A walking tour of Pudong, Shanghai

From the spiky Oriental Pearl Tower to the pagoda-style Jin Mao Tower, Pudong is home to some of Shanghai’s most distinctive architecture. Located east of the HuangPu River (Pudong directly translates to ‘East of the river’), it’s best known for the glitzy Lujiazui financial area the Shanghai Stock Exchange and its array of striking skyscrapers.

Begin on a high at Shanghai Financial Center

Start your day with a trip to the sky-high Shanghai World Financial Center, easily accessible from Lujiazui subway station. Its distinctive ‘bottle opener’ design stands out across The Bund and the building offers three different observation decks. Most noteworthy is the one on the 100th floor, said to be the highest observatory in the world. If you happen to visit in the evening to watch the sun go down and you’re feeling flush, head to the Park Hyatt Shanghai, which is also housed in the building. Its 100 Century Avenue Bar serves up cocktails that are almost as exquisite as the view.

Get an Adrenaline Rush at Jin Mao Tower

Just a three-minute stroll from the Shanghai World Financial Center is the Postmodern masterpiece Jin Mao Tower. Adrenaline junkies should make their way up the tiered tower to the 88th floor to brave the outside glass walkway, which is completely handrail-free. Visitors are safely harnessed to the edge, allowing them to teeter across the open glazed path and peer down to truly spectacular views below.

Escape Reality at Oriental Pearl Tower

Just steps away from Super Brand Mall is the final skyscraper on this walking tour: the Oriental Pearl Tower – one of Shanghai’s most famous landmarks. While its height is now eclipsed by Jin Mao Tower and Shanghai Tower, Oriental Pearl Tower still has plenty to offer tourists. The upper sphere of the Radio and TV tower is home to a glass-bottomed corridor, while in the basement, visitors are immersed in Shanghai’s history through the Shanghai Municipal History Museum. Make sure you find time to ride the tower’s very own virtual reality roller coaster, which whizzes you along Shanghai’s skyline.

Bund Sightseeing Tunnel

Pudong is only part of what The Bund area has to offer, so finish your walking tour by heading to the Bund Sightseeing Tunnel, which is located at the south side of the Oriental Pearl Tower. This futuristic tunnel is the quickest and most exciting way to cross the river and reach Puxi (translated as ‘West Bank’). The three- to five-minute Maglev train combines rapid speeds with a psychedelic light show.

Read more: Find the best Xiaolongbao in Shanghai

Source The Culture Trip

Explore the attractions in Shanghai, China

Shanghai is a vibrant high-paced city of bright lights from its colonial period, bustling markets, and creative energy.  As one of China’s largest cities, there are many things to explore here.

From iconic landmarks to floating towns, museums teaching the culture and history of Shanghai, beautiful green spaces and local hangouts, you will find something worth visiting around every corner of China’s biggest city.

The Bund

The Bund is Shanghai’s waterfront boulevard, lined in the heritage buildings that showcase the city’s pre-1949 past and across the river from the Pudong skyscrapers of its future. Along the Bund, Shanghai’s street life is in full force. It is bustling even at dawn, with local ballroom dancing, exercising, and practicing tai chi and qi gong. Day and night, Chinese tourists, foreigners, and Shanghai locals walk the Bund, snapping photos of each other backed by the skyscrapers. At night, the towers are lit with flashing neon lights reflected in the Huangpu River.

Oriental Pearl Tower

The Oriental Pearl Tower is a Shanghai landmark as it towers over the Huangpu River in Pudong New Area. At 468 meters (1,535 feet) tall, it was the highest building in Shanghai when it was built in the early 1990s. Looking like a cross between the Eiffel Tower and Seattle’s Space Needle, the world’s sixth largest radio and TV tower has 15 observation decks with a revolving restaurant at the 264-meter (867-foot) level.

Eleven spheres are strung vertically through the tower, a scene that is suggestive of dragons playing with pearls. The glass floor of the outdoor viewing platform is probably one of the most thrilling attractions in Shanghai.

Yu Garden

While the area around Yu Garden is commercialized and the garden itself not as impressive as the classical gardens of Suzhou, it is one of the few old sights left in Shanghai, and a valuable piece of the city’s rapidly disappearing past. Commissioned in 1559 by Ming Dynasty official Pan Yunduan, the garden was built over nearly two decades by the renowned architect Zhang Nanyang.

After you walk around carp-filled ponds and through the rock gardens and bamboo groves, you can visit the small museum dedicated to the Society of Small Swords rebellion.

Fuxing Park

Once the largest park in Shanghai, Fuxing Park is the quintessential Chinese senior-hangout spot. Find sprightly adults dancing their favourite ballroom steps, playing cards or mahjong or writing ephemeral poetry with giant calligraphy brushes. Located in the French Concession, Fuxing Park is also a great escape from the city that surrounds it. Here, there is plenty of green space and vegetation to renew your body and soul.

Shanghai Museum

Paris has its Louvre, Amsterdam the Rijksmuseum and Shanghai has its own world-class museum in the Shanghai Museum. Located in a modern building on People’s Square, the Shanghai Museum has five floors containing the best in ancient Chinese history: old coins, priceless paintings and ceramics, intricately carved traditional lacquer furniture, and ancient bronze and jade artifacts. All told, the museum has more than 120,000 pieces divided among 11 galleries. Even the building itself is a work of art, with the round dome representing heaven and the square base, land. Best of all, the museum offers free admission to 8,000 people every day.

Read more: The best contemporary art museums you should visit in Shanghai

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