Day 4 November 16 2006
We got up early this am to leave Beijing at 8:30 am flight to Shanghi. We will be flying dragon air; great due to the fact I like dragons. We landed in Shanghai about 11:30 AM and it was raining. We got on the bus and headed to Suzhou where we will be staying the night at the Bamboo Grove Hotel. We had a good lunch then went to the Lion Hill where we got to see the 7-story pagoda. This was built on the grave of one of the Ming Emperor when one of his children saw a white tiger on the hill. The pagoda leans at a slight angle like the leaning tower of pizza.
We then went to our hotel for some rest and relaxation. We where going to take the bus to our restaurant for dinner with other members of our group but there was only 5 of us on the bus. We all talked about it and decided to walk around the neighborhood and see the sights and get something to eat. We walked down to a small herb store and got something for my cough that was hanging on to my cold. The herb tasted AWFUL, but over the next couple of days it seemed to help.
After the herb store we stopped at a bakery and got a couple of snacks and then one of the couples we where with needed to get some cash so we looked for an ATM. Found several but she could not get her card to work in any of them. She had some cash and it was enough for her. We then walked down the street to a side street and checked it out, the smells of food cooking mixed with the smell of an open sewer. Not one of the better smells.
We then found a small restaurant and had a shrimp and soup dinner, the food was very good and CHEAP…
I think we left a tip that was almost our meal price.
After our meal we stopped at a coffee shop and had some tae and talked with one of our tour mates.
Well we where getting tired so we went back to the motel to get some sleep, by the way it had been raining most of the evening.