Category: Travel

We went to this nice scenic area in Summer of 2019. In case you live in Northeast China and want to experience a landscape as in Guilin, this is the place to go.

We don’t remember how its called in Chinese language, but it is about 2 hours drive northeast from Dalian towards Dandong.

It is kind of a national park, there are even some attractions in there such as a big water slide, a glass walk and boat rides. You can also do kayaking/rafting there.

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It is not a very big national park, but you can still spend half day or even a whole day there. There are some hiking options, but nothing too sophisticated.

We could even do some horse riding!

There is a cablecar up to one of the peaks, but there is „just“ the view to enjoy, not any hiking options…

The landscape was really stunning from the mountaintop.

We took a small boat ride on the river there.

There is not much more to say about this nice piece of nature, have a look for yourself sometime!

A lifelike replica of Venice in Italy

In 2014, we went to Venice in Italy. Last year, we returned to the „Chinese Version“ in Dalian. If you have never been to Italy, you could take it for the real thing. The pictures we took were certainly great!

Near to the Dalian „Seafront“ in Downtown / Zhongshan, we found 3 major highlights:

• A nice Yacht club / harbor
• A very modern exhibition centre
• A replica of Venice Italy

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„Little Venice“

The area is about ca. 2km long and 1km wide. It is kind of a replica of Venice, there are even the typical „Italian boats“, only they drive electrically and not manually like in Italy.

As a contrast, see below some pictures taken in 2014 in Venice, Italy. You will barely see a difference!

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The Yacht harbor & Zhongshan district

We did not expect such a nice Yacht harbor there. More than looking was not in for us, you have to be a member to get in. But it was enough for dreaming to own a yacht 🙂

Zhongshan district is kind of the downtown area and has many nice shops and skyscrapers, but also „old“ Russian style buildings.

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Dalian Exhibition Centre

We also found a very modern exhibition centre nearby, which has a very nice surrounding area as well.

We hope you enjoyed reading and could see once again what beautiful places can be found in Dalian.

Seoul, the capital of South Korea is a unique city. Spread over a large area it combines modern with ancient architectures.

Since Seoul is only 1 hour from Dalian by flight, we decided to take a weekend tour there (in April 2019, looking back with a little nostalgia how easy and common international travel was before COVID).

We did not really make any planning, just wanted to see some main sights. It turns out there is not „the main spot“ where you „have to“ go, there are many interesting areas.

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Hotel – Grand Ambassador Seoul

It turns out hotels in Seoul can be crazy expensive. So we tried to find a „reasonable“ 5-star hotel which does not cost 250€+ per night. It turned out the „Grand Ambassador associated with Pullman“ had a quite good location (10 minutes to next subway station, near Seoul tower) and was „affordable“. Anyhow, the hotel turned out great and the breakfast alone was worth the price.

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Tour overview

We had totally 4 days for our trip (Friday – Monday)

• Day 1: Arrival and Nightlife
• Day 2: Changdeokgung Palace and Trickeye Museum
• Day 3: Lotte World
• Day 4: Gyeongbokgung Palace and return flight

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Changdeokgung Palace

This is a 600 year old UNESCO World Heritage City and one of the jewels of the city. The area is really huge (we spent at least 3 hours only walking) and includes many gardens and areas with smaller buildings.

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Nightlife

There is of course also probably any activity you can do at night. We went to some bars, an outdoor market and just strolling through the touristy streets. You can find everything for every taste.

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Gyeongbokgung Palace

Not much to say about this huge palace installment. It has a top rating of „must see“ on TripAdvisor. It is also the largest palace in Seoul.

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Lotte world

Lotte is a huge company, wich is into real estate and shopping malls (probably much else). There is a whole district, called Lotte World, with a distinct skyscraper, a nice lake and kind of an amusement park (not to forget countless shops).

As it was just the time of cherry blossom season, you can imagine how many people were there (many). You even had to wait in line to take a picture at the best spots.

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Trickeye Museum

Near the Lotte world we found a nice „AR (augmented reality)“ trickeye museum. It was really fun and you should definitely give it a visit.

First, there are several wall pictures with optical illusions where you can take some crazy pictures.

