Self-organised trips
Shanghai is the largest city in China with over 23 million inhabitants. Shanghai is a beautiful city to visit offering fantastic Art Deco buildings; a wonderfully diverse cosmopolitan atmosphere; historical sites and a modern skyline. Shanghai is a huge city and a popular tourist destination for both local Chinese people and international travellers.
THINGS TO DO AND SEE IN SHANGHAI
- Shanghai is a truly large city so it is worth deciding on your destination itinerary before you set foot on the streets, and a good idea to have the name of your accommodation written in Chinese for the return journey. Shanghai has something to offer everyone including spiritual temples, inspiring museums, modern architecture, classical parks, tea houses and wonderful people watching opportunities.
- Shanghai’s Bund is a popular tourist destination and is an embanked riverfront along the Huangpu River. Views here offer a great visual comparison between the city’s historical buildings down one side and more modern buildings on the other, including some of the tallest and most inspiring structures in Asia.
- Shanghai Museum founded in 1952 is designed by a local architect in the shape of a ding (ancient bronze cooking vessel) and can be found on People’s Square. The museum houses over 120,000 exhibits including ancient Chinese bronze, jade artefacts, ceramics, paintings and also furniture form the Ming and Qing dynasties.
- Shanghai offers some great spiritual temples including the Jade Buddha Temple founded in 1882 displaying a jade Buddha statue nearly 2 metres tall and also a reclining Buddha made of marble donated from Singapore. The famous Yuyuan Garden is over 400 years old with classical Chinese architecture throughout. Visitors to the gardens have the chance to see six separate featured areas, each with their own unique attractions including pavilions, ponds with rockeries, old trees, oriental flowers, ancient wells and the famous Jade Rock over 3 metres tall.
For more travel information on what to do in see in Shanghai, we invite you to visit our partner GetYourGuide.
EATING OUT & NIGHTLIFE IN SHANGHAI
A breakfast Shanghai style is typically food quickly grabbed from a side stall like Sangjibo (pork buns steamed) and eaten dipped in black vinegar with Chinese-style flat bread. The Chinese mitten crab dish is a hairy crab typically served during winter and steamed in bamboo containers and also a favourite is crispy chicken boiled and then roasted until the skin goes crispy.
GETTING AROUND IN SHANGHAI
For extensive travel around Shanghai city, the Jiaotong Card can be charged with money and then used for travel on the metro, buses and even taxis. Cards can be purchased from metro stations as well as some convenience stores. Shanghai is a large city and distances between attractions can require a lot of travel and all afore mentioned transport methods are typically efficient, frequent and good value for money.
