Final Day: Sunday was the last day of the trade fair and our last day in Shanghai. Dragon and Jong, both fluent in Chinese, were able to cover the booth themselves, giving Peep the day off. Peep had taken a couple hours break from working the fair on Saturday, returning to the hotel for a rest, and was feeling well enough to tour the city with me despite her lingering cold.
We made our way to the Metro and purchased new one-day passes, our three-day passes having expired, and rode to our first stop for the day. We transferred lines once, making the typical lengthy walk between train platforms, surprising for such a modern Metro system. Emerging from the Metro station, we walked several blocks to the Jade Buddha Temple.
Jade Buddha Temple: The Jade Buddha Temple was founded in 1882 to house two solid white jade Buddha statues brought to China from Burma. The temple was destroyed during the overthrow of the Qing Dynasty, but the Buddhas were spared and the current temple was constructed in 1928 to house them.
Laid out in the typical Chinese Buddhist style, we entered though the Mountain Gate, saw the Hall of Heavenly Kings and the Grand Hall, which had three seated Buddhas: Amitabha, Gautama, and Bhaisajyaguru, going from left to right. It also had many additional statues along the sides of the hall depicting the Gods of the Twenty Heavens.
Seated Jade Buddha: We then reached Jade Buddha Tower, location of the seated Jade Buddha. Although smaller than the seated Jade Buddha I saw at Jing'an Temple the day before, this one is much more well-known and highly revered, making the temple a popular tourist spot. There was an extra fee to see the seated Jade Buddha, but even when combined with the temple entrance fee it totaled less than the entry fee at Jing'an Temple.
Reclining Jade Buddha: Within the Reclining Buddha Hall, located along one side of the temple grounds, sits the second jade Buddha statue, the Reclining Jade Buddha. This statue is smaller in size than the seated version, but no additional fee is required to see it and photos are allowed.
Lujiazui: Located on a peninsula of the Huangpu River, Lujiazui is the new financial district of Shanghai. Its location directly across the river from the Bund, the old financial district, made it an ideal spot for this purpose when development of the area began in the early 1990s.
Here we viewed some of the buildings, including the Jin Mao Tower, who's design is inspired by traditional Chinese architecture such as the tiered pagoda; the Shanghai Tower, now the second tallest building in the world at 632 metres (2,073 ft) high; and the Shanghai World Financial Center (SWFC), with its signature trapezoidal aperture near the peak. The SWFC has an observation deck 474 m (1,555 ft) above ground level, but we didn't make the trip up.
We then ducked inside the nearby ifc Mall to find a place to eat, settling on a nice sit-down restaurant, Morton's Steakhouse.
More Sightseeing: After lunch we stepped back outside to see more of the area, including the distinctive Oriental Pearl Tower, eventually making our way down to the Pudong Riverside Promenade for views of the Bund through the haze of the day.
We next took a ride on the Bund Sightseeing Tunnel, a tourist attraction taking riders beneath the Huangpu River, landing us back at the Zhongshan levee, where we were the evening before. We took in the views of Lujiazui across the river by the light of day before heading back up Nanjing Road East. By the time we reached People's Square the couple of museums there had already closed their doors for the day.
By this time, Peep was ready to call it a day, so we jumped back on the Metro to begin the journey back to our hotel. However, on the way there I convinced her to ride past our stop and all the way to the end of the line at Shanghai Pudong International Airport. Once at the airport, we purchased tickets to ride the Shanghai Maglev Train.
Shanghai Maglev Train: Opened in 2004, the Shanghai Maglev Train is the first commercially operated high-speed magnetic levitation train in the world. At a top speed of 431 kph (268 mph) it is also the fastest commercially operated train of any kind. It currently runs from Shanghai Pudong International Airport to central Pudong, just 30.5 km (19 mi) away. There have been several efforts to expand the line, but none survived past the planning stage.
We entered the train with few other passengers and settled into our seats, the only ones occupying our particular cabin. Despite its higher speed and more comfortable accommodations, the maglev gets far fewer riders than the regular Metro, probably due to the higher ticket cost and shortness of the trip, requiring transfer to the regular Metro to complete the vast majority of journeys.
The train sped out of the gate and quickly got up to 300 kph (186 mph), its top speed for that time of day. The ride was comparable to a regular train ride in smoothness, but the scenery passed by at a much quicker pace.
After our brief ride on the maglev, we transferred to the regular Metro line to take us back to our hotel. Once there, we enjoyed a nice dinner and then packed for the trip home before turning off the lights for the day.
Monday's Return: We were up early the next day to catch the first leg of our flight back to Laos. Our flights were scheduled with too little layover time, causing us to miss our connecting flight from Hong Kong to Bangkok, so we had to book a seat on another airline that left a little later. That gave us just barely enough time to make our Lao Airlines flight back to Savannakhet once we finally landed in Bangkok. However, our luggage could not keep up with us. After some further delays, our luggage finally arrived, safe and sound, on Friday.