Day 3 of travel: Hangzhou - Xitang Water Village (西塘水乡）
We spent the morning visiting Bao Shu Pagoda 保掓塔 , one of the ancient pagoda located at the hill behind the hotel we were staying. We had to climb up quite steep staircase to reach the pagoda. It was nothing spectacular - in fact it was rather run down, but served as an ancient landmark for West Lake. We walked further up the hill, in search for another tourist landmark. But the side entrance was still closed when we reached there, and the main entrance was quite a distance away. Due to time constraint, we decided to give it a miss. We took a taxi back to our hotel. But alas, it was caught in a severe morning rush hours - with traffic jam everywhere; worse still the taxi that we traveled in collided with another vehicle (that tried to filter into the our lane). The taxi driver signaled us to leave the cab. We ended up having to walk about 15 minutes back to our hotel.
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| walking up the slope leading to Bao Shu Pagoda |
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| Bamboo forest |
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| The pagoda is located in 宝石山 |
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| 保掓塔 |
We checked out from the hotel by noon, took a cab to a bus station 九堡客运中心, and boarded a tour bus to Xitang西塘水乡. We managed to checked into the boutique hotel in Xitang at around 5pm, Thereafter, we took a leisure walk in the neighbourhood, including a boat ride along the main river, enjoying the night scenery!
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| 西塘水乡Xitang Water Village |
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| night view 夜景 |
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| Our bedroom |
Day 4 of travel: Xitang 西塘 to Tongli同里水乡
We spend half the day in Xitang, enjoying the morning misty atmosphere.
We checked out from our hotel at 2pm, and began our second journey to Tongli 同里via a private limousine (booked through the hotel staff). It was raining when we reached Tongli. The owner of the hotel that we had called to book earlier on came to greet us in his motorbike. After checking into the hotel, we rushed through the rest of the afternoon, visiting the main tourist attractions (as the tickets for those attractions only valid for one day).
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| 退思园 |
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| 雨丝绵绵 |
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| 同里 |
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| 珍珠塔 |
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| 百年古树 |
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| 三桥 |
Day 5 of travel: Tongli to SuZhou苏州
We spend the morning in Tongli, before departing to Suzhou via express bus. We reached Suzhou in the afternoon, checking into 苏州人家酒店. We managed to walk around the shopping district 观前街 nearby, and join a local river cruise at night.
After thoughts: Both ancient water villages have their own charms. Xitang is best seen both at night and in the early morning (hence, it will be good to stay overnight there). Tongli is rather quiet at night; hence, spending one day there is probably sufficient.
苏州
