definitely helped.









I missed the big circular "Paint the Night" float that they have in California - it was absent from this parade. But most of the floats were the same, and the soundtrack was the same, though it was in Mandarin or Cantonese, I'm not sure which.

There were no fireworks, owing to the construction work currently happening at the castle. So after the parade, we filed out of the park and walked back to the hotel.

We used up the 3 Fastpasses from the hotel, but did not pull a paper Fastpass all day.

Overall, our impression of Hong Kong Disneyland compared to Shanghai Disneyland is this: it's more similar to the Western parks. In fact, aside from the food, it's very like the Western parks, the original Disneyland in particular. Compared to Shanghai, it's cleaner. There's less litter. There's less line cutting, less running, and less smoking out of bounds. There are less umbrellas being used, though still enough to be annoying as hell. Many of the attractions are done in multiple languages, but it felt like they have more English than Cantonese or Mandarin. There are Western toilets that come with toilet paper and soap, amenities I'd nearly forgotten about these past few weeks. There are many more Westerners there, particularly Australians. And we were not a novelty to anyone. Nobody gave us a second glance, asked for a photo or said a shy "hello".

We didn't do everything at Hong Kong Disneyland, but we did what we wanted to do, and we did some of those things multiple times. I've heard Hong Kong Disneyland called a 'half day park', and that's just not fair. There is plenty there to see and do.

I think I *liked* Shanghai more because of how 'different' it is, but I *enjoyed* Hong Kong more, with its smaller size, lack of crowds, and behaviour from other park guests more in line with what I'm accustomed to.

Having said that, I expected Shanghai to have the wow factor attractions, and it did have those, but Mystic Manor and Runaway Mine cars are on par with Pirates of the Caribbean and Tron. For me, anyway. So in terms of which park has the best attractions, I think it's a draw, though Shanghai does indeed have more attractions overall.


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## CaptainCook

*Saturday, July 21 - Hong Kong*

We woke up and were out the door by 8 am today. We walked over to the Disneyland metro station, which is close to the park entrance. We purchased day passes and then hopped on the Disneyland subway line and took it one stop to Sunny Bay...









...where we transferred to the Tung Chung line and rode it to the end. Coming out of the station, we walked about 5 minutes over to the Ngong Ping cable car terminal.

We arrived just before they opened at 9 am. We had pre-purchased tickets, and got into the appropriate queue. We had purchased tickets for the glass bottom cable car, so our wait was a bit longer than it was for folks on the normal cars (since there are more of those). But overall the wait was not bad.





The trip across the mountains took a little less than half an hour, and was very scenic. It takes you up right beside the airport, and you have a great view of the planes taking off and landing. You can also see out to the South China Sea, and there is a hiking trail that crosses the island under the cable line where you see hikers and runners and the occasional waterfall too.

Finally we could see the Big Buddha in the distance.  





We got off the cable car and were in Ngong Ping. It's full of little shops and restaurants, and was not yet too busy.





We had pre-selected one place to get a bite to eat before going up to the Buddha, but it didn't open til 10 am. We found another place to get some quick dumplings and smoothies, and then set out to climb the 200-some-odd steps to the top.









After the last couple of uphill hikes we'd done, climbing to the Buddha was a piece of cake.





It was quite impressive to see close up. We had great weather with good visibility and admired the views down from the summit.

















After visiting the Buddha, we went back down to see the nearby monastery.









After that, we  browsed in several shops on our way back to the cable car terminal.





I'm sure these were not the best prices Hong Kong had to offer, but the souvenirs we picked up were high quality.









We rode the cable car back down the island, and were happy to get a car to ourselves on the return trip (we shared with two other parties on the way up). The line to go up was crazy long by the time we got down around 12:30 pm, which made us happy that we'd beat the rush.

Next on the agenda, we took the train to Hong Kong station. Upon arriving, our first order of business was attempting to find one of the legendary Tim Ho Wan restaurants for lunch. We knew we were in the vicinity, but we got completely lost in the maze of subterranean corridors and escalators to multiple levels in the subway station. We found the spot on one of those 'you are here' directories, but could not for the life of us get there. By the time we made it, there was a huge line waiting to get into the restaurant. And we had to be at our next stop at 2:45 pm. Sadly, Tim Ho Wan got axed, and we ate a forgettable meal in the subway complex instead.

At the appointed time we went to Statue Square to meet up with a tour guide from KKDay. The best deal we found on skip-the-line Victoria Peak tickets were part of a group tour. We figured that because we were going up mid-afternoon on a Saturday, it would be busy, and the skip-the-line premium would be worth it. We were right. We marched past hundreds of people with our tour group and were at the peak by 3:30 pm.









We let our tour guide know we'd be doing our own thing after getting on the tram to the top, and she was fine with that. We admired the view (luckily we had a great weather day for this), we shopped in the bazaar, and we had a bubble waffle before hopping in line to come back down.













The return trip was just as quick, even though we didn't have any more front of the line privileges at that time.

Once off the peak, we rode the Star Ferry across the harbour to Kowloon.





It was a good way to see the city skyline, and the trip was short and cheap (13.30 HKD for all of us on the premium upper deck).





By now it was past 6 pm, and we were all starting to drag, but we were at the waterfront and the Symphony of Lights show was scheduled to start at 8 pm. We thought we had to stick around late enough  to see this classic Hong Kong show. Well... it was totally underwhelming... especially coming off the Paint the Night parade just the night before! I would totally rate this as skippable.





As soon as it ended, we hoofed it back to the subway, and rode back to the Disneyland subway stop. We walked back to the hotel, and all flopped on the beds in relief once we were back in the room. It had been another couple of back to back very long days, and we were wiped out.

Overall, our impression of Hong Kong was very much that it is 'Asia lite'. It felt a lot like Vancouver (and looked a lot like Vancouver, too). There's lots of English language signage and most people speak at least a few words of a it; there's lots of western food available; toilets are western style; queuing seems to be more of a thing than it is on the mainland.

