Hang Zhou

We visited Hangzhou City last September 4-6. We planned to go there the day before and even went to a bar the night before the trip. Our original plan was to catch the 9:30 train to Hangzhou which meant waking up early to get to Shanghai South Railway station which is on the other end of Shanghai. It's fifteen stations away from JiangWan Town station, the nearest from our school. We ended up getting the 11:45 train which arrives at 1:07PM in HZ. It's a fast train with a top speed of 140 KPH. When we got there, we had to ride a bus to reach the city center or at least the West Lake area then look for a cheap hotel. Good thing I listed cheap hotels from the internet. We got to a hostel which costs 40 yuan per person but they didn't have enough beds to accommodate 9 people. They were corteous enough to call other hostels that could accommodate us. It was a little bit more expensive but had a home-ier feel to it. We finished unpacking at around 3 then headed back to the Lake area to grab some food. We went to Butterfly Laguna which offered a eat-all-you-can with great choices. We were so hungry that we ordered about 70% of what's on the menu! It was our breakfast,lunch and dinner altogether. We chilled afterwards and watched the famous fountain show by the lake. Afterwards, we tried out some local beer since Dexter was really into drinks. We got back to our hostel by 10. There, we stayed in the lobby area and got to meet an Austrian who has been everywhere. He has the best job in the world! He earns by travelling! He's been to our country for around 6 times already. He could speak a little bit of Laos,Cambodian,Filipino,German,Chinese,etc. He's even a Freddie Aguilar fan! One tip we learned from him on travelling is to live like a local. So he stays at the cheapest places, eats local food and really finds the best bargains around town.

The next day was not so nice for us. We decided to extend our trip for another night but found out that we had to leave our hostel. Luckily, we got another great deal at a nearby hotel. It was also raining so we had to get umbrellas at the Lingyin Temple area. We visited the different carvings and trekked to the top of the hill. The weather was really cold. After our tour, we came back again to the Lake area. We checked out another area in the city and decided to eat Hot Pot. It was great! After a round of ice cream, we went to S.O.S., China's famous disco. There will be no pictures posted of the place since it's not allowed anyway and what happens in Hangzhou, stays in Hangzhou!