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Tuesday’s entertainment in Chongqing

Guanyinqiao evening entertainment

What can you do in the evening in Guanyinqiao area? Plenty of restaurants, shopping malls and places to enjoy late afternoon and evening are inviting the voisotors to taste this comercial site after dark.

Just before the sunset you can sneak in to the Sonam Indian Restaurant to enjoy Chicken Tikka Masala with traditional garlic bread. For 50 RMB you will get full dish and cold beverage.

This restaurant is located in the 5th floor shopping center right across the pedestrian area to the left when you exit light rail through exit number 3. You will see the KFC sign. Just go inside the shopping mall entrance to the right and find your way up the 5th floor. Believe me, the search is worth it.

You can smell the incense before even entering the restaurant. Chinese hostesses in Indian garments are not fluent in English, but will take you a fully pictured menu with English translation. Before you place your order a glass of water and a small snack is served. You can check the chef’s work also, since the wall dividing restaurant from kitchen is transparent. Or simply dive into the Indian melodies decently accentuating pleasant atmosphere in the restaurant.

After you finish your meal it is time to roam around the pedestrian area. You can find anything and everything from clothes, shoes and lingerie to torchlights and fake swords.

When you are done with “window” shopping head to the LunaSea 喵酱茶屋 cat coffee.This lovely place is hidden in 25th floor of a commercial building near Guanyinqiao – 重庆江北区北城天街城红鼎国际 C25-11(print the address because you will have to ask someone on the street to navigate you). For a relatively high price – virgin Mojito 36 RMB you get amazing atmosphere and great service. Young lady owner really loves her work(cats) and gives customers feeling like they are at friends house rather than in a coffee. Free wifi, amazing view and free cat play. Not to mention you can choose from many different board games, from go to Monopoly. One more thing – try not to wear black clothes the cat fur is everywhere.

Enjoy Chongqing, Enjoy Guanyinqiao, Enjoy China.

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Random food

Random Chinese food

Looks: 7

Smell: 5

Spiciness: 0-5

Satisfaction Factor: 6

Overall: Very good

Price TAG: 32 RMB

My dear friends from Chengdu, Sunniny and Alex arrived to Chongqing. Maybe you remember them from my Spring festival trip reports. And they brought me a very happy news. After  years of relationship, they are getting engaged. I could not believe when Sunnini showed me her ring. Seriously guys, all the best and remember to let me know the exact date 😉 But to celebrate this big news we went to a local restaurant not far from my work at Parkson shopping mall. Since there is always plenty to choose from we decided according to the amount of people already sitting in. Thats in 90% an indicator of a good restaurant. The environment was clean an pleasant as same as the personnel.

Menu in bright colors with very nice pictures. I picked Fried vegetables with garlic, steamed lettuce and sliced cold tofu. You, mei you, you…means the vegetable was available and the tofu also, but unfortunately steamed letuce I was looking forward to try was out of stock. I admit 9 o’clock here in Chongqing is very late for a regular dinner.

In 10 minutes Sinnini and Alex told all the story behind engagement and I tasted the best sliced tofu so far. Served on a small plate with blossom and chilli powder aside. I loved that way cause you can choose how much spice do you want on top of your meal. It was a great food and perfect company.

P.S.: Sorry for the picture, my phone was out of focus :-/

More Random Food…
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Gele mountain Trip – 歌乐山

Gele shan in Chongqing

Meeting time was at 9:30 at Shapingba metro station (Nowadays you can already take metro directly to Leishimu station, which will get you close to the gates of SISU).

From Shapingba we changed to bus number 210 and drove 5 stations directly in front of the gate of SIUS university. Station name chuanwai (川外).

Audrey picked us up at the gate and we followed her to the base of Gele mountain. Still inside of the campus, right next to a training ground. Even the dormitories are on the same ground where former POW camp was located.

First stop on our visit is the former prison of CRA officer Ye Ting, now called the Martyrs’ Memorial or if you want the Baigong guan. Admission is for free(or 30RMB depends if you are a student) and you can roam around the former POW grounds freely, bring your own food and simply have a picnic inside the compound. The whole area is relatively large, but we are visiting just the most important building accessible from SISU campus. Having our first, but not last, snack and turning back to a side track that will lead us to the Gele mountain peak. More about Martyrs’ Memorial.

The climb was steep and we got tired quickly. Chongqings humidy never falling under 70% was taking its toll on us and we were sweating and pounding as ascending to what seemed a never-ending set of steps. As we climbed, the sky darkened more and more and eventually rain drops occurred. It was not strong, but annoying. Girls were afraid to get too wet and tried to convince me to turn back. “Not an option. We are going to make it to the top today.”

On the way my new 600D camera records faces, moods and achievements of our little group. I must say the 50mm lens is great for making portraits. Comparing to my former Nikon coolpix…well you can not compare Skoda with Aston Martin, can you? Though portraits are beautiful and in great quality, the landscape can not be captured at all. One of my first walks with such an equipment and I already see the drawbacks also. Heavy, large and not easily to store camera that gives you opportunity to make great pictures under given circumstances. As I like capturing also the nature and landscape a different lense would be a better choice.

Second stop, the base camp and entrance to Gele mountain park. On the same level where cable cabin up the mountain stops is restaurant. There we hid from the rain, as it was getting heavier and heavier. Admission to the park is 10 RMB. You can try climbing wall in there, sit down in a pleasant tea house or get to go carts.
But to the peak is still few hundred meters away. We decided to wait for couple of minutes to see if the rain stops. It did and we could once again set to the last stage of our climb. It was a holiday and people in here are always enjoing their time out, when they ca. Any national holiday in China is a little celebration. Everywhere is a lot of people. Trains and buses are packed. Roads congested. And most shops offer discounts.
The peak is marked by a stone and statue and details about the origin and history of Gele mountain carved in it. You can not see much of a landscape because all the vegetation around, though Our last stop was marked by snacks, photos and extraordinary puddle that did not want to leave our group. His master had to eventually carry it away. Something is telling me, the snacks and dried meet was the reason:-)

On the way back we enjoyed the beautiful landscape (well if the weather is the landscape must be beautiful) while descending in the cable car cabin. All the area of Shapingba is stretching under the mountain for you, giving you one of the spectacular views of Chongqing one can see only from the surrounding mountains. Talking about the cable car – it is adventure by itself to hop-on and hop-off it.
Our Labour day trip and Gele mountain hike was concluded by a traditional HOT-POT in restaurant near Leishimu station.

Challenging hike, beautiful views and plenty of amusement…all of that can be found on Gele mountain in Chongqing. Hope to come back one day. It is a really nice place to hang out.