Wilson's Wanderings: Adventures in New Places

We had decided that this year for the Spring Festival Vacation, we would take a trip around China instead of spending much of our free time in Qingdao. We had about 8 weeks of vacation during spring festival, so we had plenty of time to see many places all around China. All in all, we traveled about 3000 miles during our trip; some by train and some by plane and a little by boat. We probably walked about 100 miles going to many different tourists sites. We did all the planning and traveling on our own. The only help we had was to get some of our train tickets. What was really amazing was that we were not nervous, even though we speak very little Chinese. We were able to get around and communicate pretty well.

What an adventure we had!!!

We started from Qingdao, traveled to Nanjing, then to Guilin, then to Chengdu, then to Xi'an, on to Beijing, Dezhou and then back to Qingdao!

Every place has some amazing sights to see, delicious food to eat, and wonderful people to meet. I had made a list of places we wanted to see, things we wanted to eat in each city. We went to many of these things, but the best times we had were when we just took walks and discovered places we did not know existed. We found parks, food, buildings, statues, rivers, waterfalls and many other things by just wandering the cities. We had very nice hotel rooms at every place; small, clean, and just what we needed. We packed light, only one suitcase, so we washed in the sink many nights. It was easy and we did not have to worry about lugging around too many suitcases. It turns out I love traveling light!

Nanjing: First class train tickets, metro, and hotel room

Guilin: We flew from Nanjing to Guilin. We stayed in a hostel. Wonderful meeting new people.

Chengdu: We flew from Guiling to Chengdu. We stayed with some friends in their wonderfully, big apartment. Our cute apartment could fit in just the living room/dining room area. We had a driver in Chengdu; no need for taxi's or the bus.