Shanghai China Snippets Observations about living in Shanghai and China in general

January 29, 2007

China Travel Blog Interviewed

Filed under: China Travel — Shanghai @ 3:59 am

Just published a new interview on MyChinaStart.

This time I chatted with RoyGraff from Ccontact about the Outbound Travel Industry.

He talks about Chinese tourists, the challenges for Western tour operators and more.

If you’re interested to learn more, read the China Travel Blog interview.

January 19, 2007

Beijing Olympics English Map Launched

Filed under: China Travel — Shanghai @ 6:01 am

You can find now an English Zoomable map of Beijing on the website of the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games.
It’s pretty nice and detailed with main roads, the Olympic locations and other landmarks.

You have the option to download a screenshot of the map (a your zoom level) and I liked the option to draw lines on the map, using the scale option to measure distances between points.

beijing map olympics

Unfortunately the menu bar items, like scale, save etc don’t seem to work in Firefox.
Check it out.

December 17, 2006

China Travel Statistics

Filed under: China Travel — Shanghai @ 3:38 am

The number of Chinese going abroad pales compared to the numbers of tourists visiting China but that will increase in the future as more and more Chinese will have the money and the interest to have a look beyond the border.

Some China Travel statistics

  • Visitors to China in 2005 – 120.3 million
  • [tag]Chinese citizens[/tag] who traveled abroad in 2005 – 31 million
  • Year in which China is predicted to become the world’s number one tourist destination – 2020
  • Permitted overseas destinations for [tag]Chinese[/tag] citizens – 117
  • Revenues from travel industry in 2005 in [tag]China[/tag] – 528.6 billion Rmb
  • Number of visitors to [tag]Shanghai[/tag] in 2005 – 5.7 million.

December 9, 2006

Back to Shanghai with Spring Airlines

Filed under: China Travel — Shanghai @ 10:09 am

Back to Shanghai with Spring Airlines

Our airline was Spring Airlines, one of the very few official budget airlines in China. I already mentioned in a previous post that Hainan Airport sucks at the moment due to ongoing construction. Flying with Spring Airlines doesn’t make it any better. It’s the ultimum of cattle class. Leg spaces is non-existing, a tall foreigner next to me had his legs folded up against the lap tray table (it wasn’t opened) the whole flight. Spring Airlines doesn’t offer food for free so bring some with you.

A lasting memory of Hainan

Chinese tourists haiwaiian style
Despite my occasional ranting I like Hainan and its beaches. One of the things I noticed is that the average Chinese tourist has evolved from a baseball cap wearing tour group member to the couple wearing unisex Chinafied Hawaiian combinations. Give it a couple of more years and they may start to dress themselves as individuals.

December 8, 2006

No Prawns Today in Sanya

Filed under: China Travel — Shanghai @ 9:53 am

When we booked to go to Hainan I had visions of big juicy prawns. They stayed visions. Wind is something that seems to make the prawns wary to get caught in the fisher men’s nets unfortunately and windy it was.

The Seafood Fresh Market

Sanya Seafood Fresh Market
There’s a great Seafood Fresh Market (Chun Yuan Seafood Square) in Sanya city. About a 30 minute drive from Yalong Bay. Daily fresh fish, right from the boat, is available here. You pick your fish, shellfish or other creatures from the sea and they’ll prepare it on the spot. For about 150 Rmb including beer and veggies plus a live show of cutting up your chosen fish and shells. You’ll be satisfied.

Sanya Seafood
From Yalong Bay there’s a blue double-decker bus that takes you to the West Station (Xi Zhan) in Sanya Town. Raise your hand and it will stop. From here you can take a small bus, no. 202, 204 or 207 to the Seafood Market. Get off the bus when you see a big building from the ICBC (Industrial & Commercial Bank China) on your right side . Take the first street left and keep on walking [it bends to the right] until you’ll find the Seafood market on your left. You can’t miss it.

Address:
Chun Yuan Seefood Square
Ji Xiang Lu (500 metres north of city garden)

Tomorrow more about the way back and Spring Airlines

December 7, 2006

Hainan Sanya Trip, Beach It Is

Filed under: China Travel — Shanghai @ 9:51 am

Hainan, touted as the Hawaii of China, isn’t as bad as I had expected. I had visions of Phuket, overcrowded beaches, ugly beach developments, basically mass tourism at its worst. It wasn’t and I’m happy for it.

Hainan Yalong Bay

Yalong Bay is one of the better parts of Hainan. There are only 4 star and above hotels plus beach. A lot of soft sanded, very white beach. The roads are clean and new and there is an abundance of flowers, palm trees and lawns on the side. 40 minutes from the airport which should set you back between 60 and 80 Rmb if you take a taxi.

Hainan Hotels

Yalong bay hotelAll the big names are represented here, Hilton, Marriott, Sheraton etc plus a score of local 4 & 5 star hotels. We’re not yet in the 5 star range so we settled for the Golden Palm Resort, a 4 star Chinese hotel. It’s decent, spacious, has a great pool and is 58 seconds from the beach, according the advertisement in the elevator. I didn’t time it but it’s pretty close.

Golden Palm Resort Sanya

The only thing you shouldn’t do here is eat. I have read before restaurant reviews about rubber tasting tuna and I now know what it is. The food is horrible, both their breakfast and their BBQ seafood buffet. Processed factory food with no taste. Even the three dotted crabs had lost any meat they may have had.

Which brings us to the food and as there are only Hotels finding decent local and affordable food nearby is not easy.

A 10 minute taxi ride takes you to Tiandu, a 2 street village that has several fish restaurants, not great quality but decent enough and a good alternative. To splash out go to one of the western buffets. We went to the Hilton that has a buffet in the weekend. Their lamb chops were delectable (first and last time I use this word ever) and the price was 195 + 15 % service tax. Drinks are not included.

Things to do in Hainan

When we bought our travel package we had the option to go cheaper if we would join some day trips to tourist traps. We didn’t. If you do sign up for the cheaper option and decide later you won’t join you’ll have to pay a penalty. What would China be without penalties anyway, financial penalties in the work place, penalties when you travel.

We spend our 4 days mostly on the beach. Why else go to Hainan, culture? The beaches are perfect, the water is warm and the sun mostly behind the clouds this time of the year but it still beats the Shanghai winter.

December 6, 2006

Hainan Airport Sucks for the Moment

Filed under: China Travel — Shanghai @ 9:30 am

This week is going to be Hainan week, or at least for the coming days. Why Hainan? Because we went there and I felt like a good write up of the Chinese Hawaii would be in place. It’s a pretty nice island but before I’ll get into that, in the next post, first some travel advice.

They are making Hainan airport bigger which results in having hardly any space right now. We traveled back last Sunday and the whole place is small, unorganized and pretty much a disaster. If you go to Hainan, make sure you won’t go during a holiday like Christmas as I can imagine it will be worse.

And no, I have no understanding for disorganization so don’t thank for me it.
hainan airport

Quiz question!!!
sanya airport

What is the first thing that comes to mind when you see the Hainan airport logo?

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