Second, and that’s probably the cooler thing, you can download an APP on your phone and at certain spots your phone adds stuff to the pictures you take there. So for example, there is a static picture with a volcano bursting in the background. The APP then adds falling lava, smoke and other things into the picture and you can take a video of it. In another spot you could lay on the ground and on the phone it looked like a shark is eating you. Or you could sit on a model horse and the APP adds wings to it so it looks like a winged unicorn.

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Banpodaegyo Bridge

It doesn’t look like much, but it is totally worth going to this bridge at night. There is a huge lawn where people have small tents and just enjoy themselves. The bridge itself is illuminated and there are water „fountains“ that look colorful in different lights. I posted a video as well, but it looks much better in reality.

A little further down the „beach“ we found something like a gaming arcade hall. It was huge fun shooting spiders with some plastic guns!

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Further Impressions

I hope by below collection of impressions we can give you some ideas about what’s Seoul like. There were cool and busy streets, things we have never seen before, like a backpack for your cat (which is worn on the front, not on the back, no idea if it is called frontpack).

We are really thrilled to come back! Since Korea is our very close neighbor, as soon as COVID is gone, we will be back for more of this wonderful city and country!

Worth a visit, despite the high temperatures and partly closed attractions.

End of January 2019, just before Chinese New Year, we visited Harbin, a city in the far north of China near the Russian border.

Every year the world famous “Snow and Ice Festival” is held there for several weeks. Unfortunately, at this time, the temperatures where too high (around -5°C to 0°C), so most of the buildings, which are built entirely from ice blocks, were closed due to risk of collapsing.

We didn’t check the weather just before we went there, so this came as quite a surprise to us. The good thing about it was that there were almost no tourists. The bad thing was that most of the “Ice City” (and all the bars, attractions and events) was closed. We could however visit the snow sculpture park. Even though some of the sculptures where already a little melted, it was still an astonishing display of craftsmanship.

So what did we do? Since we only had a short weekend (arrived Friday night and left Saturday early afternoon), we had a look at the sculpture park and explored the city.

By the way, as every major city (Harbin is the capital city of Heilongjiang province), Harbin is very well connected by high speed train network. It took us merely 4 hours to travel almost 1,000km from Dalian by train.

The city has strong cultural influences from Russia (given its proximity and history), which you can see in the architecture and many Russian shops.

We found some nice places including a “German style restaurant”, several Russian style restaurants and other nice places.

Harbin also is home of one of the biggest indoor skiing areas, as you can see below. We were not able to get in without buying a ticket (around 240 RMB) which includes skiing. We skipped it. From the looks of the website, it has to be amazing though!

There are many other places to see, such as the Siberian Tiger park and many Scenic areas. As we couldn’t come back in 2020 due to COVID, we will definitely come back in 2021! If you plan to travel to Harbin, it is really cold in winter, dropping to -30°C or even colder!

A great vacation destination and currently our home.

Location

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Hotels

First, we want to mention the Hilton, which by definition, is a world class hotel. But this one looks like a castle from a fairy tale.

大连金石滩鲁能希尔顿度假酒店
豪华型,经济技术开发区海滨西路57号更多商户信息评价请查看：

Just very recently the new (world known) “Hard Rock Hotel” has opened right next to the Hilton. We did not yet visit it, but be sure to find a post sooner or later!

Of course, there are also other “local” hotels to be found, but more interesting could be the many houses and apartments that you can rent for vacation. They are really luxurious from the outside, and from what we saw on the internet, also inside.

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Great beaches with clear blue water

In Jinshitan you can find several nice beaches and scenic spots such as the Dalian Geopark and great nature.

You can have all sorts of fun at the beach, from sunbathing, BBQ, swimming, renting a jetski or just enjoying a beer somewhere.

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Scenic spots wherever you look

Not too far from the beach, along the main road, there is a big theater and museum (there are always special events on national holidays). Also, there are some nice temples to visit.

On the far east side there are 2 geoparks, a smaller one with beautiful stone formations and another, bigger one along the cost.