Today was our last full day in Hong Kong. Tomorrow we head home. I'll be back with a quick wrap-up of our last day.


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## CaptainCook

*Sunday July 22 - Hong Kong to Toronto*

Going home day is always a drag, and so it was today. We woke up and glumly packed up before walking over to the Disneyland Hotel. At 9 am, they were offering Tai Chi with Master Goofy for all hotel guests. The tai chi portion of the event was quite short, and there was a photo op afterwards. This was the only time we saw a character in traditional Chinese dress though, so that was fun.









We returned to the Explorers Lodge and again had breakfast in the cafe - more congee, this time with noodles for me. My last Chinese breakfast. Then we made one last stop in the hotel gift shop, and went back to the room to finish packing up in order to meet the 11 am checkout deadline. We brought our bags downstairs and inquired about catching a ride to the airport. The hotel staff put us into a small taxi with our bags hanging out the trunk, which wouldn't close, but was secured by a bungee cord. We were skeptical. But we made it to the airport, bags and all.

We checked in, went through security, had a bite to eat at a food court and picked up a couple of last minute souvenirs. By the time we boarded around 2:30 pm, it was raining. We had had great weather in Hong Kong, and I was pleased to see that we dodged the rain during our stay. We also saw on the airport information boards that there is currently a cyclone in Shanghai. Again, I'm thankful that that did not happen while we were there! We were fortunate to only have one bad weather day on this trip that seriously impeded our touring (during our Great Wall visit). 

We took off on time, and as of this writing, we are somewhere over Russia, with 8 hours and 43 minutes of flight time left. (Nonstop from Hong Kong to Toronto is 15 hours and 5 minutes total.) We'll get into Toronto around 6 pm and if all goes well, should be home around 10 pm after a very, VERY long day.

I'm ready to go home now, but we had a fantastic trip to China. The kids agree that they loved it too. It was very exotic for us, while offering comfortable and convenient travel between locations. Best of all was the wide range of things we saw and did - theme parks, mountains, shows, hiking, wildlife, history...

It was also eye opening and gave us lots to think about. Population control, pollution, government control of information, sustainability - these issues all came up time and again as we made our way around. To see cities home to more people than our entire country, to experience the smog firsthand, to be trapped behind the Great Firewall of China - these are great life lessons that I hope my kids will learn from their firsthand experience and that go to show the value of travel beyond the fun and entertainment.

We have now crossed 5 of the 6 parks off of the Every Disney Park bucket list. I have no doubt that we will head to Japan in the next few years to complete it. But, it won't be our next trip. Our next adventure will take us to Morocco for spring break in 2019. Disney parks are awesome, but there is a big world out there, and we hope to see as much of it together as we can.


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## indoshakespeare

Thanks for sharing ^^


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## Mandarinma

I’ve loved reading your report, thank you


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## BLTtinkerbell

I enjoyed following along! Your trip report was very insightful and helped me plan my trip to Hong Kong. Thank you so much for sharing! 

Happy travels!


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## bkmanhole

Thank you so much for your trip reports, it was great following along!

When you finally get to the Japan parks - it will blow your mind!


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## CaptainCook

bkmanhole said:


> Thank you so much for your trip reports, it was great following along!
> 
> When you finally get to the Japan parks - it will blow your mind!



From everything I've heard, it seems that we are saving the best for last.


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## BecBennett

Thanks for so much info! It's been really handy to read  

If I get around to booking our October trip we will have been to all parks except Paris. Tokyo is amazing though.


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## CaptainCook

BecBennett said:


> If I get around to booking our October trip we will have been to all parks except Paris. Tokyo is amazing though.



I think you've got to do it - you're going to be so close!


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## hellocat2

What an incredible journey! Amazing trip report!


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## wannabee

what a great report. I'm heading to HKDL in September and your report helped a lot


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## jgl130

I totally lurked on this whole trip report. Thanks for posting! My family and I are headed to Shanghai and Tokyo this November. Your tip about using Mr. Orange was super helpful. I’ve booked them for Shanghai and Beijing!


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## BecBennett

CaptainCook said:


> I think you've got to do it - you're going to be so close!



I'll race you to see who gets all 6 first


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## CaptainCook

BecBennett said:


> I'll race you to see who gets all 6 first



We're thinking Tokyo 2021. So that gives you a few years to get a head start on us!


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## CaptainCook

Will repost later.


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## Dentam

I just found your report and thoroughly enjoyed reading it!  I went to China for a two week trip in 2016 and visited many of the same places, though the Panda sanctuary and what followed in your trip were all things I didn't see and would LOVE to.  I definitely hope to return some day soon.  Thanks so much for sharing!


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## CaptainCook

For anyone who's interested - I've finished editing and uploading our trip video to YouTube. The Shanghai Disneyland part starts at 0:55, and the Hong Kong Disneyland part starts at 35:15. Hope you enjoy!


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## Simba001

Really enjoyed your trip report & your video added an extra touch. 

I was wondering did you tip your Mr. Orange drivers? If so, how much do you recommend?  
Did you tip regular taxi drivers? 

I appreciate you talking about Mr. Orange.  It seems like a very organized company with great communication.   Thank you for mentioning this company in your report.


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## CaptainCook

Simba001 said:


> Really enjoyed your trip report & your video added an extra touch.
> 
> I was wondering did you tip your Mr. Orange drivers? If so, how much do you recommend?
> Did you tip regular taxi drivers?
> 
> I appreciate you talking about Mr. Orange.  It seems like a very organized company with great communication.   Thank you for mentioning this company in your report.



For drivers who were with us for a good part of the day, we tipped 100 yuan. For a shorter transfer, such as train station to hotel, perhaps 10-20 yuan, depending on how far and what we had available. I don’t think we tipped the taxi driver in Beijing who inflated his rate to take us to the theatre in the rain; he was already well compensated!

There was one driver who refused a tip. The others all took them.


