Day 85 - Huangpu

This morning we found out that we'll probably be here all day. The captain is waiting for the agent to confirm our departure. I actually think it's a combination of when cargo operations will be complete, combined with the availability of a pilot. I was up on the bridge this morning talking to him about the city. His opinion is that there is nothing to see in Huangpu. I think he's right. The city is a very drab looking industrial town with probably everything geared to the port. I did manage to take a nice shot of the city just before we docked yesterday so I've used it for today's picture. You can see the massive building partly constructed in the background. That seems to be very common in this area. The crew were out last night at one the local bars and I suspect plans are being made for tonight as well. I suppose if I really wanted to see Huangpu this would be an option, however, I'm not sure if a bar near the port is actually seeing Huangpu.

China was the only country on this trip I wasn't really looking forward to visiting. I'd have to check to know what year we were here before, however, it was 12 or 13 years ago. We spent about 10 days here and visited the typical tourist spots. I'm always glad we came to China, but I had never planned to return. From what I hear it's probably best not to return to them. The section of the Great Wall we visited back then now has a cable car and a McDonalds. I seriously doubt either of these has added to the majesty of the Great Wall itself. In a way it's probably better to remember the sights as they were. Also, for a Canadian, China is pretty crowded. The encyclopaedia I've been using shows Canada's total population in 2005 estimated just under 33 million. Shanghai, our next stop, had a municipal population of 16.7 million in 2000. For myself it was culture shock. Even some of the smaller northern ports have populations greater than 2 million. Shanghai is probably the obvious city to get off the ship and explore, except, we've seen the more obvious tourist stops. In the end I suppose it will have more to do with either the port agent or how stir crazy we get.