Wake and take a taxi to the Tea Museum, where the taxi driver waits for us (I meet Andrena there) whilst we look around the museum. He gets pissed off as we take a good half an hour when he suggested that it only takes a few minutes to see everything! He then takes us to Longjing Village (Dragon Well Village) to buy tea. The first 'tea house' we went to tried to charge us Y500 a catty (500g) for the tea, so we walk out! We carry on walking up the road and get to the village proper. The air is so clean here! On our stroll, an old lady comes up to us and asks us if we wanted to take pictures! She then grabs us and grandma-handles us to get into the perfect poses for pictures with the mountain as backgrounds and surrounded by tea plants (trees?). She could have been a film director with her demands of “stand this way… no, no, point the camera this way!” We end up going to her tea house and buying tea from her. Y250 for a catty! Half the price, so I buy 3 tins!
Time is running short as Andrena has to catch a train back to Shanghai, so we get a taxi back to town and get some food. We go to a Muslim place for a quick bite, which turns out to be the slowest meal to cook ever! And the spiciest as well! The food takes so long that Andrena actually misses her train back to Shanghai, so we go for drinks at the hotel opposite (originally coffee, but then saw that alcohol was same price!). Safely get her on the train on our second attempt!
I then decide to go for a wonder around the city which takes me to Carrefore (French food store, like Tesco). I walk past the car park and see a man going to all the mopeds and hitting the boot compartment and setting all the alarms off. He had the BIG and CLEVER look on his face! I then went to the Temple of King Qian, the king of the area many years ago who led the local people through many years of peace and prosperity whilst joining with rival kingdoms to create China. I saw the tiniest squirrel in there! Very different to the grey ones at home! It seems that I had just missed something, as a lot of photographers were walking out and there was gold clothe on all the walls and pillars.
I then found a book store and replenished my reading literature and got a paper which I sat by the lake and read as the sun went down. Was very old man like! As the sun went down I returned to my hostel by bus this time. Hangzhou’s bus system is strange in the fact that I got a coach with the bus route on and there are also mini vans which run the same route. So it’s not one company with a fleet of buses, but many people running the same line.
I get back and have dinner; West Lake fish again. I’ve realised that I am eating well again - hurrah! I then chat with the reception girl at the hostel all night, showing her pix of my travels so far and testing her English! I’m surprised that she didn’t recognise Marx and Engels in one of my pictures. Early night.
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