CupKayke

Pier 39 has a 7D theatre experience ~ it's about 10 min long. They also have this light maze type thing that you have try to walk through without setting off the alarm. Its for kids and adults. Only $12. We are in our early 40s and we'll be trying it out next month. Its called 7D Experience (I think). There is a viewing area where you can watch, too.

LUVING all the replies!! Thanks everyone. Really appreciate all the specifics. Looks like we've been able to wrap-up our two days fairly well ~ even added-in a quick stop at Bella Gelataria, hopefully.

Wanted to add some great news ~ we are booked for a 2.5 hour kayaking tour with "EcoMarine Paddlesport Centres" now! I found them on the web and then followed them on Facebook and called this morning and they booked us while I was on the phone. It is perfect because the kayak tour leaves from their Granville Island location at 2pm. What a great day this will be! If anyone is interested in joining us, this is a "private" tour that I told them they could make public (its the same price) and add 4 more kayakers if they wish. It's 2pm to 4:30pm Saturday September 26th, Rain or Shine, and 65 CND per person. The total that came out of my account this morning was $103.52 USD. I'm going to post this tour on our roll call in case anyone wants to join-in. You don't need to contact me, just call EcoMarine and ask to join the Granville Island kayak tour that day. https://www.ecomarine.com/tours/guided-tour-from-granville-island/

1-888-425-2925 (toll free from US)

and they have a local phone # on their website, too

Thanks again for the answers. I luv Cruise Critic! We are more excited about our days in Vancouver than we are our cruise. :D

xlxo ~ Excellent!! You answered the majority of my questions ~ greatly appreciate it.

The "Igloo" is just the entrance to the Pacific Centre Mall on Georgia Street. :D It really does look like an igloo. I only know this because it's on The Tour Guys website. http://www.tourguys.ca/#!downtown-waterfront/c152

My husband and I very recently booked a trip to Vancouver next month with a cruise following. We will be spending 3 nights in Vancouver so we have 2 full days of touring/exploring. We realize it may be cool and rainy but this is my favorite type of weather and we will arrive prepared. With my limited time to plan and considering our tastes, I’ve drafted the following 2 day itinerary… and I have a few questions…I have written some of the questions in-between the other ramblings below if someone would be kind enough to answer any of these questions. There is another small list of questions at the end of this post.

We are staying at the Best Western Plus Chateau on Granville Street. We are in our mid-40s… active but not athletic. We’d like to stay busy for most of the days in Vancouver… we’ll relax in the evenings and on the ship.

Day 1 – We will be up early… we will have breakfast in the hotel and then relax on our balcony or in the hotel until around 10:30am (unless someone has an idea of something close by to visit/do this morning). We will walk < 0.5 mile to “The Igloo” on Georgia Street to take the “Tour Guys” Downtown and Waterfront Walking Tour from 11am to 12:30pm. We end at the Olympic Cauldron on Canada Place Way.

This is where I need a bit of help… we may try “Fly Over Canada” inside Canada Place if we are close. This is something my husband would enjoy! I can’t seem to find on Mapquest how far it is from the Olympic Cauldron to Canada Place? I’m thinking we are close. ?? Then, a quick lunch somewhere near Canada Place or on the waterfront that isn’t extremely expensive (less than 50 CND per person or am I being too cheap??) …an outdoor patio by the water would be perfect for a lunch, we would like Vietnamese food if really close but a pretzel & lemonade may be okay too. No sushi. We love crab legs, shark, most cooked seafood. Nothing fancy – we will be in our “hiking-type” clothes, tennis shoes, and probably rain jackets today. Any suggestions??

Next up – take the free shuttle from Canada Place to Capilano Park/Suspension Bridge. If we arrive here by 2/2:30pm we still have plenty of time because the park doesn’t close until 7pm this day. We will take the free shuttle back to our hotel to hopefully hit happy hour which is 4pm-7pm. 

Day 2 – We are taking the Granville Island Foodie Tour this morning. It starts at 10:30am . I’ve yet to figure out the best way to get to Granville Island. An Aquabus? False Creek Ferries? I look online but can’t figure out which of their stops are within walking distance from our hotel, if any? I think a ferry would be the “fun” way to go but is it practical? If so, that would be great! Would love some suggestions on this. A boat is my first choice.

