More Finland, and a bit of Estonia!

My adventures in wintery Finland continued with - surprise, surprise, a cruise to Tallinn. Tallinn is the favorite destination for Finnish booze-cruisers, but it's actually also one of the most picturesque and well-preserved medieval cities in Europe. So off we went, me, dad, Janne and Katja, on the brand-new (the rather boldly named Megastar, if memory serves me).

The journey through the snow-covered Helsinki archipelago was quite a nice one, and we arrived in Tallinn just in time for lunch! After some quick research on tripadvisor, we decided to book a table at a place called Mekk. And boy, was it good... Tallinn is one of the best places in Europe to eat very sophisticated and tasty food for extremely reasonable prices. The food here was about as good as at Chef et Sommelier the day before yesterday, yet the prices were considerably easier on the wallet. OK, I know labour costs aren't the same, but for people coming from Helsinki, it's great!

The food bit done, we had our mandatory stroll around the beautiful historic centre. We checked out the main square, with the picturesque town hall, and visited the free pharmacy museum - quite an interesting little curiosity (and still an open pharmacy as well, actually!). We then made our way up to Toompea, or castle hill, and briefly checked out the nice views across the old town. We also paid a brief visit to the beautiful Orthodox cathedral - this one is even nicer than Uspenski cathedral in Helsinki, I would say.

The next stop was the (bear with me, a bit of a mouthful, this) Lennusadam seaplane harbour. It basically houses a huge seaplane hangar, which has been converted into a naval museum, which charts the small yet energetic nations naval history. The place is worth visiting just for the inventive building, and how it's used to showcase the boats (including a submarine!). The highlight here is no doubt the submarine, which can be visited on the inside, but there are also other interesting ships outside in the harbour that can be visited. A very interested place to visit, if miliary/seafaring history interests even a little.

And then, 'twas time to head back to Helsinki. We were nearly sober on arrival - are we getting old or what ? Nobody should get back sober from a Tallinn cruise...

On Thursday, I had a crazy plan to go and meet some ex-Nokia colleagues in Tampere. I actually managed to convince my young cousin Jukkis to drive me to Tampere with Jarkko's rather cool 5-series Beemer. We started our visit by checking out an ex-colleague's, Pentti's, startup called Nomicam. Quite an interesting setup they have, great to catch up with some ex-colleagues as well.

The plan was then to meet up with some more folks for dinner, but before that we had a bit of time to kill, so after a rather tasty burger meal at Friends n' Burgers (I say that without irony, their burgers are great!), we headed off to check out the Finnlayson factory complex, kind of for no particular reason, other than the fact that it's quite an interesting place to stroll around. We visited the Werstas industry museum, which was actually very interesting - and fantastic value for money as it's free! Tampere is sometimes called the Manchester of Finland thanks to its industrial heritage, and this museum pays great homage to this aspect of the city's past. I warmly recommend visiting should you happen to find yourself in Tampere.

The meal was great - we had loads of beer and ridiculously spicy chicken wings (I asked for suicide level sauce - you get what you ask for), and had quite a good turnout (Sami, Hannu & Rita, who used to live in Nice, Pentti and also Olli, my ex-colleague from Ulm). Great to catch up with everybody! We made it back in one piece, rather late at night, thanks to some sterling driving from young Jukkis.

Now, no wintery visit to Finland is complete without an "avantouinti" (Finnish for "winter swimming"). This time around, I wanted to try it out at a place called Löyly, a sort of fancy sauna in Helsinki, located in Hernesaari. It's a little bit pricey, but quite a wonderful place to visit. The architecture is great, and so are the saunas. There is even a "savusauna" (a smoke sauna). And of course, I got to do the winter swimming, even if the hole of the ice was rather tiny (not that winter swimming in my case really implies any actual swimming - it's more a case of "get in there, try to survive for about a minute, and get out").

