Travel Diary: Hangzhou and Huangshan

When I started planning our trip to China I knew the last two cities we visited were all about getting back to nature, but I honestly didn’t expect them to be quite as beautiful as they were. After being in busy Beijing we headed to Hangzhou, to the south. The purpose of coming was to explore the West Lake, a massive expanse of water surrounded by causeways, pagodas, temples and bridges just begging to be explored on foot or on bike. We booked into our very budget accommodation, went to sleep and woke up the next morning ready to get amongst it. The only problem was, we took a wrong turn. Instead of turning right outside our hotel, we turned left, because we ‘sensed’ there would be more to eat toward the left. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. We walked for hours trying to find somewhere to get something to eat and kept coming up short. Either the place was closed, we couldn’t read the menu or it was a meat-fest (I’m vegetarian). This is the sad story of how we came to be in a line, waiting for a table at Pizza Hut, next to a Walmart in the middle of (...)