Our tour is over by 12:30pm. We will probably walk around the market and buy anything we wanted to buy on the tour and did not have time to do so. Not sure what else there is to do on Granville Island that day. The Tour Guys are not offering the 1pm Granville Island tour this day – it looks like they are closed for the season by this late September date. We may simply walk and shop and explore the market inside and out.

We would really enjoy an early afternoon 1 or 2 hour kayak tour around Granville Island or near downtown Vancouver ~ even if it's chilly and a misty rain that day. I have emailed two different sites that look to still be open late September (I’ve already found one that is closed for the season by this late date) so I’m waiting for email replies as what we would really like to do is taking a guided kayak tour around the houseboats and the waterfront area. Does anyone know a kayak tour company you can recommend? If all else fails, we may just spend the majority of our day on Granville Island walking and shopping, have an early dinner at Edible Canada and then head back to our hotel for an early night but I’m open to suggestions for this afternoon if we can’t find a Kayak tour.

Other general questions:

• Anyone know of any grocery or liquor stores near our hotel? One of my favorite things to do in other countries is peruse the grocery stores – they are usually a good laugh and sometimes there are great finds in grocery stores on t-shirts, local cups, souvenirs for co-workers/friends.

• One of my husband’s favorite things is to buy a bottle of liquor for the hotel. Any recommendations where we can do this near our hotel?

• Can anyone recommend a decent Vietnamese restaurant within 10-15 min walking distance from our hotel? I would love to try a bowl of pho.

• Please don’t flame me for this…. my husband smokes. I have read that Vancouver is non-smoking inside all hotels and parks, beaches, etc. Does anyone know about restaurants? We still live in an area where all the restaurants still have a smoking section. Is this an option anywhere in Vancouver? Will there be places for him to stop and smoke outside occasionally? My husband carries e-cigs and he is also a very courteous smoker but if we are out walking and there is a place for him to have a real cigarette, this would make his day better. For the record, I hate smoking. I love him. No lectures, please.

• Has anyone noticed if Discover is accepted in Canada? We get miles on our Discover card and thus far we haven’t encountered a single place that accepts Discover! Odd, it seems.

Thanks for any suggestions or answers to my questions. I am trying to figure out what we will be doing or get a good general idea before I order some Canadian money.

We did the San Diego to Vancouver trip this year, and I was surprised at how little information was available regarding anything on the trip, since it is a short one-off. The people here were very helpful in letting me know what to expect.

 

I reviewed it on my blog if you want to take a peek... you can see the daily programs and menus and such...

Just read your blog. Thanks for the info. Good little review!

What a nice surprise to see this thread alive again. I am glad I could assist others going with Gate 1 on this trip with information and details. Hindsight is 20/20...and we would do this trip all over again. :)

I don't know if I wrote it in my review or not (maybe I did?) but the people we traveled with on this Gate 1 tour/cruise were very well traveled.... many had visited countries we have not even considered... Egypt, India,Africa etc... one couple had traveled to more countries than they could possibly count and this was their third time, at least, with Gate 1. Gate 1 Travel really is about people who want a great deal and a good experience - not the same o' same o' - and not 5-star luxury when you are in a poor country like China. We will probably return to China years from now to see the Xian warriors as my in-laws say they are a "don't miss" and who knows... if Gate 1 is around... we'll be using them. We are already planning to use them again next year for a different trip.

Mory & Lamchops... sorry it has been a while but thank you for the nice comments about my review. The longer away it is since we traveled, the more I want to redo this vacation. Ha! :D

Thanks for the info on genvisa. The service I was going to use mychinavisa doubled their price. Genvisa has a reasonable price and will only have one FedEx charge for two visas ordered at the same time.

You are welcome.

Dear Cupkayke: I followed you on a site regarding what you were going to back and I'm so excited to find you again doing this amazing review!!!!! So glad you enjoyed the trip and I loved the photo of you and your husband at Chongghng. Ooops spelling. What a cute couple.

 

I am doing the Viking China Emerald trip in April and sure hope it's warmer than you found it! As I've been researching and reading on the China posts I know about bringing snacks, etc. Hadn't read about the empty water bottle, thanks. I will take into account the leggings. I am not planning on bringing much clothing; I've been know to do that in the past. I will take pepto bismal tablets, Tylenol, cough meds etc. Any other med. suggestions? Sounds like you had an interesting group of fellow passengers.

 

Hope you get back to see this message. And, I will check back. I feel as though I've been to China now.

Rodie ~ thank you for all your nice comments! I love the picture in Chongquing too! :) You will probably have much better weather in April!