After a booze filled night out with Aki and Jani, it was sadly time for me to head back to France on Saturday. All in all, yet another wonderful visit to my home country.  Hopefully it won't be too long until I can make my way back!

Wintery Finland

Of course, a visit to Finland was kind of mandatory before heading off to the land of the rising sun. As often, I had a pretty full program planned by the time I arrived, the basic idea being having the time to see as many people as possible in one week.

I arrived in Helsinki late Thursday, and spent Friday day just chilling out basically, and enjoying a not very wintery Helsinki. For the evening, I made my way over to Katja and Janne's place, where Rasmus and young Philip joined us for our traditional gaming night (it actually snowed on the way to their place, yippee!!). Let the nerdy times rule - we kept on playing Dominion until about 3 in the morning!).

The next day, I drove up to Turku with dad, where I was planning to meet up with the old gang from Pargas for a few beers. We started in Koulu (where else?), with Oski, Jocke, Tomppi, Jani and Jonas showing up. After some heavy debating about Brexit, Trump and so forth (with Jani being a bit outnumbered...), we carried on to Apteekki, another classic Turku drinking establishment. I ended up crashing at Jonas' place, where we wore off the hangover by watching Family guy and other intellectual stuff on Netflix...

On the way back, we stopped by to say hi to Tomi and his family, and check out Suvelan Kappeli (they chose quite an unexpected location for such an interesting architectural creation - after all, Suvela is a bit like the Bronx of Espoo ;-) ).

I spent Monday doing what I love doing in Helsinki, that is walking around and taking photos. The weather was not the best for it, as it was a bit cloudy, and VERY windy indeed. So it felt like a bit of a polar expedition at times, since I didn't have any gloves. But I was treated to some pretty nice views, especially towards Katajanokka from Tervasaari (a small island located in Pohjoissatama). I also checked out Uspenski cathedral (the orthodox cathedral, in my opinion the prettiest church in Helsinki), after which I headed off for my lunch date with Jocke in Bellevue. Bellevue is, in spite of the somewhat misleading name, actually the oldest Russian restaurant in Helsinki. The reason for this choice of venue was that I wanted to try blinis, and what better place than this to try this Russian delicacy?

On Tuesday, the plan was to celebrate Janne's 40th birthday (OK, a month or so too late, but better late than never, eh?). To mark this milestone, we decided to go to Chef and Sommelier. It's a place I've wanted to try for ages, since the sommelier, Johan, is actually a childhood friend of mine. And they do have a Michelin Star as well. So expectations were high. And Chef and Sommelier surely didn't disappoint! I love the concept - modern nordic cuisine, all made of locally sourced ingredients. There were some real surprises, like pine soup. What I like about the place too is the laid back atmosphere - this is not your typical Michelin starred restaurant at all. Hats off to Sasu and Johan for a great culinary experience!

Yoko, one more time

One of our favorite restaurants on the Cote d'Azur is, no doubt about it, a charming little Japanese restaurant in Cagnes-sur-Mer called Yoko, managed by the equally charming Yoko and her French husband (who makes some amazing desserts!). OK, just pure chance it's a Japanese restaurant, right ;-) So anyway, naturally, we had to come here one last time for dinner, before heading off to the land of the rising sun.

Yoko was nice as always - and showed the sort of attention to detail which makes her restaurant such a great place - she actually spotted our wedding rings, and congratulated us! Now that's pretty impressive, considering we eat there maybe twice a year! Anyway, needless to say, the food was as fantastic as always.

We will miss Yoko, that's for sure!

A weekend in Paris

Before starting our big Asian adventure (after the "small Asian adventure" of last autumn), we quite fancied one last weekend in Paris. So when our dear friend CoCo decided to organize here 40th birthday party in February, it was an easy enough decision to accept her invitation.

We arrived Saturday morning, after a rather pleasant journey on the night train (something we should do more often, really - taking the train is so much more relaxing than flying, even if it does take a bit of time - but that's not really an issue with a night train is it?)

