Shanghai's Soul: Water Village, Skyscrapers & Bund Icons

After COVID the tourism in China started awakening with its confusing things. In many places in China you will still struggle with this. But in Shanghai we really felt differently. From the first minutes of the tour when we met our guide Kris we felt relief and pleasure what you were expecting from the tour like that. Kris speaks excellent English and you enjoy every moment of the tour even all other aspects about life in Shanghai. Shortly we felt like we met an old friend and just having fun with him. Shanghai Trippest was also helpful after trip providing customers support services like the manager of the Trippest Niko who arranged tickets for the other not in Shanghai attraction.

Our mini tour was a memorable experience. Despite the cold weather, our driver and tour guide made sure we were all taken cared of. We were dropped off and picked up conveniently at spots where the rain wasn't too troublesome. Our tour guide, Daniel Shao, handled and executed the tour flawlessly, even customizing the tour to accommodate our minor requests. Also, he took care of our communication problem via phone with other merchants even after the tour. We had a great time and it was worth all the rain pounding on us. The history, places, people, food and mood were just perfect.

We went to this water town on a rainy winter day. The place is beautiful. We visited Kezhi garden, a century-old pharmacy, and small alley shops. It was easy to walk around because there were only a few people. Our tour guide, Daniel Shao, made the trip worthwhile. He knows the history very well. He’s very accommodating and goes way beyond what a tour guide should do. He was even helpful with Chinese translation even after the tour was over. This is the highlight of our Shanghai trip.

Our mini tour consisted of Jan and I, one other guest, our tour guide (Ding) and the driver. We booked this tour through China Highlights, along with Shanghai transfers and a two day (overnight) Beijing tour from our cruise ship in Tianjin. Everything we did with China Highlights was brilliant. In Shanghai, the vehicle was comfortable, though getting into the back seat was tricky for David our fellow traveller. A perfect day, our guide was on time, and getting the small group together took little time. The tour of Shanghai was an eye-opener, having not visited China for over 20 years the modern development was hard to believe. Strolling the Bund looking across the water to "New Shanghai" was spectacular. Everything was so clean and orderly. The sights from the tower were amazing. The water village was a contrast, an impression of "old China" on display. Ding was most informative. Lunch in an authentic local restaurant was generous. Our driver knew all the backroads, in heavy traffic he somehow managed to get us home on time. An excellent tour that didn't miss a beat.

Since we were the only 2 people on the Mini-Group tour that day & it was a Public Holiday, our Tour Guide Catherine suggested we do The Bund & Financial Centre first to avoid the crowds & heat later it the day. It was a great recommendation as the morning was easy to walk around The Bund as it was not too crowded & we skipped all the queues getting to 100th floor of the SWFC to see the magnificent views of Shanghai. Despite the Public Holiday traffic, we still made it to the Water Village in plenty of time to explore the Garden before having lunch & then continuing our tour of the Village. Catherine was an excellent tour guide & ambassador for Shanghai, she was extremely knowledgable & had a very pleasant way of sharing her information. We had a great day & thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.

<p>Definitely the quickest way to get the jist of Shanghai in a day and it was filled with a schedule that included the old and the modern which I liked a lot. Sophie was my tour guide and as great as she tried to make the day, we fell short on excitement until we arrived to The Bund which immediately became the highlight of everything. The tour was professional in a lot of way but had too much of downtime which really killed the mood. Still, would recommend for those who want to take a lot of pictures, first time in Shanghai, and don't have a lot of time.</p>