As for packing and tips, I can't think of much else. I took a small pharmacy and didn't use hardly anything. Our doctor had prescribed us a 7-day antibiotic if we needed it and we did not. My one night I needed pepto was over by the morning. There was a fellow passenger with us (a single guy) who had any medicine for anything and offered them to everyone regularly. HA Our fellow passengers were interesting and funny and nice people ~ several who had taken Viking cruises through Europe and many that were well-traveled far beyond my husband and I. We were surprised by how much we liked the group travel experience and we are now looking into another group-type trip next year.

As for any other tips, I can't think of anything but shoes maybe... I wish I would have taken/worn a pair of stylish boots. I tend to be a tennis shoe girl on vacation because they are comfortable and there is lots of walking. I need to try to find a pair of boots that are super comfy that I could walk in all day... if I was going in April, that's what I would look for ~ comfy boots... but style is always secondary to comfort for me when we are traveling and walking all day. That' s really the only thing popping in my head this morning.

Glad you enjoyed reading my review and I hope you have a wonderful trip!

We recently used Generations Visa. I mailed our passports, documents, & money ~ received everything back with our Visas with no problems in less than 3 weeks. genvisa dot com

PS ~ Our tour guide warned us as did our day guide in Shanghai "Shanghai is not the REAL Chinese."

He repeated, several times while we were walking to The Bund area ~ "Remember, this is NOT THE REAL CHINESE." We all agreed. Wish we could have seen Xian instead!!

We are taking a cruise tour and are worried about our cases. We will have three large cases, plus two (larger size) carry ons. We will be flying

Shanghai, to Xian, Xian to Bejing. We have flown in China before, and our

carry ons, we too big and went under. We are flying buisness class to and from Asia, but the cruise line arranges the air in China. As anyone do this?

We have tried call the cruise line, they really didn't know, our Travel Agent also was unable to get this information. Thanks for any help.

It was my recent experience with Air China that each person can check two bags on any flight within or to China - even the small 2 hour flights - you can check two bags per person. It was also my recent experience that you can carry-on anything you can carry - there were multiple Chinese flyers with multiple bags per person and as along as they could carry them, not a word was said. Our group started getting a bit lax and doing the same thing on our last couple of flights - I carried a backpack, a purse, and a big bag with a large box of cookies for my co-workers on two Air China flights - no questions asked. I got to the states and the United Airlines lady said "Okay, I'll make an exception" but she was being nice and I had too many carry-ons. It's different in China.

Thank you for taking me along on your trip.

 

China is on my bucket list and I will look into Gate 1.

You are welcome

and thank you to anyone else who had kind things to say about my review

Really, really can't thank you enough for this review and for taking the time to answer my questions. Hope you are finally over the jet lag!

You are welcome. I don't know if it is work, the holidays or jet lag but I'm up at 3:20am again. It is much, much better now and I'm almost back to normal. :D

Thanks for such an informative and balanced review. We are hoping to travel to China later next year so I enjoyed reading this very much :D

You are welcome and I'm glad you enjoyed reading my review. :) Have fun in China!

Correction!!

our Gate 1 Tour Guide for the entire trip was:

....not Jason Liu. I thought that was his name from day one but i just finished putting my entire picture album together for my husband to take to work and lo and behold... There was a letter from Jason Yin so I looked on our Gate 1 id tags where he had written his phone # and name as Jason Yin. My apologies! just wanted to get that correct because he was... Fabulous!!!

Thanks for the summary!

 

This was a very interesting a well-written account of a very exotic itinerary and I liked your honesty re the sights sounds smells and tastes you encountered.

 

The hotels and cabin on the ship look rather spartan but then that's how I imagine China for the most part as they just came out of the dark ages lately. The ferry bathroom.....yikes!

 

The closest I've been to China is Chinatown in San Francisco.

 

So not one for my bucket list but I was able to cruise with you without leaving the comfort of home-which is the mark of a good review.

 

I salute your sense of adventure!