We had all the day to us in Paris before heading off to the party in Montmartre, so we decided to make the best of it. We started off by checking out the Orsay museum, a place we'd both been to several times already. But hey, a museum like that merits several visits anyway! Besides, it's much less busy than the Louvre, for example.

The cultural bit (which really is mandatory in Paris) out of the way, we decided to head off for lunch. We ended up in a delightful little creperie not far from the museum, where we enjoyed some of the finest crepes I've had anywhere, including Brittany! Our appetites sated, we met up with Sarah, and ex-colleague of Mathilde's who's relocated to Paris. Great to catch up with her as well, especially since she had some great news to announce to us with the arrival of a baby!

We then made our way to our hotel, which was located in Montmartre, which truly is one of the most beautiful parts of Paris (which is to say in the world!), in spite of the tourist hordes who have invaded it, in no small part thanks to that wonderful movie called Amelie.

The party itself was, of course, fantastic fun! Most of Mathilde's friends from her Angers years were there, great to catch up with them.



One of the problems of "really growing up" is that as people have kids and stuff, it gets harder and harder to meet up for great "adults only" parties. Anyway, as can only be expected from a party celebrating CoCo, everybody had a fantastic time.

CoCo, of course, loved by all as she is, got loads of cool pressies (I wonder what she's gonna do with all those bags she was given, though?) Much to my surprise, we carried on to the wee hours of the morning. And I didn't even have such a bad headache in the morning. Is there still hope for me !?

We spent the next morning exploring Montmartre a bit more. We decided to check out the cemetery, one of the more famous ones in Paris, with quite a few famous Frenchmen and -women are buried (people like Alexander Dumas, Edgar Degas, and last but certainly not least, Dalida). Quite a peaceful place to wonder about, actually.

The next stop on our breakneck schedule was lunch with Isabelle. The plan was to meet at the outskirts of Paris, in a place called Suresnes. It's a pleasant enough place, quite green, in contrast to downtown Paris (there are nice views towards the Bois de Boulogne). Before lunch, we decided to check out the American military cemetery (wow, what's this about all them cemeteries today, eh!?)

The lunch, which we enjoyed in a rather fancy French bistrot called Pere Lapin, was unsurprisingly delicious. And of course, most importantly of all, it was great to catch up with Isabelle again!)

Felt a bit wistful to leave Paris, since we don't know when we'll be back next time. Soon enough, I hope! If not, we can always quote Bogie and say "we'll always have Paris" (not sure what that's got to do with anything, but there you go...)

A busy weekend in Nice

Due to our project to move out to Japan, we are trying to squeeze as much as we can out of our social life. After all, we want to say bye bye to everybody we know here, before heading off. Working in Japan, I'm afraid I shan't be having a lot of holidays to travel back to Europe with, unfortunately...

So on Friday night, we were more than happy to join Chris, Aurore and Marie for a dinner at Chris and Aurore's place. More than happy, since we always have a blast with them, and we know the food will be excellent and plentiful! As it was, this time around as well. We had a raclette, one of my favourite dishes in France. Raclette is a dish from the Alps, basically involving potatoes, ham and melted cheese - how could one possibly go wrong with ingredients like that, eh? This was followed up by equally excellent deserts prepared by Mathilde and Aurore. Yummie!

On Saturday, we managed to catch Naim, who was visiting Nice. We agreed on a lunch at Safari, a nice restaurant with a terrace on Cours Salyea. It's a place we go to very rarely, and even if it is a very touristy place, the food is very good. Probably the best restaurant on uber-touristy Cours Saleya. And since we were blessed with some of that lovely winter sun that often hits Nice this time of the year, that terrace was just a fantastic place to be...

Afterwards, we walked over to Rue Bonaparte, a trendy street by Place Garibaldi, where we met up with Marie and Mathilde's colleague Olivier for some coffee and cakes.

Ah, what a wonderful day! Nice is another place in this part of the world I will miss a lot, I will certainly fondly remember  sunny winter days like this!