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## Simba001

CaptainCook said:


> For drivers who were with us for a good part of the day, we tipped 100 yuan. For a shorter transfer, such as train station to hotel, perhaps 10-20 yuan, depending on how far and what we had available. I don’t think we tipped the taxi driver in Beijing who inflated his rate to take us to the theatre in the rain; he was already well compensated!
> 
> There was one driver who refused a tip. The others all took them.



Appreciate this information.


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## BecBennett

Your video is really great.


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## ILDisneyfan

Great report with all the pictures and the video.  Thanks for posting!


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## BecBennett

Were you happy with just the transfer to the great wall? Or do you think you would have benefitted from a guide? Same question for your other site seeing locations too I guess.


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## CaptainCook

BecBennett said:


> Were you happy with just the transfer to the great wall? Or do you think you would have benefitted from a guide? Same question for your other site seeing locations too I guess.


Whoops, I missed this earlier, sorry! Yes, we were happy with the transfer only options we chose. We don't like to be bound by someone else's idea of a timeline. I know if you hire a private guide, you can ask them to speed up or slow down as needed. I prefer reading up on what I'm going to see ahead of time, and then wandering around at my own leisure once we get to where we're going.


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## bfaber

CaptainCook said:


> *Thursday, July 12 - Beijing
> 
> We only have a limited time in Beijing.  What did you like more?  Temple of Heaven or Forbidden City?  Our schedule right now only has us on the grounds of Temple of Heaven as we will arrive after the buildings are closed.  Should we be spending more time there than Forbidden City so we can arrive earlier and get in the buildings?*
> 
> We slept well at the hotel. We had a room right off the main dining room and lounge area, and had expected it to be noisy. Instead, we woke up wondering if we were the only guests in the hotel, a question that was reinforced when we were the only ones to show up for the 7:30 am breakfast seating. The meal was actually served closer to 8, and we had two Western breakfasts, one meat dumplings and one vegetable dumplings between the 4 of us, and shared them all. I only had the dumplings, and they were delicious.
> 
> We packed up our bags and left them with the hotel while we went out for the day. Thankfully, it was overcast (or perhaps just smoggy) and dry outside. We began by taking the subway to Tiantandongmen, and purchased tickets to enter the Temple of Heaven park. There are two price points for tickets here, and you need the more expensive ticket to access some of the sites, including the Hall of Prayer for Good Harvests.
> 
> We started off by going to the area in the park where Beijingers congregate to exercise.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> We thought we might be on the late side for this, arriving around 9:30 am,  but there were plenty of people there. We started out by watching a group of men playing something like hackey sack with an oversized shuttlecock, and it took no time at all for them to invite us to join them.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> That went on for quite a while and was good fun. Eventually they did of course try to sell us a shuttlecock of our own, and for 10 yuan/$2 CDN we did buy it.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> (This guy insisted I take his picture with Liam!)
> 
> From there, we moved on to a guy who invited us to play something like badminton, but with paddles instead of racquets. He was impressed by Liam's skill (he plays on the school badminton team) and kept saying "Wonderful! Wonderful!" We also bought a badminton set from him for 30 yuan/$6 CDN.
> 
> All around us, there was exercise equipment, and people doing chin ups and pull ups and swinging around on monkey bars and stretching. Most of them were elderly, and they looked like a very fit bunch. They were playing traditional music on portable radios, a group of women were chanting and playing a clapping game, a couple were doing tai chi, and overall it looked like a very fun and relaxing way to spend their day.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> We moved on through the park, through the Long Corridor, which was beautiful, and on to the Hall of Prayer for Good Harvests. This was pretty spectacular to see in person, and definitely checked an item off the bucket list. We exited from a different direction than where we came in from, and wandered through a bit more of the park and the gift shop before deciding to head out.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> We took the subway back to our home station, Tiananmen East, and headed to the Forbidden City. It was around noon when we arrived. The kiosk for foreigners to buy tickets is surprisingly far inside the complex; we were sure we'd missed it. Finally we purchased our tickets, and headed into the 'real' Forbidden City.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> (The kids getting asked to pose for pictures again!)
> 
> It too was pretty spectacular, though we were content to wander through the complex without going into all of the buildings themselves. It wasn't unbearably crowded, but it certainly was busy.
> 
> 
> 
> dxzgdxzv
> 
> We came out the north end of the Forbidden City, and crossed the road to enter Jingshan Park. This only cost 2 yuan/40 cents per person to climb up the hill to the pavilion at the top that offers a spectacular view out over the golden rooftops of the Forbidden City and reminds you of how large the complex really is. The climb looks imposing, but is not too bad. It took us around 15 minutes, and the staircase goes through a cool and shaded  bamboo forest.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Done now with the Forbidden City, we headed back to our hotel, which was only a short walk away. We took a brief break there before heading across the street to Siji Minfu, also known as "Mass Foodie's Roast Duck" on the big red neon sign.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> We had scoped this out as one of the city's popular spots for an excellent Peking duck dinner; outside the restaurant they have posted a number of awards that they have won. We arrived after 2 pm, hoping that a mid-afternoon meal would mean good seating availability, and were shocked to be told there was a 2 hour wait. We put our names in, but were a bit dejected as we headed back across the street to the hotel. We had Mr. Orange picking us up at 5 pm to head to the train station, and we were not at all sure that we'd have time to eat before leaving.
> 
> Back at the hotel, Chad used a translation app to let a member of the hotel staff know about our conundrum, and asked for a recommendation for another nearby Peking duck restaurant. The staff member did not speak English, but seemed to indicate that he could help us, and indicated to follow him. We went back across the street to the restaurant, past the hordes of people waiting out front, through the dining room, up the stairs to another dining room, and directly to a table! He spoke a few words to a waitress and left us to enjoy our meal.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> We ordered a full duck and (after much confusion) the condiments and pancakes to accompany it; it wasn't clear to us whether these would be included or not. We also ordered some drinks and a bowl of plain rice for Mallory, who is a picky eater. The waitress brought out a huge bowl of grapes on ice as a starter. We were not expecting that, but they were nice, especially since we hadn't ordered any sides with our meal, not knowing exactly how much food it would entail. After the grapes, the duck came out, and was presented to us at the table before it was taken to a nearby counter for carving.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> (Initially I felt a bit silly about wanting to watch the carving, but other tables filled with locals were doing the same.) It came back to our table in a beautiful presentation with the condiments and pancakes on the side (good thing we had ordered these).
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> The duck was delicious, and even Mallory had some and liked it. This meal was a fabulous experience and well worth the cost at 300 yuan/$60 CDN  including our drinks.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> By now it was about 4:30 pm, and it was time to go back to the hotel to collect our bags and catch our ride to the train station for our 6:50 pm train. Our driver came a few minutes early and we set off for the Beijing West train station. Because we had already printed all of our tickets, it was quick and easy to enter the station through security, and locate our waiting room on the second floor. We picked up a few snacks for the trip from the shops in the train station, and boarded the train. This was a T class train, and not nearly as nice as the first overnight train we rode. We still had soft sleeper tickets, but the train was much older. There were no electrical outlets at each berth, just one out in the hall for the whole car to share. There was a lot of noise from the train itself, and a whole lot of smoking happening, despite the no smoking signs. I also witnessed an argument that stopped just short of a brawl between a passenger and an attendant who was managing the snack cart. It looked like it might be a long night.