 

Norris

Thank you and you are welcome! I'm glad I still have a sense of adventure... LOL :)

Here are pictures of our hotel room in Beijing:

Here are pictures of our hotel room in Shanghai:

FINAL TIPS:

· Both hotels in Beijing and Shanghai have a water boiler/tea pot. You can use the tap water and boil it to make your own tea, hot chocolate, noodles, etc. Many of us did this several times throughout our tour. Don’t forget to pack your own tea or hot chocolate because one tiny packet of Lipton tea in the Shanghai hotel will cost you 28 Yuan. We joked that had we thought of it ahead of time, we would have thrown a couple of packs of ramen noodles in our suitcases to eat on the nights when it was too late or we were too tired to go out and eat. The cups in the hotel in Beijing were HUGE – like bowls, so this would have worked great. It’s all part of the experience…

· Air China’s plane to and from the United States has three rows of “2-3-2” – Rows 33, 59 & 60. I had researched this prior to our trip. This is perfect for couples, gives you extra leg room, and I would highly recommend you and your partner attempt to get one of these rows if at all possible. We had the far right side of the plane, Row 60 traveling to Beijing and the far left side of the plane, Row 60, traveling home to Los Angeles. These were the longest international flights we have ever been on and the BEST international flights we have ever experienced. I recommend the last two rows on the plane. There are three bathrooms back there and people seem to not know about them or not use them often plus there is plenty of room to stretch and walk around or just stand up for a while if need be. It was a quiet area of the plane.

· Water is supplied by Gate 1 daily and there is always plenty of it – your tour guide will offer it consistently and even if you don’t think you need it, take it and put it in your daypack so you have plenty to brush your teeth in the room, etc. The water in your room on the ship is unlimited and free for the Gate 1 tour group – everyone else pays 8 Yuan per bottle .

· You will want to get enough Yuan prior to flying to China to last you until you get on the cruise ship – and then you can hand them $100 US bills or $20 US bills or $10s, it matters none, and they will quickly exchange your money. I handed them some bills to exchange one day and one of the 5s was ripped so they could not take it so make sure your bills are in good shape also. The things I remember people buying in Beijing that looked the most “fun” were the Communist hats and they had some handmade Christmas ornaments at The Summer Palace. I think most of the shopping began in the villages along the river however, there is a large grocery store minutes away from your hotel in Beijing (and from your hotel in Shanghai). Just say “supermarcado” and they will point you there, somehow. LOL

· The people in China are not dressy people. Sweats are worn by men and women everywhere most of the time. Our tour guide wore sweats all three days of touring in Beijing and this put me at ease and I felt more comfortable wearing my Yoga pants – and then I looked around and most of our group wore leggings the entire time. There were three ladies I never saw in anything but leggings. The Chinese are casual people everywhere, all the time. You could buy a pair of sweats for 18 Yuan, btw (but you need to be small). You could buy a complete sleep outfit at the “grocery” store – all sorts of cute pajamas – for 20 Yuan. Casual is best if you want to fit-in in China.

· A bottle of Absolute will cost you 150 Yuan everywhere. A bottle of the “decent” firewater will cost you 40 Yuan. Beer is cheep – a couple of Yuan per can – but only 3% alcohol. Cigarettes vary greatly from a few cents per pack to 120 Yuan per pack. How expensive your cigarette is in China is sort of a “class” thing - men exchange cigarettes on the street like we exchange business cards here. Lighters are less than 1 Yuan each and you can get one from the Captain on the ship for free or at least he gave one to my husband the first night. Real nice guy.

FINAL THOUGHTS:

If I gave anyone the impression during this review that I was unhappy with our trip in any way or with Gate 1, that was not my intention. This trip was…A~M~A~Z~I~N~G! I wanted to use my review to point-out the few things that bothered me or that I would change if I could or if I had known ahead of time, it would have made things easier so I could help others in the future. For me, the things that stand-out the most would be: requesting a different a room on the cruise ship the very first day we realized we had a sewer/smell problem, packing 3 or 4 pair of walking pants/yoga pants/leggings and only one pair of jeans and less tops, packing some ramen noodles (true!), and probably just making ourselves attend every tour, regardless of how we may have felt. Having said that about the tours, I do want to say that two ladies on our trip were sick the last day – one had been sick for a couple of days with what seemed to be the flu and she was absolutely miserable and the other one had developed a fever the last day but she seemed to be chugging along okay. Maybe skipping out when we thought we needed too was for the best, maybe not. Also, I would go ahead and explore on our own from the first night without hesitancy but hindsight is 20/20.