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Enjoy yourself in the beautiful nature

Apart from all the sightseeing and stuff to do on the beach, you can enjoy other activities, such as horse riding, hiking, standup paddling, biking, gathering seafood (a major social activity!) or sliding in winter (there are even snow cannons since Dalian is very dry in winter).

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Blueberry Farm & Springfield Equestrian Club

One “jewel” in JinShiTan is the “Blueberry Farm” near the Dalian American School / Village. It is surrounded by nature, there is a small Zoo and you just feel like on a farm and on a small vacation from a busy city life.

There is the “Springfield Horse Riding Club” and a nice bar “My place”.

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Further locations

There are also several onsen (hot springs) hotels around and a shooting club (you can do real shooting and paintball).

One of our favorite locations is the BeiMa Villa Cafe. It is decorated with so much love and the coffee and cake is incredible! We love it 🙂

北马山庄植趣咖啡
咖啡厅,武夷路北马6号别墅旁更多商户信息评价请查看：

Below you can find some more impressions.

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Further impressions

Of course, there is also the “daily life”, for example every week there is a huge “fresh” market where you can buy everything, from vegetables to meat, spices, plants, pets, hardware, cloth, well…almost everything.

There is so much more to Jinshitan. I hope this gives you a good impression and if you are near or in Dalian, you will go for a visit!

A brief introduction to a nice coastal city in the northeast of China.

This blog entry is supposed to give you a brief introduction to Dalian. It is not supposed to be a complete “Wikipedia” article. It is more to give you an impression what the city is like.

Dalian is a city in North China, located in the province Liaoning and Bahai Sea (Yellow Sea). Including all the neighboring districts, it has around 7 Million inhabitants.

Nearest other cities are Shenyang (Capital of Liaoning) and Dandong (border to North Korea).

Dalian has a good public transport system (small subway system in the core city, and kind of a metro going to the outer districts). It has good high speed train connections and a new and modern train station (Dalian North). The airport is located near the city centre and offers good domestic connections as well as international connections, however most of them to Japan and South Korea, not US or Europe. Of course right now, due to COVID, most international flights are stopped. There is as well a second airport under construction (north of the city) however the construction just started (2020).

Located at the tip of a peninsula, Dalian is surrounded by water and build into hilly terrain mostly (which is great for hiking). Below pictures are most likely your first impressions of the city from above.

The climate in Dalian is similar to Central Europe (for me coming from south of Germany, the difference was not too big).

The summers are a little hotter and more humid, during July and August, the temperatures go up to 35°C with high humidity (I really learned to appreciate ACs).

During wintertime (November to March) the temperatures can drop down to below -10°C, but normally are around -5°. The wind can be very chilly from the seaside. The winters are very dry as well, I have not seen any significant snow in the last 2 years. Most apartments and houses have central heating and the heating period starts around end of October to end of March.

The most pleasant time of the year (at least for me) is September and October as well as April – June. Then you have around 20-25°C during the day, however it can be chilly in the mornings and evenings.

The air quality in Dalian is very good. From my impression, it has improved a lot during the last years due to the efforts of environmental protection issued by the central government. Since there is often a breeze from the sea, which brings in clean air, the “average” air quality is around 50 AQI (which is “green” according to the Air Quality Index, be sure to get the AirVisual APP). During bad days (especially in winter, due more coal power plants will be switched on for heating), it can go as bad as 200, but this is really not very frequent. On many (summer) days the quality is even below 30 AQI.

Dalian features one of the largest public squares in the world, Xinhai square. It is a beautifully maintained square with a length of over 1km. There are many very nice and well maintained parks in any area of the city.

As mentioned, due to its geographic location, there are many nice beaches scattered across the coastline. There are too many to be named.

There are also many small islands around Dalian, which can be reached by boat.

I would define the “Downtown area” near Zhongshang district and near Xinghai square (locals may have a different idea, though). This is were most of the things happen and some nice malls and restaurants are located.

Another major district is Kaifaqu (or DDA, Dalian Development Area). It is about 30km away of Dalian downtown, but kind of its own city. There are some international communities there, international grocery stores, international cafes, bars restaurants (i will dedicate another blog for details), nice malls (Wanda), Cinemas, Starbucks and basically all you need.

Dalian is (again due to geography) famous for its seafood and you should definitely try it.