BecBennett said:


> I love pekin duck was it enough for a proper meal?





CaptainCook said:


> Whoops, I missed this earlier, sorry! Yes, we were happy with the transfer only options we chose. We don't like to be bound by someone else's idea of a timeline. I know if you hire a private guide, you can ask them to speed up or slow down as needed. I prefer reading up on what I'm going to see ahead of time, and then wandering around at my own leisure once we get to where we're going.


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## CaptainCook

*We only have a limited time in Beijing. What did you like more? Temple of Heaven or Forbidden City? Our schedule right now only has us on the grounds of Temple of Heaven as we will arrive after the buildings are closed. Should we be spending more time there than Forbidden City so we can arrive earlier and get in the buildings?
*
If I had to pick one, for me, it would be Temple of Heaven. It had more variety of things to see and do with it being located in a park setting with lots of Beijingers hanging around, socializing and exercising, an addition to the beautiful ancient architecture.

I am not positive, but I think if you are there after hours, you will not be able to get into the part of the complex to see the Hall of Prayer for Good Harvests, even from the outside. I don't think you have to go into the buildings to enjoy them (we only peeked inside) but you'll at least want to be able to access the buildings from the outside.

@bfaber (not sure why it's not letting me quote you directly!)


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## bfaber

CaptainCook said:


> *We only have a limited time in Beijing. What did you like more? Temple of Heaven or Forbidden City? Our schedule right now only has us on the grounds of Temple of Heaven as we will arrive after the buildings are closed. Should we be spending more time there than Forbidden City so we can arrive earlier and get in the buildings?
> *
> If I had to pick one, for me, it would be Temple of Heaven. It had more variety of things to see and do with it being located in a park setting with lots of Beijingers hanging around, socializing and exercising, an addition to the beautiful ancient architecture.
> 
> I am not positive, but I think if you are there after hours, you will not be able to get into the part of the complex to see the Hall of Prayer for Good Harvests, even from the outside. I don't think you have to go into the buildings to enjoy them (we only peeked inside) but you'll at least want to be able to access the buildings from the outside.
> 
> @bfaber (not sure why it's not letting me quote you directly!)


Thanks!!


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## CaptainCook

A week or so ago, someone read this thread and sent me some messages about it. Now that I have time after the busy holiday season to reply, I can't find those messages (my Alerts history is clear and I have no Conversations). If that person was you, can you please contact me again - I'd be happy to answer your questions!


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## SWofDisorder

Hi there
It was me.  I did find a lot of information that I was missing when I read your pre-trip report.  I was asking about Mr. Orange which is now sorted also about the trains within China, overnight vs. Highspeed.  If you have time, I will recreate my list of questions. Thank you for posting again about not getting my PM.

I have posted about my issues, mostly being Lhasa and getting out.  Also what order to put my trip in.  It is very similar to yours, take out beautiful mountain village on the river, insert Everest and it very close.  We are doing all the tourist things because...we are tourists.  I do want to know how to find that beautiful cotton candy?  More questions but let me make the list.

Chengdu:  Where path did you follow to get to the nursery so fast and ahead of everyone at the Panda Research center?


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## CaptainCook

I sent you an email with some details, but neglected to answer the cotton candy question! We had seen the cotton candy in a Youtube video before we left home too, and were determined to find it. We knew it was in the Muslim Street market, but we didn't know exactly where. The market is not just on Muslim Street, but extends several blocks into the surrounding area. Do not venture into these areas if you're looking for the cotton candy - it's right on Muslim Street, and there were a couple of different vendors selling it. Our mistake was to venture into the smaller alleys right off the bat, when we should have stuck to the main drag to find it faster.


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## cynditech

Thank you so much for sharing all the details for your China trip.  We are going this June 2019 and finalizing our plans.  Alot of your information really helped us in making decisions.  We liked the idea of taking an overnight train on one leg of our trip


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## HawaiianMom521

Hi Carrie-  I'm Norma (NNE from YouTube)  I can't PM you.  I think I gotta "earn my ears" ;-)  the option to "start a conversation" does not appear when I click on your name/profile.  In Disboards, I'm HawaiianMom 521.


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## MommaBerd

Just read through your fantastic trip report! My family of five did two weeks in Hangzhou/Shanghai last year at the end of March/beginning of April. We were limited to those places as my DH was also conducting business. We just loved being there, and reading your trip report just makes me want to go back and see more of China, especially your last destination. It’s tough, though, managing accommodations with a family of four or more, right?!? I am going to bookmark this TR, in case we are able to go back in a few years! You all did lots of fun things that I’d like to try too! Thanks for taking the time to write such a detailed TR.