And my last words about our Gate 1 Travel experience… it was exactly what I wanted it to be… and more. The only surprises were good surprises like extra tours, the MagLev train, Chongquing village, etc. The Gate 1 price for this type of tour is unbeatable. The other tour groups with their flags were beside us at times, doing the same things, for a much higher price. My in-laws did this exact same tour with another company for over double the price per person PLUS they had to pay for their flights separately. The Gate 1 hotels were nice, accommodating, clean, and large. Both hotels for this trip were far nicer than the Hilton LAX we stayed in pre and post trip and both rooms were giant compared to our Hilton LAX room. Our bathroom in Shanghai had two showers – one on each side of the sink. Gate 1 Travel delivered an excellent trip… everything ran smoothly… there were lots of extras and add-ons for no fee… and we were well taken care of from the minute we landed in Beijing until the minute we landed back in Los Angeles. We will absolutely look at Gate 1 Travel in the future for other tours. While on this tour we met at least four others who have traveled with Gate 1 – some multiple times. One of the single men traveling with us noted that he was in Israel and stayed in the hotel owned by the same man who owns Gate 1 Travel – who also happens to be from Israel. Everyone who had used Gate 1 Travel previously spoke highly of them, said they were predictable, the hotels were good, the trips were smooth, and all went well each time they had traveled with them. Our group consisted of 28 people…age range was 21 through 74…. 7 pilots from Sarasota, Florida (with wives/sisters, etc)… at least three people traveling completely alone (one lady, two men)…. two semi-recent Brown graduates (one now works for Google)…. a retired teacher and her son, an incredibly nice Hungarian lady and her mid-40s daughter, a well-traveled American Pilipino family that had been on vacation to various places since August 31st, a couple that could list the countries they had not visited much quicker than the countries they had visited, etc. Intelligent, kind, funny, warm-hearted, and down-to-Earth people made this group wonderful and our Tour Guide, Jason Liu, was the glue that held it all together. He was fantastic! It is my opinion that if you are looking to travel comfortably, if you are smart with your money and comfortable meeting and becoming friends with strangers… Gate 1 Travel is for you. Also, I know I mentioned a lot of drinking but I never drink more than 2 glasses of wine. That’s just me. Others did not drink at all. Some quietly prayed before their meals. This tour was setup where you could do your own thing every day or join the group every day or weave in and out as it was best for you. I would recommend this tour to anyone. I hope you all enjoyed my review. Our trip is over now but the memories are forever…

Excellent review. I have never been to China but this summer did my first (but not last) tour with Gate 1 in Central Europe.

 

 

Our impression of Gate 1 was -

• great price
  
• wonderful hotels
  
• interesting tours
  
• unusual and intriguing optional tours
  

No unpleasant surprises, everything was as described.

 

Judy

Thank you and I agree with your sentiments completely.

This is my review so I can write my opinion. I did not like Shanghai. AT ALL. Shanghai is not the real China. Shanghai was full of the French, Germans, Americans, etc - all westerners with round eyes and light colored hair who spoke other languages (not Chinese), shopped at the mall in China made for westerners with ridiculous western prices (more expensive there than here even), ate at the Burger King, McDonalds, & Starbucks at the mall, and lived in ex-pat housing that looked like small homes with green lawns. This is not what I came to China to see - the "fake" China. Clearly nothing like we saw in the rest of China. The real Chinese people, on the sides streets away from The Bund and mall areas.... they hated us. This is the only time that they gave us dirty looks, treated us badly, and were resentful of us. There was NO bargaining on prices or they would raise the price from the marked price when you picked it up (happened twice). The "Chinese" people you see on The Bund?? They are Chinese tourists from other countries (mainly America as they all spoke English). This area is full of hotels and busloads of tourists, American Chinese tourists taking pictures of Shanghai and telling people back home this is what China looks like when it is not. The ONLY time we ever ran into rude service was Shanghai and it was probably because they were sick of the rude westerners everywhere spending more money on a phone in one day than they make in a month. I could write forever about this but I would prefer to never return to Shanghai again because The Bund area in Shanghai is what the government has created for westerners and then they tell the world "this is China" but it is NOT the real China - most Chinese people are starving and living without heat or cooling year-round. There were several in our group who had long discussions about this situation.

The ex-pat homes as seen through our hotel's glass elevator:

Lemon oreos, found in a grocery store today:

Everywhere else they eat dog and cat is on the menu - as our guide said "If it has four legs, we eat it" - we saw pitiful, starving, boney dogs in almost every city and in Shanghai, we see this... in a grocery store...