If you plan on visiting Dalian, i would suggest to plan for a weekend or 3 days. This will be enough to cover the major “sights”.

If you are into hiking, there are several trails through the hills around downtown, Dalian Xijiao National Forest Park and other huge parks. There is also the “Big Black Mountain” near Kaifaqu, the biggest mountain in the area (663m elevation).

There is also a huge zoo, Dalian Forest Zoo, with many different animals and Pandas.

Of course you can extend a stay up to a week, there is Lvshun in the west (40 minute drive) with a nice historic port, “Little Guilin” (Zhuanghe) to the northeast (about 2 hours drive) or Dandong, a city on the boarder to North Korea (3,5 hours drive). Or the city of Anshan a nice historic temple about 3 hours to the north.

Summary

Introduction to Zhangjiajie

Some of you may know that the movie Avatar was actually shot in Zhangjiajie. Watch it again after you read this post and I am sure you will recognize the scenery (as well as what has been added by CGI).

Of course, this was not the main reason we visited Zhangjiajie in Chinas Hunan province. There is much more to discover than the “Avatar Mountains”

The city itself is rather small (in Chinese terms) with about 1.6 Million inhabitants. There is an international airport (DYG). We flew in from Dalian (DLC) via Shanghai Pudong (PVG).

There are several National Parks and scenic areas around Zhangjiajie, which we visited.

• Wulingyuan National Park
• Tianmen Mountain Forest National Park
• Tianzishan Scenic Area
• Zhangjiajie Grand Canyon National Park
• Baofeng Lake Scenic Area

Our Hotel: No.5 Valley Lodge

We stayed there 8 nights and were lucky to get an upgrade after 3 days. First we booked the “Deluxe Theme Room” which was basically a whole house/villa for us alone (2 persons).

The price was not cheap, but you get what you pay for. High end service, stunning scenery and you don’t have to worry about anything.

Then we got upgraded to the “Tree House Suite”, which was actually not really bigger but much cozier and offered a great view.

The hotel service was unbelievably great. We got something like our personal WeChat support where we could organize everything from booking a table for dinner, organizing trips or anything else. The staff spoke perfect English. The whole atmosphere was very “family-like”, the hotel is quite small but spread out over a huge area and several small houses.

The hotel features 2 restaurants, one at the poolside and one with lake view. The “poolside restaurant” is the “high end” restaurant. Each day you can get a 4-5 course dinner for around 150 RMB/person. The other restaurant offers also a good dinner for 100 RMB/person, the only difference we could recognize was that the view was not as good as from the poolside. The food quality itself was very good in both restaurants.

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Summary / Travel Plan

See below the travel summary and links to the corresponding blog articles.

• Day 1 – Travel / Arrival
• Day 3: Relax, 2nd try to visit Wulingyuan (cancelled due to rain)
• Day 2 and 5: Wulingyuan National Park
• Day 4: Tianmen Mountain National Park
• Day 6: Zhangjiajie Grand Canyon
• Day 7: Relaxing
• Day 8: Travel /Return

The “Avatar” Mountains (The movie Avatar was shot here) – 2 day tour

It took me a while to write this blog. The story behind it is that it took us several attempts (3) to visit the park in its entirety. One reason was the weather, one day it was so foggy and rainy, we literally saw nothing but mist. The other day, we “got lost” due to the lack of a english and comprehensive map. Looking back, it was a great adventure, but at the time it was a little frustrating. In order to save you that experience, I will summarize the 3 days and lay out how an optimal visit could look like (you should probably spend 2 days).

The first day we went more or less blindly into the park. We took the entrance near our hotel (west gate). The entrance procedure back then was complicated with all kind of health checks and health code APPs (its now standard and more easy) but back then it was a little confusing for everyone.

First tip: Try to get a to-scale map from somewhere, in english language. We got totally 3 different maps on 3 different days (and locations) and none of them was nearly to scale. Alternatively, research the locations you want to go and mark them in Apple Maps or any other APP. There is probably also a Chinese APP for the park, but we could not figure it out.

I am sorry if we cannot describe the locations more clearly, but as explained earlier, we did not have a decent map and navigated more or less by compass.