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## CaptainCook

HawaiianMom521 said:


> Hi Carrie-  I'm Norma (NNE from YouTube)  I can't PM you.  I think I gotta "earn my ears" ;-)  the option to "start a conversation" does not appear when I click on your name/profile.  In Disboards, I'm HawaiianMom 521.


Ah, OK. Well, if you have any questions, feel free to ask in this thread - I'll check back and reply.


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## CaptainCook

MommaBerd said:


> Just read through your fantastic trip report! My family of five did two weeks in Hangzhou/Shanghai last year at the end of March/beginning of April. We were limited to those places as my DH was also conducting business. We just loved being there, and reading your trip report just makes me want to go back and see more of China, especially your last destination. It’s tough, though, managing accommodations with a family of four or more, right?!? I am going to bookmark this TR, in case we are able to go back in a few years! You all did lots of fun things that I’d like to try too! Thanks for taking the time to write such a detailed TR.


Glad you enjoyed it! Yes, there are certainly some places where you see the holdover from the one child policy and guest rooms meant for no more than 3 people. We only skimmed the surface of China and loved what we saw. Our visas are good for another 9 years - perhaps one day we'll go back!


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## sweetpee_1993

I just totally drank in your entire trip and absolutely enjoyed the read!  If I wasn’t already excited about our future prospects, I surely am now.  While it’s not 100% just yet, signs are pointing towards my hubby to be sent to Nantong, China (an hour or so outside Shanghai) for work sometime perhaps as early as this summer.  He will be there for anywhere from 18 months to 3 years on a 10/2 week rotation.  His brother who works for the same company will also be assigned there at the same time (he spent 18 months over there a couple years ago).  They’ll each have a furnished apartment, drivers, etc. with all living expenses paid.  My sister-in-law and I are close to the same age.  Our children are all grown and/or in college.  We can come & go as we wish.  Me being the primary Disney-Phile in the family, I’m absolutely pouring over all things Shanghai & Hong Kong Disney.  Plus, of course, just general getting around things like buses, trains, shopping, destinations, communication, culture, etc.  I’m quite sure we will have some of our Disney friends and maybe even some family come to visit as well.  So much excitement!  I cannot thank you enough for all the thought and detail you put into your trip report here!  Fabulous read!

The part that really struck me was the people asking for pics with your family!  I had mentioned this to my husband just a few days ago!  Hubby and I are redheaded and freckled!  Our adult sons are both also redheaded and freckled! Brother-in-law & sis-in-law are an interracial couple.  I had wondered at any likelihood of us being a novelty.  It’s not unheard of for us to get noticed here at home in the US.  More than once I’ve been told “Mostly redheads are ugly but you aren’t ugly.”  Uh, thanks?  ROFL!  I remember a couple years ago when hubby was in Seoul he said he got many looks when he was on buses and trains.  On an uncrowded bus once a group of shy younger girls asked for his picture with them and were absolutely squealing when he showed them pics of our family.  He said in general the freckled part he thought was mostly considered unattractive which doesn’t at all offend me.  Wouldn’t be the first time I’ve heard it (or derogatory slurs about our ginger status).  I guess I’m kinda excited at the prospect that I was correct in assuming we may be seen as a bit of a novelty!  I’m happy to play along!

And, color me crazy, but I’m also not put-off at the prospect of having to at some point utilize a squat potty.  I suppose I’ll look up more info on that.  My mother-in-law and sister-in-law are both pretty adamantly against it.  Eh, having spent my teen years living in the country between hunting and bonfires out in the woods miles from any buildings it certainly wouldn’t be the first time I’ve squatted.  LOL!  

Again, so very excited at everything you wrote and the pictures.  The little mountain place on the river sounded fabulous!  Thanks again for such an amazing review/report!


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## KEK1

Fabulous TR I thoroughly enjoyed reading! Thanks!


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## sweetpee_1993

BTW, did they say what breed of cats those were in the cage cafe you visited?  The curled ears are characteristic of American Curls. I don’t think that’s a characteristic of any other breed but I’m no expert either.  LOL!


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## lilmc

sweetpee_1993 said:


> having to at some point utilize a squat potty



I’ve never understood the aversion to using them. I’d much rather squat low than try to hover over some nasty toilet seats anywhere! (As long as I’ve brought my own tp and remember to roll pant legs if you’re wearing them!)


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## LovesTimone

Thank you so much for the really well done TR...The video sealed the deal for me... 

The first thought is your family is just adorable, Honestly just so cute!!!! I will say the look on your daughters face when watching the acrobats is a priceless moment you could just see the wonder and magic in her eyes...As well I love your park shirt.... just so you know I am so stealing this... I hope you won't mind... we to are on the path to do all six parks... we have 3 right now, WDW, Disneyland California, and Disneyland Paris under our belts... so looking at the other 3..

We are looking at late April, early May of 2020... Not really sure... This is a good time of year for DH with his job as well our anniversary is at the beginning of May, and we are empty-nester's so it would be just the 2 of us... We too like the idea of at our own pace... I will be checking out Mr. Oranges car service. * Did you book the driver for all day? and if you don't mind what was the cost? 

Did you like the Disney resorts that you stayed? American King Beds?

As well in the other hotels is getting a American King Bed possible? this is something that DH and I need, he is almost 6'5" and I am 5'9" so we are both tall.. and we both have some back and neck issues... 

What papers do you need to travel to China, A guy that used to work with my DH... He and his family went... he told DH that you need so much paperwork to travel over there and moving around is a nightmare going through check point after check point... I thought that I read somewhere that you need a Passport, and Travel/ Tourist Visa... I really just started looking and grazing around the information pools on this so I'm really in the dark about where to start and what is needed... any advice would be much appreciated...

