Update: I changed the order of the photos and a few captions because they bugged me. Sorry for any confusion!

Tuesday morning, I set out to explore the area south-south-west of our apartment. My specific destination was a small green spot on my map, Guilin Garden. It turns out that Guilin Garden is a small public park that used to be the home of a Shanghai gangster, Huang Jinrong. The walled garden was devastated by the Japanese in the mid-1900’s and then restored and opened to the public in 1988. The elaborate gardens surrounding the main house, which is now a tea house, contain a series of courts with various focal points. In one, a raised and covered wooden pathway flanked with built in benches meanders through heavily landscaped areas and over a stream. In another, an “athletic pavilion” floats in the middle of a large pond. In a third, a large stone-paved court is surrounded by picnic tables where small groups gather to play cards, and in a fourth a flat grass lawn is surrounded by large shade trees. Even mid week, the garden was teaming with people, but there were so many discreet areas that it was easy to find a peaceful place to be alone to read my book, The Good Earth (which by the way is a fantastic book about a Chinese farmer in the early 1900’s). I will certainly return to this park throughout the summer to watch the gardens change as the trees bloom and evolve for the season.

Saturday morning, I talked Nik into exploring the south-south-west area with me. This time we didn’t have a specific destination, but wanted to get as close to the Huangpu river as possible. The thought was that we would see some pretty impressive industrial areas, but what we found were small neighborhoods, construction and markets that line the South Shanghai Railway. We were out for most of the morning, and here is what we saw.

Nik has also done a post about this week, mostly photos of yesterday: Biking, Gaming, Resting, Saturday in Shanghai

As mentioned in my previous post, Nik and I have taken to the game we call “Feather”. The rest of China knows the game as Jianzi, meaning “little shuttlecock”. Here is a video our friend Mike took last weekend, and then Nik added audio.

I must admit. Life is good when you can bicycle through a city and not be too concerned with being killed. Since I bought my new bike on Tuesday, that’s pretty much all I have been doing.

What’s that Nik? We need to go to the grocery store? No problem, I’ll just go to the one across town instead of the one across the street because it will only take 15 minutes to get there.

What? You want to go to a park? There’s one on the other side of the river that looks cool, let’s go there. It should take an hour.

Do we need to get subway tickets? Nope, our ride is locked up just outside.

Shanghai is flat, the weather has been amazing (except Thursday), there are bike lanes everywhere, the streets aren’t potholed (most of them anyways) and traffic generally goes pretty slowly. It is one of many perfect towns to bike in. My personal favorites have been Portland, Copenhagen, Denver, Beijing and Yangshuo, but I am certain that there are more.

The one downside to biking is that because I am going a little bit faster and am on the street instead of the sidewalk, I tend to pass up little nooks and crannies that I would explore on foot. Our plan, though, is to start riding to areas that are farther away, and then walk around and explore. That way, we’ll have the best of both worlds. For now, our bikes are too precious to leave on any old sidewalk, so we’ll be sticking to the streets.

I bought my bike from the GIANT retail store at the corner of Jianguo Lu and Hengshan Lu. It is a basic 24″ women’s single-speed bike with a great bell. It cost about Â¥600 ($88) including a good lock and the front basket. Nik inherited a STRONG men’s single-speed bike from a co-worker for free that I’m sure he will pass along when we leave.

I guess it’s not true that I’ve been riding my bike constantly for the entire week. We have done some other noteworthy things.

We are slowly discovering the amazing food that can be found in Shanghai.

Then one day, we found Nik’s Chinese twin.

We’ve also seen plenty of examples of how this city is busting at the seams with people.

We have also been practicing a little game we call “Feather”

And sometimes, we visit the local newspaper board with our friends.

Three weeks in, and it’s all still pretty amazing. Spring is in the air, and the city seems more alive every day. Nik’s enjoying his work, we’re making new friends, we’re eating well, we’re discovering new things every day and we’re having fun! What more can we ask?

* Photos taken by Nik, who did a tandem post. Get it? Tandem. As in a bicycle: Biking Shanghai, Luxun Park, Food, Poisoning