Le 44

It's been a while since we've been to a proper restaurant in France, what with our 4 month absence 'n all (ahem, I forget myself, we were in Lyon a couple of weekends ago weren't we?

So I was more than happy to accept when Julien and Charlotte (who are very much up to speed with the best places to eat on the Cote d'Azur) suggested joining them as well as Aurelien and Julie to check out a nice new restaurant in Antibes they'd tried and enjoyed.

The place is called "Le 44" - since their menu (with starter, main course & desert) costs 44 Euros (does that mean they will have to rename the place when they have to raise prices due to inflation and the place just being so darn popular - which will inevitable happen when people discover this gem of a place).

I loved the place - the food was really excellent. Almost Michelin-star quality, but without all the fancy pancy stuff that sometimes comes with those Michelin Star establishments. We had a rather lengthy chat with the young, energetic, friendly and extremely friendly chef. I rather like his approach to cooking - using local, reasonably sourced ingredients.

So, should you ever find yourselves in Antibes - do come here - but remember to book (the place is popular, and when people find out just how good it is, it will become even more so!)

A weekend in Lyon

So it's just been a couple of days since I've been back in France, and needless to say, I'm finding it just slightly difficult adjusting back to our daily routines, having to go to the office, and all that...

Actually, while we were in Japan, we'd signed up to participate in the JLPT exam (JLPT stands for Japanese Language Proficiency Test), which just so happened to be taking place in Lyon on the first weekend after my return. So, time to pack the bags then and hit the road for Lyon! (great excuse to check out Lyon again, one of my favourite cities in France).

Our hotel was a rather unexciting chain hotel called Le Campanile in a rather charmless suburb of Lyon. So after checking in, we jumped on the metro, and headed into the town centre. We spent the morning walking around in the lovely old town, checking out all the cozy-looking restaurants (many of them Bouchons, traditional Lyonnaise eateries). We settled on a nice-seeming restaurant in the old town, where we had an unsurprisingly delicious French meal! Nice change to get back to French food, after 4 months of Asian grub.

We spent the afternoon randomly walking around town - we've been to Lyon a couple of times already, so didn't feel an overwhelming need to go to any museums or similar (well, we were planning on visiting one the next day, actually). Lyon was pretty busy on this Saturday, with some sort of festival going on, involving a lot of students putting up various spectacles in the streets. Some police demonstrations going on as well....

For dinner, we decided to try our hotel's buffet restaurant - not one of the best ideas we've had, I have to say. The buffet was unsurprisingly unappetizing, so I decided to order something from the menu instead - pizza. It was definitely the worst pizza I've had for years - and that's saying a lot. One of those Micrwave pizzas you can get at the supermarket tastes better! A bit of a fail then...

The next day was our Big Exam Day. But before that, we decided to check out a fancy museum they've recently built in Lyon, Le Musee des Confluances. It's quite a masterpiece of modern architecture (if you are into strange geometric shapes made of glass, metal and wood, which I obviously am then, since I rather liked the building!). The museum itself is pretty interesting too - it's apparently a science centre and anthropology museum.

I loved the place - this is how modern museums should be like. Basically they've found the right balance between what traditional museums used to be like, yet using modern technology where appropriate. And most importantly, it's a place where you learn a lot - which to me is the most important thing when it comes to museums like this. A much more interesting museum than for example MUCEM -  the new museum in the port of Marseille.

And the Japanese exam, then ? Well, given that we were doing the N5 exam (the lowest level), I would've expected it to be easier, given our 6 weeks of intensive studies in Tokyo. Actually, I found it a bit tough, so fingers crossed, results are out end of January....

Anyway, nice to be back in France! ;-)

More Beijing exploration

After we got back from the Big Wall, we continued our exploration of Beijing. So much to see, so little time...

The next day, we woke up to a totally different Beijing compared to the previous days. The famous pollution had reached peak levels, with the famous smog rolling in. Pretty scary actually, not something I could imagine living with all year around... Anyway, we decided to brave the warnings and head out to explore town anyway.

