Hangzhou

Day 6: Train from Nanjing to Hangzhou

28 December 2013 Saturday

After a packed and fruitful three days in Nanjing, we were prepared to take it a little slower in Hangzhou. Our morning train was scheduled to leave about 10am. Here's the Nanjing train station - look how clean and new everything is. 

There's even a counter giving out complimentary bottles of mineral water for passengers. Just show your ticket to collect a bottle.

And the train arrived right on time again. This 1.5-hour ride cost us ¥114.50 (S$24) each.

Hangzhou is the only destination that I've booked a hostel instead of a hotel. Reviews on this hostel were great on Hostelworld - from service, cleanliness, to location. And true enough, I was pretty pleased with it.

Here's a double bed room with private bathroom, about S$50 per night. There was a television with several local channels, kettle, bedroom slippers, a table, two chairs, some wall space to hang your jackets, and just about enough floor space for our two open luggage.

Bathroom was clean and new, so no complains. They also provided two small towels and toilet paper.

The hostel's main entrance, which is tucked just around the corner of a lively pedestrian street.

So just around the corner from the hostel were these amazing bustling Hefang and Imperial pedestrian streets, lined with restored old buildings converted to shops, little museums, and restaurants. We couldn't ask for a better location.

Lunch time - we couldn't wait to have some of the famous local dishes. Just parallel to the pedestrian street is the famous Gaoyin Jie Food Street 高银街美食街. There are over 10 restaurants to choose from.

We decided to try one recommended by Lonely Planet. We ordered the famous Beggar's Chicken 叫花鸡 and Dongpo Pork 东坡肉. Plus another vegetable and rice, the bill came up to ¥55 (S$11.50).

The Beggar's Chicken is a marinated whole spring chicken wrapped in leaves and mud then baked. The meat was tender, fell right off the bones and was a little salty. We weren't in love.

Dongpo Pork looked amazing when it arrived on our table, the skin was glossy smooth and our chopsticks could just slide through the fabulously tender meat. The only downside was the amount of oil the pork was sitting in. Terribly sinful dish considering the layer of fat pork on top of the oily gravy.

Since we decided to take it slow, we went back to our hostel's cafe, Shine Cafe, to chill and relax.

He ordered a latte and I had cooling cucumber juice, which cost us ¥44 (S$9).

Dinner was pretty late by the time we sneaked in a few hours of nap. We went back to the Gaoyin Jie Food Street 高银街美食街 near our hostel to try the West Lake Vinegar Fish. The fish had so many bones, I think we only finished a third of it before we gave up. Besides the fish, we also had fried egg with tomato and shredded pork, all for ¥82 (S$17).

Day 7: Hangzhou West Lake

29 December 2013 Sunday

Although the hostel's cafe is not cheap, we decided to treat ourselves with breakfast just downstairs. We had a big breakfast, scrambled eggs, orange juice and flat white for ¥66 (S$14). 

The main activity for that day was to check out West Lake. We walked around a little, trying to capture the mesmerising surroundings.

The lake's surface area covers 6.5 kilometre square, so it would take close to five hours to stroll a full round. We decided to hop on the buggy for an one-hour tour around the lake for ¥40 (S$8) each.

We then found the Green Tea restaurant near the lake for early dinner. There was already a queue forming and it wasn't even 5pm.  

We spent ¥108 (S$23) for dinner - and had claypot eggplant, porridge, pork rib, bacon and wintermelon soup and drinks.

[If you'll like to follow the trip chronologically, please go to Day 8: Back to Shanghai from Hangzhou. You'll need to scroll down the page to Day 8.]