The scenic spots have all special names, but i cannot remember them (this is what happens if you write a blog of a travel 3 months ago.)

Along the way (as usual, Chinese people love taking pictures) there are some spots where you can get some traditional cloth and take pictures with it.

One of the spots was a “natural bridge” on which a kind of a temple had been build.

In the park there are a large number of monkeys, that can get quite aggressive if you bother them too much (see further below). These here are the more friendly ones.

The path goes on for a few kilometers downhill and you end up in the valley and eventually at the south gate.

The way to the south gate is again not very clear, but we managed to find it by asking some people. If you want to go back to the west gate, you have to take several buses and a 20 minute uphill hike. Be aware that the park closes 17:00, so plan enough time ahead or exit on the south gate.

If you take bus northward instead of eastward from the mountain cable car station at the west gate, you will end up near a place called Tianzi Mountain Sightseeing platform. From there on, there is again a long downhill hike 1-2 hours to a huge lake (near the east gate).

Tip: You can also get there from the north gate (Tianzi Mountain Gate).

The path was really slippery, so pay attention in case it is wet.

After arriving at the lake, you have to take a bus to the central area of the park. There you find a very big mall / hotel in the middle of the mountains. It was really a weird sight, however practical with a lot of shops and restaurants to fuel up.

Near the “mall” were also many more agressive monkeys, a pack of them (3-4) even attacked us. After shouting at them loudly, they took off though. Seemed like a bunch of teenage monkeys trying to prove themselves 😉

After another bus trip, you will get to an elevator which takes you back on top of the mountains, where you can go back to the west gate cable car mountain station to descend.

To summarize, the best way to enjoy the park would most likely be like this.

Day 1: Enter through South Gate, cover the area there, go up the elevator and exit through west gate.

Day 2: Enter through north gate, take bus to Tianzi Mountain, hike down to the lake and hike to the east gate.

Grand Canyon and Baofeng Lake Scenic Area – 1 day tour

Baofenghu Scenic Area

On our way from our hotel, No.5 Valley Lodge, to the Grand Canyon, we stopped at the Baofeng scenic area, as it was on the way. The area features a temple as well as some hiking opportunities and a scenic boat ride on a beautiful lake.

We decided for the “lazy” version, to drive to the lake by bus (the bus stop is right after then entrance, you cannot miss it.

We took the bus back to the entrance area and then hiked about 1 hour in the woods. There is a steep hill to go up, if you go to path on the left, you end up near the lake (it is only about 10 minutes walk). If you go to the path on the right, you will come to an seemingly abandoned, yet nice temple.

Zhangjiajie Grand Canyon

The Zhangjiajie canyon is some 260m deep and features a 430m long glass bridge across. We have been to the Grand Canyon in the US and this natural wonder is definitely on the same level. You have to go in on the one end (south) and come out on the other end (north).

You start at the visitor center, where luckily for us, there were almost no people at all (June 2020, probably due to COVID and also not being any holiday season). I cannot remember the entrance fee, but i believe it was around 120-140 RMB/person.

Crossing the bridge is really is not for the faint of heart, especialy if you are afraid of heights. Even though you know there is glass a few centimeters thick below you, your mind always tells you you are going to fall. It is a strange experience. There is a metal walkway on the sides, so if you don’t feel like constantly walking “in the air” you can walk there. It is still an amazing experience.

After crossing the bridge, you descend the canyon. There are several elevators (i remember 3, each one is charged for extra, some 30 RMB or so per person) and stairs you have to take. At the bottom, the area was not yet completely finished (June 2020). It is basically a path made of wooden planks along the canyons walls. There is a river flowing in the middle and the scenery is breathtaking.

The last part you have to go by boat. The total hike was unexpectedly long, it took nearly 4 hours from entering the part to exiting. Of course you can spend more time, but there is not any additional areas you can go, the path through the valley is very straightforward.

Wulingyuan “Traditional Village” area

There was not much going on at that time, but we enjoyed the time nevertheless or perhaps because of the lack of many tourists. There are all kind of shops, we bought some paintings and tea. The shop owners were very nice.

The whole tour can be done easily in one day.