My husband is tall, and I am blonde... the guy that worked with my DH said that we would get alot of attention because of this.. DH and I are go with the flow type of people... It seemed that they wanted pictures with your kids... or did you and your DH get asked for pictures as well?

DH has always wanted to do the sleeper train thing... So I was thinking that this might be a good choice... Is there different type or levels of sleep compartments on the trains?...
Can you give me the name or info where to find the info about the train...

Did you learn any Chinese before you left?


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## supedewoop

I can answer some of these questions, as I live in China. 

You need a passport and a Tourist visa. If he was here on another kind of visa, he probably needed more paperwork, but I've been told the tourist visa is pretty straightforward (but still a hassle, because many places don't need a visa at all for tourism).  Moving around in the country shouldn't be too much of an issue, but you will need to show your passport and visa anytime you transport from one city to another (train or plane), as well as any time you check into a hotel. If you're going into rural areas, you may need to show it if you're in a car at some point. It IS a good idea to keep your passport on you, or at least a picture on your phone of your info page and your Chinese visa. I know it's generally not recommended for general travel and obviously be REALLY CAREFUL with it, but it's better to have it then not. If you're worried about it, do the phone photo. For me, I don't feel like it's a ton of stuff, but I can see how it will feel like a hassle to some people, especially just travelling. 

Chinese hotel beds are generally smaller, but a high-end western hotel will be more likely to have a big bed. Check the reviews. 

You don't really need to know Chinese if you're keeping to touristy-things in a big city, but you will have to heavily rely on signs, planning, and figuring stuff out on your own. Chinese is also REALLY HARD, so there's not a good amount to learn before you go that would require less planning in other areas. I think it's easier, from a language perspective, for a foreigner to use a subway than to use a random taxi, for example, because you can look up how to get from point a to point b and read a map in English before you go, but a taxi driver might not understand your request even if you are saying it "correctly", but if you're not good at following maps, that doesn't work for you. (A hired driver may be different). Always carry your hotel address with you, to show someone so that you can at least get back there if you get lost. 

There's different levels of sleepers. As a foreigner, at minimum, you probably want a soft sleeper. And, keep in mind other people will "use" the lower bunks by sitting there or whatever, even if it's "yours". Higher bunks are better. Honestly, based on what you said about hotels, I don't know that a sleeper train is a good idea for you. 

You can get pictures if you STAND OUT, even in the touristy areas because there's other Chinese tourists from rural areas that have never seen blonde hair or a person over 6 feet, but it's less and less common every year. You're more likely to get "stealth" photos than people asking, but I honestly prefer when people ask. But then, I stand out because I'm fat, which is a more negative trait than others.


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## LovesTimone

supedewoop said:


> I can answer some of these questions, as I live in China.
> 
> You need a passport and a Tourist visa. If he was here on another kind of visa, he probably needed more paperwork, but I've been told the tourist visa is pretty straightforward (but still a hassle, because many places don't need a visa at all for tourism).  Moving around in the country shouldn't be too much of an issue, but you will need to show your passport and visa anytime you transport from one city to another (train or plane), as well as any time you check into a hotel. If you're going into rural areas, you may need to show it if you're in a car at some point. It IS a good idea to keep your passport on you, or at least a picture on your phone of your info page and your Chinese visa. I know it's generally not recommended for general travel and obviously be REALLY CAREFUL with it, but it's better to have it then not. If you're worried about it, do the phone photo. For me, I don't feel like it's a ton of stuff, but I can see how it will feel like a hassle to some people, especially just travelling.
> 
> Chinese hotel beds are generally smaller, but a high-end western hotel will be more likely to have a big bed. Check the reviews.
> 
> You don't really need to know Chinese if you're keeping to touristy-things in a big city, but you will have to heavily rely on signs, planning, and figuring stuff out on your own. Chinese is also REALLY HARD, so there's not a good amount to learn before you go that would require less planning in other areas. I think it's easier, from a language perspective, for a foreigner to use a subway than to use a random taxi, for example, because you can look up how to get from point a to point b and read a map in English before you go, but a taxi driver might not understand your request even if you are saying it "correctly", but if you're not good at following maps, that doesn't work for you. (A hired driver may be different). Always carry your hotel address with you, to show someone so that you can at least get back there if you get lost.
> 
> There's different levels of sleepers. As a foreigner, at minimum, you probably want a soft sleeper. And, keep in mind other people will "use" the lower bunks by sitting there or whatever, even if it's "yours". Higher bunks are better. Honestly, based on what you said about hotels, I don't know that a sleeper train is a good idea for you.
> 
> You can get pictures if you STAND OUT, even in the touristy areas because there's other Chinese tourists from rural areas that have never seen blonde hair or a person over 6 feet, but it's less and less common every year. You're more likely to get "stealth" photos than people asking, but I honestly prefer when people ask. But then, I stand out because I'm fat, which is a more negative trait than others.




Thanks so much for your information...

On the passport, a friend suggested that we get a passport card, to carry with us instead of carrying our regular passport around with us, as well take pictures of the regular passport for our phone... do we need to keep the visa with us as well?

We are just in the beginning stages of planning... so I am trying to learn, find out, anything and everything I can...

Any information or suggestion is always appreciated...


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## supedewoop

The visa will be in your passport, so take a picture of that with your phone. 

Check with your friend and see if he was a tourist or if he was "working" or something. I thought he rules are quite different and some of his notes make me think it might not have been a tourist. But, I've never been a tourist, so maybe it's closer than I realize.


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## OldSchoolReasons

LovesTimone said:


> Thanks so much for your information...
> 
> On the passport, a friend suggested that we get a passport card, to carry with us instead of carrying our regular passport around with us, as well take pictures of the regular passport for our phone... do we need to keep the visa with us as well?
> 
> We are just in the beginning stages of planning... so I am trying to learn, find out, anything and everything I can...
> 
> Any information or suggestion is always appreciated...




