Wednesday, August 31, 2016

Suzhou/Wuxi Trip 2016 - Day 6 - Bye Bye China - Sunan Shoufang International Airport to Singapore

Finally, time for us to depart the hotel to head to the airport. We collected our luggages from the reception of Hotel Grand Park Wuxi, sad to say goodbye to the nice hotel. The bell boy called a taxi for us. As it was already night and non peak hour, the taxi took about less than half an hour from Zhongshan Road to Sunan Shoufang International Airport and the cab fare is only 61 yuan. For those who do not want to take cab, can take the metro (2 yuan) from Zhongshan Road to Wuxi Railway Station and board the airport bus to the airport. The bus fare is only 5 yuan but do note the timing of the bus. If you miss one bus you have to wait quite some time for the next bus, you can view the timing from here. Please check the latest updated timing and the bus journey is about less than an hour from the station to the airport.

The domestic airport and the international airport buildings are side by side, more flights flying from the domestic airport while there's only one international flight late at night flying from the international airport i.e. Tigerair from Wuxi to Singapore.

There's few restaurants and coffee house in the airport,prices are reasonable, no problem having dinner at the airport.

Peaches in season being sold at the airport.

That brings me to the end of my Suzhou/Wuxi Travel Story. Not sure when is my next travel story, have no plans at the moment.

Tuesday, August 30, 2016

Suzhou/Wuxi Trip 2016 - Day 6 - Nanchan Temple Pedestrian Shopping Street and canals

After the marketplace shopping, we walked over to Nanchan Temple Pedestrian Shopping Street, the weather was fine, all shops were open and the place filled with lots of people unlike the first night we visited here, was raining and deserted. What a huge difference!

Nanchan Temple was built during the Southern Dynasty (549 A.D.) and was originally called Huguo Temple. During the reign of Emperor Xianheng of the Tang Dynasty, the name of Huguo Temple was changed to Lingshan Temple. Not until the reign of Emperor Tiansheng of the Song Dynasty, did it get the name Nanchan Temple.(source.)

Lots of shops and eateries here, we did not shop for anything in here, did not find anything interesting to buy.

Lots of canal waterways in Wuxi and Suzhou, almost all looked the same.

Vendor selling souvenirs.

Video coming later.............

Saturday, August 27, 2016

Suzhou/Wuxi Trip 2016 - Day 6 - Nanchan Temple Market

After checking out of our hotel, we left our luggages with the reception cause our flight is quite late, so we can have time to go for some last minute shopping.

We took the metro and alight one station away at Nanchan Temple Station. We came here before on our first night but was raining and too dark to really have good time to stroll. This time, the weather was fine and so we had a better time.

After exiting from EXIT 3, we could walked all the way straight to cross the road to Nanchan Temple Pedestrian Shopping but we decided to be more adventourous, we detoured and stroll to a small alley just beside the EXIT 3.

As the small alley is not too dark or deserted, we were brave enough to venture further in and came across some marketing place after crossing some roads.

Wow there's so many roast duck stalls that prices were so competitive, only cost around 15 yuan for one roasted duck, that's really cheap.

Seems like some wholesale place for fruits, super cheap, one box of water melon only 25 yuan (there's 6 medium size water melon in one box) but alas I could not buy them back hahaha.

Interesting to visit the market place, did a little shopping here , prices were really cheap and please be careful of pickpockets and if carrying handbag, beware of snatch theft from motorbikers. I did carry my handbag but I made sure i always stand on the inside while my hubby stand outside and keep taking good care of my bag (our passports were inside).

Wednesday, August 24, 2016

Suzhou/Wuxi Trip 2016 - Day 6 Wuxi Old Library and Chong an Temple, Wuxi , China

After breakfast, we went for morning walk around the park near Chong an Temple. Saw this very old library which looked so beautiful. The library was more than 100 years old. Nice building for photo taking.

History of Chongan Temple, Wuxi.

We went to Chengzhong Park again and watch the kids feeding the fishes.

Today is the last day of our trip but our flight is 11 pm, so we asked for late check out at 2pm, which the hotel was so nice to let us have late check out.

Monday, August 22, 2016

Suzhou/Wuxi Trip 2016 - Day 5 Carrefour

After lunch we browse around Carrefour Supermarket, they sold a lot of local chinese food. Worth visiting the place.

Saturday, August 20, 2016

Suzhou/Wuxi Trip 2016 - Day 5 Lunch

After our tour of Lake Taihu, we took Bus 20 and intended to go back to Zhongshan Road to have lunch but along the way we spotted a building with a big banner of Carrefour Supermarket. (Cannot remember the name of the building or road.), so we alighted and walked into the building. Saw a small cafeteria selling local food, looks good. It was similar to our local economical food stall back in Singapore. We just selected the dish and pay at the cashier.

Our lunch was around S$8 three dishes and one soup and two bowls of white rice.

Friday, August 19, 2016

Suzhou/Wuxi Trip 2016 - Day 5 - Lake Taihu

Our sightseeing for Day 5 is to Lake Taihu. Actually, we planned to visit the Grand Buddha at Lingshan about an hour away and was a bit far from the city. As it was raining heavily, we cancelled the plan to visit the Grand Buddha cause it was really a very big open space without much shelter not suitable for a raining day. So we changed to visit Lake Taihu and no plan to take any ferry cause of the rain and a very bad weather. So we took Bus 20 from the bus stop, which is at the side of our hotel.

Best to take bus to Lake Taihu instead of taxi (of course unless you have hired private car or bus). Cause taking taxi to Lake Taihu is no problem but coming back from Lake Taihu to city by taxi will be a problem cause there wont be much taxi in the vicinity. So taking bus to Lake Taihu, will ensure the location of the bus stop, so easier to take bus back from Lake Taihu to city.

The bus terminated at a theme park. (Forgotten the name of the theme park), no admission on that day cause of the rain, so we could easily walked through the theme park and exit by the side gate to the lake otherwise we need to walk out by the main road.

Hahaha, was so eerie and deserted, hubby and me were the only tourists there, no other tourists or locals.

We walked for about less than 10 minutes and arrived by the side gate of the theme park and exited this side gate and crossed the road to reach the lake.

If not for a wedding at a restaurant, it really was so scary to be the only two tourists there.

So inconvenient to carry the huge and heavy umbrella around cause of the rain.

For those who wished to take the ferry, can take Bus K1 or K87 bus to Yuantouzhu.

Ship Route: Take regular ship at Yuantouzhu Wharf (The last ship is at 15:00)

For more information, please view source..