We started with another one of the main sights of Beijing, the Summer Palace. It's quite a long metro ride to get out there, as the place is 9km outside of town. The palace complex, which is actually the largest and most well-preserved Royal Park in China, dates back to 1750, when it was constructed as a place for the Emperor and his family to enjoy and entertain guests. Empress Dowager Cixi actually embezzled navy resources to make the place as splendid as it is today.

It's a huge place, and to really see it  all in one day is a pretty challenging task. We did manage to see most of the highlights. We probably preferred the Tower of Buddhist Incense, which sits on one of the highest spots in the Summer Palace. The views from there towards the Royal park are pretty amazing - even if the smog did admittedly ruin the view a little bit.

We were also treated to the spectacle of some Chinese theatre at the Grand Theatre, which is located in the poetically named Garden of Virtue and Harmony (most famous historic places in Chinese palaces seem to have grandiose names like that).

All in all, I was a little bit disappointed by the Summer Palace, actually. I mean it's an impressive place, for sure, but I just didn't enjoy the visit as much as say the Forbidden City. I'm sure the tourist masses had something to do with it (but then again, they were at the Forbidden City too...), and even more so, the pollution. Perhaps the best time to visit the place is during summer, when the pollution is less oppressive... Still, the Summer Palace is obviously worth a visit, no question about that!

We then made our way to the town centre, where we decided to check out one of those famous Hutongs we'd read so much about. Hutongs are basically small historic alleyways, lined up with historic stone house complex, with inner courtyards. As we quickly discovered, they are basically the heart and soul of Beijing, just great areas to have a walk around. They are becoming rarer and rarer, sadly, as Beijing continues to raze them in its mad rush for modernization.

Thankfully, they are becoming very popular with tourists, with trendy cafes, restaurants and bars lining up the alleys, which I suppose gives some intensive to preserve them. If you ask me, the Hutongs of Beijing are just as much a most-see "attraction" as the Forbidden City or the Summer Palace!

For dinner, we decided to try out the Beijing Branch of my favourite steamed bum dumpling restaurant chain, Din Tai Fung, located (as they often are), in a fancy modern shopping mall, not to far from our youth hostel. As always, the dumplings were nothing short of amazing - I tried truffle-flavoured as well as chocolate dumplings this time around. Yummie!

The next day, we checked out the third absolutely must-see Beijing attraction - the modestly named Temple of Heaven. This Imperial temple dates back to the Ming Dynasty, or 15th century - it was mainly used by the Emperor to pray for good harvests. It's actually not a temple in the ordinary sense in that normal people do not come here to pray.

The temple is surrounded by a huge park, which was actually a very fascinating place to observe Chinese people in leisure mode. There were people doing jogging there, people doing sports, people playing go, people playing cards, people doing Tai Chi, choirs singing communist hymns, people walking their dogs. So we actually spent a good hour just walking around, watching people going about their routines. Fascinating!

The temple itself was, as expected, overrun by tourists - and for good reason! I definitely enjoyed the Temple of Heaven more than the Summer Palace - I found the architecture more impressive here. The highlight of the temple complex is definitely the Hall of Prayer for Good Harvests - this is where the emperor came to pray. This 36-meter high circular, tower-like building must be one of the most magnificent wooden buildings in the world.

Almost equally beautiful was the Imperial Vault of Heaven, also circular, and just perfect. There is plenty of more to write about the Temple of Heaven, its buildings, and just the important the complex used to have in Imperial China, but I shan't bore you with the details - please read wikipedia or something if you want to know more ;-).

Anyway, I would say that if there is one place you need to visit in Beijing, I would say it's the temple of heaven (even more so than the Forbidden City) - I just loved the place. In spite of the touristy hoards and the pollution that was still very much there, ruining my photos...!