That's all I'll say about Shanghai. I've made my sentiments clear. I'd rather see Xian than Shanghai. I'd rather see any city in China than Shanghai. I realize I don't necessarily take well to the food or smells but that is what I was there for ~ to experience their life and be a traveler, not a tourist.

The next day we explored some more side streets with some new friends we made in our group and then checked-out of our hotel by 1pm. We were taken to the airport, got fantastic seats for the long-long flight home, and then flew Shanghai to Beijing... had a long delay on the first flight... ran through immigration and security... and made it on our flight from Beijing to LAX with NINE minutes to spare! It took us a total of 70 hours to get home because we spent the night in LA (slept <3 hours) and then flew LAX to Denver to STL and then drove four hours to our home. The longest, most exhaustive traveling we've ever done. It is a full week later and our times are still not correct yet.

I will make one last entry later with some more information on our Gate 1 Travel Group, the cruise, etc. This was the most interesting trip I've ever taken in my life.

The next morning breakfast was at 7am, there was a scheduled group tour at 8am to the YuYuan gardens and to a silk factory and then you were scheduled to be on your own all afternoon. Many of us were stricken with travelers diarrhea. I was up off and on all night. I skipped breakfast but my husband told our tour guide we would not be going on the short trip to the gardens this morning.

By 9:30am, I was fine so my husband and I left our hotel room before noon and did not return until after 6pm. We walked EVERYWHERE.

To back-up, however, they took another group picture today and again, we missed it and again, so did several other people. Shanghai is very westernized and many people chose to do their own thing in Shanghai since a taxi to 3 miles away was about 15 Yuan there and 20 Yuan back.

Also, today, they added-in a visit to the famous Shanghai bizarre!! Apparently, this is where they had all the items westerners like us look for on vacation - things we did not see anywhere else in China - baseball hats that said Shanghai, Christmas ornaments that looked like The Summer Palace, etc. We were given a card and instructions to go to the bizarre on our own the next morning but we took a walk along some more side streets instead as we were already packed and I was finally shopped-out.

Also, apparently many people spent lots of money today on silk rugs and carpets. I know our friends spent $800 on one piece. Others spent thousands. I saw the pictures but this is not something that would go well in my home so I don't think I missed too much there but it would have been neat to see how the silk is made but being close to a bathroom was more important to me this morning. Again, I do not fret over what was missed but choose to enjoy what we did see and I consider myself lucky that this is the only time during the trip when this occurred.

Today we explored the side shops and the main areas all the way to The Bund. I bought some tea at a tea store (there were several in the area).

We made it to The Bund financial district around dusk...

Financial District (banks galore)

The Bund area at night:

We were taken to our gorgeous hotel in Shanghai and given a Premium Room on the 13th floor - just one level below the Executive Suites. We had a nice view of the Pudong River out our large windows. The hotel is beautiful, has a restaurant on the fourth & fifth floors, a Russian vodka bar on the 3rd floor, a glass see-through elevator at the end of the hallway for views, and overall a very nice hotel.

Night view from our room:

After check-in most of us met at 7pm with our Gate 1 Tour Guide (voluntary only) and his final surprise today was to give us a 45 minute walk around the streets of our hotel. Our hotel is about a ten minute walk to all the restaurants, attractions, and bright lights where the Bund area starts. It is about a full 30 minutes (if you are slow) to the actual Bund area where the Pearl Tower, Bottle Opener, etc is located. Tonight, we were given a tour of the side streets and directions to easily get around Shanghai on our own for the next two days/nights. This was something extra our Gate 1 Tour Guide did for us that again was not on the itinerary and was very helpful to everyone over the next two days as we all felt comfortable walking around everywhere because he gave us tall, large landmarks to orient ourselves to the area to remember. The next day my husband and I would leave our hotel and walk for nearly five hours exploring the side streets and then through the "western" mall area and down to the financial district and The Bund sightseeing area and back to our hotel. Easy breezy.

A restaurant on a side street... you choose your meal, they kill and prepare immediately... this restaurant was popular in the day and night.

Need an extra suitcase to take home tea sets?

Scooterville

After our shopping trip in Chongquing we drove to the airport, went through security, and had about an hour to eat something. There was a Subway in the Chongquing airport upstairs on the main level. I ordered a hot ham and cheese (they heat all sandwiches without asking). It was superliciously fantastical. My husband ordered some sort of steak and cheese with extra cheese. We ordered one as a "meal deal" with one cookie and a soda to split. They were out of chips at Subway. They offered soda but ONLY Coke and they took the glass to the back and brought back out to you, filled with their mystery Coke. We both had a little bit of this odd-tasting soda. I've never seen a country live on Coke before - no Diet Coke, very little Sprite, no Dr Pepper or anything like that - ALWAYS COKE. The total for us was 56 Yuan ~ under 7 US dollars. Worth every little penny.

