Brandon O'Brien

Saturday, December 13, 2014 @ 4:51 AM in 2014 Asia

Since we didn't have any real plans we were able to sleep in a little bit which was nice. The first thing we did was head into Yuyuan Gardens which was right by our hotel. It's one of the older parts of the city dating back around 1,000 years. We grabbed some breakfast there and then walked to the riverfront to see the skyline of Shanghai.

The air quality has been a lot better here than it was in Beijing which was a nice change. The skyline view was really impressive. After spending some time there we walked down Nanjing Rd for a while which was full of shopping and people trying to sell us fake rolexes and massages. We found a place for lunch in one of the malls but were kinda let down since we didn't actually get what we thought we were ordering.

We took the metro across the river and into the financial district to walk around some of the big skyscrapers. Shanghai has some nice elevated pedestrian pathways that made it easy to get around. We heard about a bar being at the top of one of the buildings so we went over there to get some good views but found out the bar didn't open until 5 (three hours from when we got there).

Instead of sticking around we came back to the hotel where we relaxed for a little bit before heading out for some drinks and dinner. We found a place that had a huge list of imported beers and had a few there around 8:30pm. The streets were pretty empty for a Friday night which was strange. Once we finished our beers we headed out for food but everything seemed to be closed or empty which wasn't a good sign. We walked around for a little while looking for something good but had to settle on McDonalds since it was the only thing open. I was at least able to try one of the local specialties which was a hamburger with some sausage links on top. It wasn't very good and I'd probably never get it again, haha.

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Tags: china, shanghai, travels2014

Posted from: China

Friday, December 13, 2013 @ 6:31 PM in 2013 Europe

Day 170

I walked around quite a bit today exploring various parts of the city. I went over to the Royal Palace and up to Plaza Espana (which was actually filled with some kind of setup for Christmas). I walked to the San Miguel market and then back to the hostel. The San Miguel market is supposedly famous for all of its tapas. It seemed pretty touristy and everything was priced higher than it should have been. It was still nice to see and smell all the different tapas though.

After lunch I wanted to check out the big indoor fruit, vegetable and meat market called Mercado de la Cebada. It was along the same lines as La Boqueria in Barcelona and Mercado Central in Valencia, except I feel like both of those were better. This one was two floors but most of the booth spaces were empty. I'm not sure if it's more populated on different days of the week but it didn't really have the same liveliness that the others did.

On the way back I picked up a box of Turron (a type of candy that's really popular around here for the holidays). The box I got wasn't actually that good. If I can find some that tastes as good as the first one I had back in Cordoba I'm definitely bringing some back to the states. The stuff I bought was oily and didn't really have much flavor.

After that I walked over to Parque del Retiro, a gigantic park on the west side of the city. Unfortunately when I got there the weather was turning south and it was starting to sprinkle rain. The park would have been great to walk around in during some nice weather. I'll probably go back later in the week if the sun is out for a while.

On the way back to the hostel the rain persisted and it's been raining the rest of the day. I've just been hanging out in the hostel for the last few hours and don't really have any desire to head out into the cold and get rained on tonight. Unfortunately this hostel doesn't have a lounge area to hang out in so I'm just chilling in my room.

I'm a bit sad that I'm ending my journey here in Madrid. Every Spanish city I've been to so far has been awesome. Madrid is just a huge city filled with massive amounts of people, trash, beggars, prostitutes, and "cash for gold" people everywhere you turn. I really wish I would have spent more time down in southern Spain and then spent a night or two here before flying out. I feel like 5 nights here in Madrid is going to feel like a long time.

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Tags: daily journal, spain, madrid

Posted from: Spain