Isabelle absolutely insisted on doing a bit of souvenir shopping, so we decided to check out a proper Chinese antiquities market. We decided to go to the big daddy of Beijing antiquities markets - Panjiayuan. What a massive place it is - and actually I found the whole experience rather fascinating (that's saying a lot from a guy who dislikes shopping as much as I do!). I mean, there is so much beautiful stuff on display here! We also ate duck head soup here - now that's something that doesn't happen to me very often! I even gave in and bought a couple of souvenirs myself there...

This was actually Isabelle's last night in Beijing, so we decided to have a rather fancy meal at a nice boutique hotel located in the same Hutong as our hotel (anyway, I felt like a proper meal, after that Duck Head soup - there just ain't that much meat on the duck heads to dig into!). Anyway, excellent meal, and a nice way to end our common journey together.

So, one more day for me to explore Beijing solo, before it was time for me to head back as well (argh, was already starting to get a bit fidgety about going back to the office after 4 months off work!)

I started off with a visit to the Yonghe Temple (aka. the Lama Temple), which is biggest Tibetan Buddhist temple in Beijing. And an impressive one it is. What's nice about this one is the fact that it's also a temple mainly for real worshippers, rather like camera-wielding tourists like myself. The main place to check out here (apart from the peaceful Tibetan atmosphere) is the 26 meter Buddha statue sculpted from a single piece of sandalwood (now that's what I call an impressive piece of engineering!). It was a gift from the 7th Dalai Lama to the Qinglong emperor, and took no less than three years to transport from Tibet! It was also quite interesting to read all the official party jargon about how the temple promotes unity and harmony for Tibet as a part of China...

There's an interesting Confucian Temple  near the Lama Temple, that I decided to check out as well. As other Confucian temples I've been to, it's a rather austere place, not a place of worship in the traditional sense. The main thing to see here is the huge collection of stone steles here, upon which the 13 Confucian classics have been engraved. Wow, that's impressive, I guess, to the initiated... What was more fascinating was the beautiful Confucian University, located just next to the temple, with its beautiful gardens and ponds.

I spent the rest of the afternoon Hutong-hopping, just enjoying the local life and atmosphere in those atmospheric back alleys. Yep, I would say the Hutongs are definitely the part of Beijing I prefer. I even came across the oldest microbrewery in Beijing (interestingly, operated by an American). The cherry on the cake for my Hutong tour.

I ended up my Hutong walk by checking out the famous Bell and Drum towers. As mentioned before, all major Chinese cities seem to have their Drum and Bell towers, usually pretty impressive historic buildings. The Drum towers are usually located at the symbolic centre of a city. They were originally used for musical purposes, and later on to keep track of and announce the time. IN Beijing, they stand facing each other along the Northern end of the central axis cutting through Beijing (the Forbidden City is directly to the South of the towers).

I decided to finish my visit of Beijing with a big bang - so I went to check out the Legend of Kung Fu show. It tells the somewhat tacky tale of a young and innocent boy who goes to a monastery to learn about Kung Fu, but alas, he's led astray by a beautiful girl, only to refind his way and become a master of Kung Fu. So, like I said, the storyline is tacky (told in a badly dubbed English voice over), but boy is that Kung Fu impressive. Most of the show consists of beautifully choreographed spectacular sequences that are a bit like a mixture between martial arts and dancing. Pretty impressive!

That, alas, brought an end to my Chinese adventure, and my 4-month Asian adventure as well. China was certainly a fascinating place to visit. There is so much history, nature and culture to visit. I think China gets a lot of bad press - for sure some of it is deserved, but I think if people actually travelled around China a bit, they might also discover another side of the coin...

Intensive Shanghai visit

Our train journey to Shanghai went very smoothly indeed. So far, I've been rather impressed with public transport in China. The metro systems we'd used (in Shanghai, Nanjing and Hangzhou) all functioned pretty much flawlessly (even if the ever-present security checks are a bit annoying), and the bus/train services function very well indeed. Some so called developed countries could learn from these guys...