After eating we went downstairs and just like our last intra-China flight - with no announcement whatsoever, they started boarding about 15 minutes early. We see the Chinese flying through first because they have soooo many carry-ons with them - they want the overhead space. Our guide says: "It can't be our flight" but then he goes and talks to them and says "Everyone onboard!" Two girls in our group were still upstairs eating and our guide had to go look for them. Our guide boarded every flight last and told us he can never leave a tour group member in a city alone. Our tour guide is very good at his job but corralling 28 people must be a tough job. As a note... all of the intra-China flights boarded early, with no announcement ahead of time, people just started getting on the plane about 15 minutes before the time to board on our tickets.

Again, a full meal was served on this flight. I ate nothing. Even if I had an appetite, I don't think I could have stomached anything offered. All the food was barely was recognizable if at all. To me, this is part of the experience of it all and I regret not having my camera for this combination however, I am glad we had ate in the airport.

Speaking of food in the airport... I think I should mention that they will allow you through security with any food ~ oranges, peanut butter crackers, m&ms, etc. Most people were carrying snacks in their carry-ons. I didn't find this out until today. One lady had bought a big bag of oranges from one of the boat vendors off her balcony and she shared with everyone ~ they were sweet and good. You cannot get through security with bottled water but again, you can take one of your empty bottles through and then fill your bottle in the airport ~ there are plenty of water stations all over the China airports. The water stations offer cold, warm, and hot water for free and it is drinkable, of course. The Chinese carry small thermos' for their hot tea they like to drink and fill them with hot water in the airports ~ even the businessmen.

We soon arrived at the Shanghai Pudong International Airport. We had a long walk to get our bags. Along the way, there were interesting silver people:

Gate 1 is not pushy by the way - you don't have to stay together as a group going through the airport. People stopped to take pictures or smoke or go to the bathroom - we all ended-up meeting in the baggage area around the same time and that is all that counted. Most people on this trip were well traveled far beyond my husband and I so getting through an airport was no biggie.

For the smokers.. there is a smoking room in every China airport. However, they took ALL of my husband's lighters at every airport every time. You cannot have a lighter or matches. The smoking lounges have a little area where you put your cigarette in and push a button and it lights the cigarette for you.

For someone who does not smoke and actually has a sensitivity to it... for the Chinese being such BIG smokers, you would never know it. I was never around smoke. On the cruise ship, we had to keep our balcony door shut so the smoke would not flow into our room and or would be fined. In the hotels, we requested and were given smoking rooms and all the hotels had windows that opened so we opened our windows so the smoke didn't fill the room. I know the Chinese smoke a lot but I never really saw it.

Back to the airport... we all loaded our bags into a small van for the Gate 1 carrier to take them to the hotel for us and we dropped-off our carry-on bags on the tour bus and then... our second surprise of the day... we took the MagLev high-speed train into Shanghai! This was something our Gate 1 Tour Guide asked us if we would be interested in doing and EVERYONE voted yes! It was 50 Yuan per person.

Our train max speed was 301 kilometers per hour or about 180 miles per hour. It was neat because it actually seemed to twist on its side when getting into the city. It's more like an easy amusedement park ride.

We arrived in Chongquing around 3am and the view was stormy and smoggy mixed...

Today was Debarkation Day in Chongquing ~ One of my favorite days of this tour! It will take me a few entries to share some of the memories from this day. I was wide awake by 4:00am today and wanted to send an email. I went to the 5th floor lounge and it was locked. When the servers came-up to setup for breakfast I asked them when it would be opened and they said it would not be opened today - at all. I sat on the stairs and used the Internet for a few minutes and finally went back to my cabin. I did not like this aspect of the river cruise as during normal cruises, there is always a place you can get away to while your spouse is sleeping and you don't have to be in one area on one deck for Internet but alas...

I am going to move-on to the rest of the land tour now and update it rather quickly (hopefully). I will return with some final thoughts, information and opinions about the cruise and the tour overall at the end.

