28th November: Shanghai, China

Shanghai is an enormous, sprawling city. I think if this was your first every point into China you’d be impressed and probably a little overwhelmed! For us it’s lacked that wow factor and feels less liveable than most other cities we’ve been through in the country. That said, it is still very impressive and has a fascinating history. It was here in 1921 that the Chinese Communist Party was officially founded, by those angry that the nationalist government had sided with foreign powers to exploit workers effectively into slavery-like conditions. After finally taking control of the city after the 1949 victory in the civil war, the communists eradicated slave-labour and the slums and rehabilitated the vast numbers of people who had become addicted to the opium brought by foreigners.

Our final day in this megalopolis of 24 million was spent in the outer suburbs. Our metro line headed out northeast close to the Yangtze and I was particularly keen to see this great river up close again. From the area around Baoshan, it’s at least 15 km to the far shore. It was a clear day today and you could make out docks, although such is the distance that the curvature of earth begins to become apparent with smaller boats disappearing below the horizon. On the near side of the mid-estuary island, many huge ships were beginning or ending their river journey. It was difficult to get a feel of their scale in such a vast body of water. Similarly, if you look at satellite imagery, they appear to be tiny but may in fact be a hundred metres or more in length. As well as being sunny, it was also chilly and very windy once again, so we beat a quick retreat.

Even in suburbs way out from the city, hire bikes are available in large numbers on most corners and bike lanes run along every road. We’ve still not gotten around to trying that out and the cold was off-putting today. Soon! Instead, we walked to the metro and found yet another buffet on our way back.

Once back in the room, we had a productive spree booking trains and hotels as far as Yangshuo. We will be heading south and leaving winter behind. Next, to plan Yunnan and southeast Asia!