Just wanted to pipe in and say that for the tourist visa you will need to book your flights first and show proof of where you're staying (Booking.com receipts are fine and you can pick one with free cancellation) before you can get a visa. The photo requirements are also different from UK/USA sizes so you'll need to go to a photographer not a passport photo machine.  

The form is incredibly onerous so I would print one and do a practice run first.

As someone who is 5"1 (and recently blonde!) with a 6"3 boyfriend and with both of us covered from shoulders to toes in tattoos, aside from the stealth photo taking you probably won't garner as much attention as you expect. That saying I haven't been to China, but have been to other parts of Asia. It's mostly generational and most people aren't bothered. 

For planning I'd really recommend TDR Explorer and DisneyTouristBlog for Disney planning and the Lonely Planet China guide is very comprehensive and will answer many of your starter questions.


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## LovesTimone

OldSchoolReasons said:


> Just wanted to pipe in and say that for the tourist visa you will need to book your flights first and show proof of where you're staying (Booking.com receipts are fine and you can pick one with free cancellation) before you can get a visa. The photo requirements are also different from UK/USA sizes so you'll need to go to a photographer not a passport photo machine.
> 
> The form is incredibly onerous so I would print one and do a practice run first.
> 
> As someone who is 5"1 (and recently blonde!) with a 6"3 boyfriend and with both of us covered from shoulders to toes in tattoos, aside from the stealth photo taking you probably won't garner as much attention as you expect. That saying I haven't been to China, but have been to other parts of Asia. It's mostly generational and most people aren't bothered.
> 
> For planning I'd really recommend TDR Explorer and DisneyTouristBlog for Disney planning and the Lonely Planet China guide is very comprehensive and will answer many of your starter questions.




Thanks so much for the info...

Great idea about printing an copy and practicing... and the picture size... 

As far as the pictures I really am good with whatever... we really just roll with the flow... I like to just have an idea about what to expect... We were in the Dominican a couple of years ago... and this little girl kept staring at me... getting closer and closer...  so the pool hostess came over and said the girls parents had sent her over to  ask if the little girl could come over and touch my hair...I'm not sure where they were from, the hostess said, I don't think that the little girl has ever seen blonde hair before... I was like... sure no problem...There were lots of other women with different color hair... laying laying by the pool... I was wondering why me.. Then it hit me I had on my Minnie Mouse cover up.... so she came over and touch my hair... and pointed to my cover up... and said Minnie Mouse... and off she went... to cute... I guess that no matter where you are in the world... Mickey and Minnie are an international sign of friendship...   

An co-worker told my DH that we would have to _*"present ourselves in person"*_ at a Chinese Consulate,  We live in Fl.... I looked up which consulate region Florida is in and its Houston TX.... so we would have to plan a trip to get the visa, and pay for faster service... We are planning to be in New York at the end of the year, I was wondering if we have to go to Texas or since we already have a trip planned could we just do it in New York...or is it a must that we do it in the region that is listed...


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## LovesTimone

supedewoop said:


> The visa will be in your passport, so take a picture of that with your phone.
> 
> Check with your friend and see if he was a tourist or if he was "working" or something. I thought he rules are quite different and some of his notes make me think it might not have been a tourist. But, I've never been a tourist, so maybe it's closer than I realize.




He was working for 3 months then his family joined him and they spent 3 weeks traveling all around China...


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## CaptainCook

sweetpee_1993 said:


> BTW, did they say what breed of cats those were in the cage cafe you visited?  The curled ears are characteristic of American Curls. I don’t think that’s a characteristic of any other breed but I’m no expert either.  LOL!


We didn't see or hear anything (that we could understand, anyway!) about the cat breeds - but you're right, they were very distinctive looking.


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## CaptainCook

lilmc said:


> I’ve never understood the aversion to using them. I’d much rather squat low than try to hover over some nasty toilet seats anywhere! (As long as I’ve brought my own tp and remember to roll pant legs if you’re wearing them!)


It's funny - you do hear a lot of negative publicity about them, but after you've tried them you realize it's really not a big deal. As far as cleanliness they were no better and no worse than any other toilets we used.


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## CaptainCook

LovesTimone said:


> Thank you so much for the really well done TR...The video sealed the deal for me...
> 
> The first thought is your family is just adorable, Honestly just so cute!!!! I will say the look on your daughters face when watching the acrobats is a priceless moment you could just see the wonder and magic in her eyes...As well I love your park shirt.... just so you know I am so stealing this... I hope you won't mind... we to are on the path to do all six parks... we have 3 right now, WDW, Disneyland California, and Disneyland Paris under our belts... so looking at the other 3..
> 
> We are looking at late April, early May of 2020... Not really sure... This is a good time of year for DH with his job as well our anniversary is at the beginning of May, and we are empty-nester's so it would be just the 2 of us... We too like the idea of at our own pace... I will be checking out Mr. Oranges car service. * Did you book the driver for all day? and if you don't mind what was the cost?
> 
> Did you like the Disney resorts that you stayed? American King Beds?
> 
> As well in the other hotels is getting a American King Bed possible? this is something that DH and I need, he is almost 6'5" and I am 5'9" so we are both tall.. and we both have some back and neck issues...
> 
> What papers do you need to travel to China, A guy that used to work with my DH... He and his family went... he told DH that you need so much paperwork to travel over there and moving around is a nightmare going through check point after check point... I thought that I read somewhere that you need a Passport, and Travel/ Tourist Visa... I really just started looking and grazing around the information pools on this so I'm really in the dark about where to start and what is needed... any advice would be much appreciated...
> 
> My husband is tall, and I am blonde... the guy that worked with my DH said that we would get alot of attention because of this.. DH and I are go with the flow type of people... It seemed that they wanted pictures with your kids... or did you and your DH get asked for pictures as well?
> 
> DH has always wanted to do the sleeper train thing... So I was thinking that this might be a good choice... Is there different type or levels of sleep compartments on the trains?...
> Can you give me the name or info where to find the info about the train...
> 
> Did you learn any Chinese before you left?