Our flight from Chongquing to Pudong (Shanghai) wasn't until 1pm so our Gate 1 Tour Guide talked to our driver in Chongquing and he took us to a local popular shopping mart. It was SO MUCH FUN!! It looked like a small village in Germany but with red hanging lanterns. The locals do not see westerners very often so they were very engaging and friendlly to us. They asked to take our picture, they took our pictures, and sold us all sorts of dirt cheap goods - because the prices were already listed for the local people. I got 5 makeup bags for 10 Yuan which is about $1.64 US dollars and a beautiful tea service set - one like another traveler had previously purchased for 165 Yuan - I paid 50 Yuan after much bargaining. The bargaining was good today. It was fun-fun-fun. We toured the village with the tour guide and we all stopped to taste their version of beef jerky, we ate some local candy, we had some hot spices, and we ate this street food that looked like small red candy apples but it was a sour fruit that had been carmalized with red sugar on the outside -- sooooo good!

Sweet & Sour candies - I saw some of our group eating these in Beijing, too...

We watched them make noodles by hand...

We were then all given about an hour to shop. I did well.

I am going to write about the rest of our trip and post those photos later. I'm actually TIRED tonight at the NORMAL time - it's taken almost a week but FINALLY!! :) Returning from Asia is nothing like returning from Italy...

Reading every word and shared the link! Thanks for writing such an in-depth review.

 

Couple of questions that I hope you can answer:

1. Did you use the laundry service and how did your clothes feel after? Were they scented, stiff, wrinkly, etc?

2. Were they strict on the amount of luggage you can bring? Were you able to bring an extra checked bag if you paid extra?

3. If someone on the tour got tired could they sit on the bus? My mom will be traveling with me and I wondered if she could rest on the bus if she got tired at the Great Wall for example.

4. Were there blow dryers in the hotels and on the ship? (I know, such a girly question!)

1 - Yes. We got 4 free items laundered per day for upgrading our cabin. A pair of socks was only considered 1 item, btw. I put out a bag each morning (9am deadline) and received the laundry back clean, in clear little bags, by 6pm every day. The laundry was not scented, wrinkly, and wasn't even stiff but the shirts were folded nicely and nothing shrunk. I smelled the socks and they simply smelled clean. I was impressed.

2 - They were not strict on the luggage at all. We did not handle our luggage, ever. We were told all the luggage was weighed together so it "evened out" but the weight max per person was announced to be around 44 pounds ~ I think ~ maybe 47 pounds per person. My husband and I both had 24 inch suitcases that weighed less than 30 pounds each. I saw two other couples with smaller checked bags than ours. I saw another couple with 29 inch suitcases each. I saw another lady had 3 checked suitcases - one just for shoes. Many people had not one but two carry-ons. The Chinese do not care how many carry-ons you have - they all have 2 or 3 or more each - if you can carry it, you can bring it on! At LA they allowed us two bags checked bags per person for the long flights, btw - no charge. Gate 1 checks your bags for the short flights so I suppose you can have 2 bags with them also as many people did. I noticed every time we got our luggage tags, both my husband's and my bag was checked under my name, like my husband didn't have bags.

3 - Most of the time, yes, you could sit on the bus. At The Great Wall the bus was available pretty much the entire time since we were there for so long people returned at various times. At the Ming Tombs the bus was available the entire time. If you didn't want to make The Sacred Garden 45-minute walk, they said you could sit on the bus and wait. There was only one time I remember them announcing that you could not stay with the bus. My only complaint about this was the driver did not turn on the bus to heat the bus until everyone was on and he left the doors open so it was very cold on the bus. We had to wait a long time at The Great Wall for someone who was lost and we were freezing. I suppose, in the summer, with no air, this would make the bus very warm. Our bus driver stayed in our bus all day ~ a couple of times we caught him sleeping when we returned to the bus. :o

4 - Both hotels had blow dryers that worked well - the blow dryers were in the desk drawers, however. Odd, I thought. The ship had a big sign in the bathroom saying you could get a blow dryer at the front desk but you could NOT plug-in your own dryer in their outlet!! I never could get a dryer on the ship and neither could several others. I have to blow dry my hair before I fix it so one day I just didn't curl it and the other days I let it dry and fixed it after noon or I took my shower before I went to sleep at night so my hair was dry by morning.

Thanks for reading and sharing my link. I want you to know that we loved Gate 1 Travel, we loved our guide, we loved our trip to China, and we were thoroughly happy with each aspect of our trip. The little things were just "little" things but I mention them so you have an even better trip than us! :D