ByGD
I have a really hard time booking hotels because I’ve spent so much of my life traveling solo and sleeping in dorms. But I totally scored when I took my daughter to China. We booked a room in the Castle Hotel in Qingdao. Formerly guest housing in the German governor’s estate, the European-inspired Castle Hotel was our home base and refuge. I used my Chase travel card and points to pay for the room, so our week and a half stay there ended up costing about $100.
ByGD
This is the tourist tower at Xinhao Shan Park in the old part of Qingdao. From a distance, I think it looks like a Studio Ghibli character design peeking out of the trees on the hillside. Up close, it looks like someplace a Ghibli character might live.
ByGD
This is Signal Hill Park (Xinhao Shan 信号山) in Qingdao. It is one of the ten important hill parks in Qingdao, and was very close to our hotel in the old German concession area. These red blobs are look-out towers for tourists. But to me, they look like Studio Ghibli creatures keeping watch over the city.
ByGD
I’ve mentioned before that animal care standards in China are not quite the same as in the U.S.
And I’ve mentioned their shopping malls that put ours to shame.
These two facts collided on the third day that my daughter and I returned to the brand-new MixC mall in Qingdao. She wanted to go ice skating. The mall had only been open for a couple of weeks, and on this Sunday it was celebrating the new ice rink. So, while she and dozens of others skated, a corner of the Olympic-sized rink was walled off from the skaters. Shoppers piled up along the rink wall to watch the show. First some penguins were trotted out on the ice to run around. Then a trained walrus from one of the city’s multiple aquariums was brought out. Among the walrus’ many tricks, he was trained to dance to the then-top hit “Gangnam Style.”
My daughter and hundreds of local shoppers were charmed. I was so shocked I didn’t even think to complain that it should have been the Lobster Quadrille.
ByGD
I took this photo of a dragon fountain in Qingdao. I think it was on an easy hike through a famous park right next to our hotel. But I can’t remember for sure. Anyway, it’s a nice fountain.