Anyway, once in Shanghai, we headed off to the apartment block, where we were supposed to meet up with Isabelle. And she did indeed arrive pretty quickly, and once we'd gotten settled in, we decided to hit the road, to find a bit of food to fill our growling stomachs. 

We walked across to the French concession (which is supposed to be a good area to grab some food) - and we ended up in a place serving hot pot. Unfortunately, they only had a menu in Chinese, so we ended up going for the "let's just tick off 10 things randomly off the menu and hope for the best" strategy. It turned out to be an only partial success, at least as far as Nick and Isabelle were concerned, as most of the stuff they brought strongly resembled brain tissue and strange organs. Be as it may, I rather enjoyed it!

The food bit done, we headed over to a nice pub, where we had a few beers, catching up on the latest news (a lot of it, unfortunately, about the American elections). Anyway, great to have Isabelle onboard for our travels!

The next day, we got up bright 'n early, eager to explore Shanghai. We started off by checking out Jing'An temple, as it was located just down the road from the apartment we were staying at. It's a pretty calm place to escape the hustle and bustle of Shanghai. Actually, it's a very busy temple, but most of the visitors are actually real worshippers rather than selfie-snapping tourists. An impressive place - and the place does have an illustrious history going back to the 12th century, too!

After a quick coffee at a funny animal themed place (well, I actually had what is becoming my favourite drink - a Chai Latte), we headed off to yet another temple - this one called the Jade Buddha temple. It's the most famous temple in Shanghai - its fame comes from the two jade buddha statues that have given the temple its name. The temple is a really beautiful place to visit - but the two famous jade statues (one a sitting Buddha, and the other one a reclining Buddha) are actually quite small, and far away from the viewing position, that it was a bit hard to appreciate them properly.

Enough tourist visits for a bit - time for lunch. Since we were in Shanghai, we decided to try out Xiaolongbao - steamed dumplings, one of Shanghai's signature dishes. We headed off to Shanghai's Old Town (Old Time may be old but it's been transformed into a bit of a tourist ghetto - full of selfie-obsessed tourists!), and had our steamed dumplings at one of Shanghai's most famous places restaurants.

Well, at least that's what one can assume, judging from the portraits of celebrities (like Bill and Hillary Clinton) hanging on the walls. The Xiaolongbao were excellent, as expected - but perhaps not quite as sublime as in my favourite Xiaolongbao restaurant chain - Din Tai Fun.

We continued our exploration of Shanghai with a visit to the nearby Yuyuan garden - one of the most famous Chinese gardens in all of China, dating back to the 16th century. The Yuyuan garden is quite a maze, full of pavilions, labyrinths, small ponds, walkways and the like, so it feels like a bigger place than it actually is. I really enjoyed the visit (in spite of the ever-present tourist hordes), but I maintain my preference of Japanese gardens over Chinese ones...

We continued our rather intensive exploration of Shanghai by speeding back to the French Concession - which is supposed to be one of the nicest parts of Beijing. Unfortunately, we didn't have a lot of time to walk around, so we just settled on a nice panoramic drink from the top floor of a fancy hotel. A well-deserved drink, I might add, after all that running about!

Of course, no visit of Shanghai is complete without seeing the Bund, so that's where we headed next (we were on a tight schedule here, since we had a night train to catch to Xi'An later on!). The Bund was busy and impressive as ever - this time the evening view was even better than during my previous visit - as a full moon complemented the panorama!

We decided to dine nearby, in a place called Lost Heaven. A bit of a pretentious name, perhaps, but the food was certainly the best we'd had so far in China! The place specializes in Yunnan cuisine - and we all agreed on the fact that the food was great!

And that was it for our short yet intensive visit of Shanghai, as it was time for us to speed down to the train station, from where we were catching the night train to Xi'an. All in all, a very interesting place - one that certainly merits more than just 2 days to fully appreciate. But, China is a big place, so no time to stay any longer!