Hotels in China

These can differ quite a lot although i have never stayed in what i would say is/was a bad one, maybe we have been lucky. Most places we have stayed at has been by someone else's recommendation.

The hotel booked by the tour company for the football was called Charms, this was the standard or budget hotel and a three star. Not sure if it is still in place but foreigners were not allowed to stay in anything less than a three star hotel.

Charms was good the location was excellent especially for people who had never been to Shanghai before. It was one block back from the walking street, Nanjing Road and a ten minute walk to places like the Shanghai Museum, people s Park and the Bund the other way. There was a small market across the road if you ventured out the back of the hotel. I arranged to buy a sim card from the hotel lobby and they took me across to register the card. Passport must be registered. We had a window seat and a large comfy chair in the room, the only thing that was a little strange was the bathroom wall between bathroom and the room was clear glass, it did have a large oval mirror on the glass but from the room the other person could be seen having a shower, the toilet was set back so that wasnt a problem. Cost 628 rmb no breakfast if not in a package about $130, not bad considering it it is the heart of Shanghai.

Then we moved to Fuyang and the Puli hotel, Warren had booked this through C-trip, a travel company that we had used in China before. We knew where the hotel was, it was situated on a road that I used to walk to the first school that I taught at and it was also close to the college. Downsides of this one was no-one spoke any English. Thankfully we do have some Chinese although one situation almost beat us. The girl at reception checked us in and gave us breakfast vouchers. Our room was on the fifth floor and we left to go, I couldnt remember the word for lift or elevator so I just gestured with my arm going up, she came around the desk and took us to the lift, took back the door card from Warren and tapped it on the lift inside, then pushed in 5. Hah, good security, need the door card for the lift to work. There was nothing on the vouchers to say where breakfast was, she had told us when and I understood that but not where, so after we had been for a walk, I asked at the desk in my best Chinese, something wasn't working as they (there were two by then) giggled and said five and one counted haltingly in English, one thru to five. i think they thought I had asked what floor we were on.
Later a girl came to turn down our room and I showed her the vouchers and asked "Nali" where she replied R low (second floor) phew one less thing to worry about. The room was good, quite big a separate shower and toilet room with a square bathtub in the bedroom.
We stayed for two nights and the cost was 598 rmb with breakfast, only thing was Warren was asked for a thousand, he had forgotten that they do want a sizeable deposit in case of damage. They also didnt take a credit card so we had to hand over ten big ones. we got it back when we checked out. $60 a night.

On to the Kaiyuan (New Century Grand Hotel to give it, its correct name in English) we had stayed there once before about six years ago after a Christmas function and yep the rooms were the same except, they were a little confused that we had booked for two people and for two breakfasts but only one bed. A few clacks on the computer and then she was all smiles, when we got to the room it had two twin beds.The room was massive with a big easy chair and footstool, a separate desk and the bathroom was so big that it needed two doors into it, there was a circular bath in there.

This was from one doorway

This is the scene from the other doorway. When we stayed before, everyone met in our room and there were eight or nine of us and all manged to have a seat either on the chairs or the beds.

The kaiyuan had a buffet breakfast which was included in the price and one night we had the buffet dinner as well. When living in Shaoxing this was our go to place for a good meal but I was disappointed in the evening meal on this occasion although I did have a Peking Duck pancake made for me.

Cost was $587 for five nights and buffet meal well worth it, pretty sure the Kaiyuan is either four or four and a half. we even had a pillow menu in our room and could request different types of pillows if we wished.