In some cases we booked the Mr. Orange service for the full day (e.g. in Beijing - the driver picked us up from the train station early morning, probably about 7 a.m., and we had him booked for the full day to take us to the Great Wall. We wound up coming back to Beijing probably around 3 pm because the weather wasn't great, but could have stayed out later if it was.) In some cases though, we just booked a pickup at a hotel and dropoff at a train station, or vice versa. Note that our drivers did not speak English and did not act as tour guides - we had already determined where we wanted them to take us and we had the resources to manage our own visit once we got there (though at the Great Wall and at the Terracotta Warriors, the drivers helped us buy entrance tickets to those attractions). 

Pricing was as follows in US dollars - this included 4 passengers and luggage (so they gave us a van for each trip, rather than a smaller car):

·        Shanghai Airport to Shanghai Disney $56
·        Multi stops throughout day in Shanghai then to train station $134
·        Beijing train station to Great Wall then back to Beijing hotel $163
·        Beijing hotel to train station $51
·        Xi'an train station to Terracotta Warriors back to Xi'an hotel $134
·        Xi'an hotel to Xi'an train station $49
·        Chengdu train station to Chengdu hotel $47
·        Chengdu hotel to airport with stops in Chengdu enroute $106  

We did enjoy the Disney resorts where we stayed. The Toy Story Hotel in Shanghai is the equivalent of a Value resort in Florida, so it's definitely not fancy, but the theme is cute. The Explorers Lodge in Hong Kong was much more upscale and very reminiscent of Animal Kingdom Lodge, which we love. We were also big fans of the Adventurers Club back when it was open on Pleasure Island - so it was fun to revisit that theme through the hotel. From what I recall, the beds were queens at best, and might have even been doubles. Keep in mind though, we were sharing 4 to a room. DH and I are both 5'9" and didn't have trouble with the beds - but at 6'5" I can understand the concern!

We are Canadian and did need passports and visas to visit. You hear a lot of horror stories about the visa application process, but it's not so bad once you get started on it. You do need to give a day by day accounting of where you will be (hotel name and address) as part of the application, and it gets tiresome filling that out multiple times... but it's not hard. I will say that I noticed after sending off the application that I made an error in one of the dates on our application, and was worried they would reject it outright, but we had no trouble having our visas issued.

I got asked for pictures a couple of times, and DH did as well, but mostly it was our kids that people focused on.

The best resource for train travel in China is a website called China DIY Travel. Foreigners cannot purchase train tickets online, so this is an agency that will do that for you for a small commission. They also have a ton of information on their site about the different classes of trains, how to navigate a Chinese train station, etc. They will even send you some phrases in Chinese characters to show your taxi drivers to ensure they take you to the correct train station and drop you off at the right doors. I felt very well prepared after using all of their resources to plan our trip and recommend them highly. The sleeper trains were a very efficient use of time for us since we were travelling long distances during the course of a relatively short trip. The first sleeper we took, from Shanghai to Beijing, was very nice and new and modern. The second one, from Beijing to Xi'an, was a little less so - but I would still recommend it. I don't recall there being different classes of sleeper compartments (though there are some lower-cost non-sleeper seats on the train), but the trains themselves vary in age and facilities.

We did have the best of intentions to learn some Chinese before our trip... but that didn't really happen. You can survive a trip without it. At the end of the day, all we could really say was ni hao (hello).

Hope this helps!


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## CaptainCook

LovesTimone said:


> Thanks so much for the info...
> 
> Great idea about printing an copy and practicing... and the picture size...
> 
> As far as the pictures I really am good with whatever... we really just roll with the flow... I like to just have an idea about what to expect... We were in the Dominican a couple of years ago... and this little girl kept staring at me... getting closer and closer...  so the pool hostess came over and said the girls parents had sent her over to  ask if the little girl could come over and touch my hair...I'm not sure where they were from, the hostess said, I don't think that the little girl has ever seen blonde hair before... I was like... sure no problem...There were lots of other women with different color hair... laying laying by the pool... I was wondering why me.. Then it hit me I had on my Minnie Mouse cover up.... so she came over and touch my hair... and pointed to my cover up... and said Minnie Mouse... and off she went... to cute... I guess that no matter where you are in the world... Mickey and Minnie are an international sign of friendship...
> 
> An co-worker told my DH that we would have to _*"present ourselves in person"*_ at a Chinese Consulate,  We live in Fl.... I looked up which consulate region Florida is in and its Houston TX.... so we would have to plan a trip to get the visa, and pay for faster service... We are planning to be in New York at the end of the year, I was wondering if we have to go to Texas or since we already have a trip planned could we just do it in New York...or is it a must that we do it in the region that is listed...



It probably varies from country to country, but - in our case, we could have presented in person at a Chinese Consulate; instead of doing that, we did the mail-in application which is processed by a 3rd party. You pay a fee for them to do the processing on your behalf, but it saves you the trip. I would guess the US might have something similar.


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## CaptainCook

OldSchoolReasons said:


> Just wanted to pipe in and say that for the tourist visa you will need to book your flights first and show proof of where you're staying (Booking.com receipts are fine and you can pick one with free cancellation) before you can get a visa. The photo requirements are also different from UK/USA sizes so you'll need to go to a photographer not a passport photo machine.



We provided the email confirmations from our hotels and that was sufficient.

For the nights we were on the train, we just said "Overnight train #XX from Shanghai to Beijing" and that was also sufficient. Again - that got us processed through the Canadian system; YMMV.


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## OldSchoolReasons

CaptainCook said:


> It probably varies from country to country, but - in our case, we could have presented in person at a Chinese Consulate; instead of doing that, we did the mail-in application which is processed by a 3rd party. You pay a fee for them to do the processing on your behalf, but it saves you the trip. I would guess the US might have something similar.



Ah that's good to know - I work 4 streets away from the London China embassy so have got lucky, it's still criminally expensive though for someone used to no-Visa travel.


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## jhoannam

Awesome trip report!!


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