Kirsten - VSO China: August 2010

It's been a while since I've written as in August I was away on my Great China Adventure with my mum. It all began in Danfeng, where my mum was invited to dinner with my landlady and offered goose head and donkey.

At a hot pot restaurant with my friends in Danfeng

Happy street food seller in Danfeng

Then it was on to Xi'an where despite temperatures of 39 degrees C, we managed to fit a lot into our 3 days there.

Of course, we went to see the terracotta warriors

A calligrapher in the painting market

This is the Big Wild Goose Pagoda, built around 650AD to house Buddhist stone tablets brought back from India

These people are looking at crickets for sale in tiny cages

The Drum Tower at dusk. In the past, the drums would sound at regular intervals through the night to let the people know the time

Then it was on to Shanghai, where the temperature was a much more pleasant 28/29 degrees C

Outside the Yuyuan gardens - lots of pretty ponds, trees and old buildings

A detail on one of the buildings in Yuyuan

One of my favourite day trips was to the City Temple in Shanghai, where lots of locals popped in to pray to a variety of gods, both Chinese ones and Buddha

All ages were there...

And Haibo, the cutesy Shanghai Expo character was EVERYWHERE!!

One of the best sights in Shanghai was definitely the skyline seen from the Bund

Beautiful both during the day and at night

A view down the Huangpo river

This was the Bund on a normal Tuesday evening, with tourists there to take pics of the skyline at night. I was SHOCKED - it was busier than Edinburgh at Hogmanay!

Next stop was Hong Kong.