The Venice Of China

Old bridge and canal
see all photos »

Another uneventful train ride graced us a safe arrival in Suzhou. This city is meant to be the Venice of China but kind of unlike Venice we got a normal taxi to the Suzhou International Youth Hostel… most of the water canals having been filled in long ago.

Adrienne managed to pick up a rice addiction in Asia and was stoked to have some for lunch (noodles had featured quite heavily in our diet). We were on our way to see the Opera Museum but were defeated by the heat.  Instead we dragged ourselves to the hostel, through some wonderful old houses, down cobblestone streets. Fisher Café offered us the quintessential Chinese refresher - a pot of jasmine tea (RMB 30) and we laxed out there before heading to dinner

Adrienne managed to pick up a rice addiction in Asia...

Another canal, near the university
see all photos »

A couple of weeks previously Sean had emailed his old boss at Beca to see if we could crash with someone in the Suzhou office. Unfortunately it was a busy time of year in their households but we did manage to catch up with Steve for a drink at Pulp Fiction. (Aussie Bar). It was great to see a friendly face and yarn for awhile. Also, we'd like to say xie-xie (thank you) to Steve for the beer!

The luxury of a sleep-in is relished when you're moving quickly through a country (China is huge and 3 weeks too little). We had a great sleep and moved to Fisher (RMB 120, it's a more expensive hostel) because there was no room at the SIYH (RMB 100). A couple were meant to move to a better room but kindly gave it to us instead. The room costs RMB 190 and they had already paid but they told us not to worry about the difference.

Rain prevented us from seeing Suzhou. We wanted to see the Master of Nets Garden and the Coiled Gate but ended up with a quick wander through the uni and buying some crap tea from the supermarket.

We were disappointed to leave for Shanghai without having seen the city properly but it will have to go on our ever growing list of "things we missed and want to come back to".