A place to rest my head...

and to dance until I drop ;)

New destination... We finally caught up with our other half after our shenanigans in Guilin.

We spent the better part of the sunlight hunting down our hostel and finding some sustenance that wouldn't horribly upset already delicate stomachs...

The area was decorated here and there with these wall murals that were quite massive. You couldn't quite get a full capture of them because the streets were randomly narrow with tiny bridges over the vast waterways that weaved through.

A dear friend and I went hunting for some food and we stumbled upon this adorable restaurant that catered to a multitude of tastes.

Dancing, singing, karaoke, club, bar, and good ol' fun.

Most importantly... burgers.... :DDD

Water Buffalo Pools

After our river adventures, the group split up into two parts; one to get tattoos while the other went on a bike ride to hopefully go swimming.

We found a few water bison/buffalo just wading around in these pools with their nose rings tied with rope to a nearby tree.

They seemed so chill, which really fit the atmosphere.

This was our final destination. When we arrived a couple of people had just gotten out to leave for some other fantastic location. Everyone but me jumped in, which I now regret but I didn't want to swim that day. Perhaps I'll return to this amazing locale at some point in the future.

The bike ride was long but filled to the brim with amazing views of the landscape.

After our day in the sun we were forced to separate and choose once again as a problem occurred with train tickets. Either we could stand in a 17 hour train ride or wait a day and hope for tickets on another train( or two). Seeing as I felt horribly sick (contributed to my not swimming earlier) I elected to wait a day. I was a little heartbroken because that meant I would miss out on Cormorant fishing and potentially another site that was absolutely gorgeous.

Instead we had an early birthday celebration with lots of drinks, dancing, and awkward stories to tell the other group once we met up later on.

I even got roses out of the whole shebang :D

Shanghai Shenanigans!

Days unknown – July 9-10^th

Went into Ling Yin Friday so I could just wake up and meet up with the group for our trip to Shanghai. We took the high speed train which took about 45 minutes to get to Shanghai and had one stop maybe 2. I really think just 2. I sat by the window and apparently was terrified of each train that just happened to pass us.

We arrived in Shanghai unscathed and began our adventure.

Wow so took a trip by high speed rail to Shanghai this past weekend.

This was my first train ride. I felt like a dork because I sat next to the window and would jump every time a train would pass us. I believe the top speed was around 350 km/h.

As soon as we arrived we started a fun trek into an amazing supermarket. I found tons of cereals that weren't just different brandings of frosted flakes. Though they were significantly pricier than Hangzhou Tower's 50 kuai (less than 6 USDs but still). They even had Milka chocolates. Mmm chocolate. Soooo many delicious imported goods.

Dumplings and egg rolls yuuum

We got better deliciousness at this fairly upscale restaurant that I have completely forgotten the name for. It was really pretty and it was weird to hear so many people using English that weren't Laowai :P

Soup filled dumplings

Soy sauce wasn't so great with these though. I think the soup mixed with my soy sauce and made it really bitter or I may have accidentally grabbed the vinegar. After our rather quick lunch (quick because we were all apparently starved) we made our way down the street towards our Hostel. It had a really cool hallway of what I'm assuming to be old traditional Chinese statues that were lit up in a very museum like manner. Though that left the rest of the hallway in darkness.

Sorry that it's rotated stupidly

We dropped off our things then we tried to make our way to the People's park to check out some museums. Before we actually made it there we stopped to check out an odd gathering of people. 

Yes this is a giant plate

We were sort of being silly and ran over to sit down on the bench.

People surrounding the area trying to figure out what it was about immediately started taking photos of us and then photos of our group taking photos. It was a giant yo dawg we heard you like--- moment. 

It was a lot of fun living it up in the limelight, especially since we earned some very sought after bug spray. Yaaay for finding an OFF advertisement and getting free repellent. I was not dinner that night at the Bund.

Before we got to the Bund we ended up getting bubble tea, stopping at an underground market of sorts, attempted to find a KFC for another bubble tea in the Hershey's store/shopping complex, and found the abstract art museum with an exhibit called the Tao of Nature.

These statues were near the bathrooms

The bathroom walls were covered in slang/inappropriate words with details depending on gender. There were little buses cruising along the walls.

And a random assortment of household items painted white dangling on a wall.

Once again apologies for unrotated annoying

Modern art is odd but definitely fun sometimes. There were these cases of prehistoric fossils. An actual fossil along with something of pop culture relation like a pikachu fossil next to a plant one. 

We left for the Bund! It was really gorgeous and rather phallic. Bad placement of the globes or great placement?