Backpack Travelling Mindset is Not Always Ideal

You get what you plan for, sometimes, when you travel. So, if you don't make an itinerary, and you don't make a reservations, you don't have a right to complain if your trip ends up becoming a little bit chaotic. I know this, because, this has recently happened to me. I was trying to do an overnight visit to Shanghai while on my way to Pudong as a part to return to the USA for ten days. I thought I would get a hotel somewhere near Jing'an Temple, but I realized on my way there, that not having a reservation and a bulky suitcase was a very dumb, very stupid idea on my part. Seat of the pants traveling on a whim is okay if you only have a backpack, but it doesn't work when you lugging luggage behind you. So, instead of bothering to even look for a room advance, I went to a tourist resource desk at Shanghai's Hongqiao railway station and asked for recommendation. I was told that one particular hotel would send a driver, and so I agreed.  At first, I thought this was a good choice.  The place looked nice. It's English name is Baolong Homelike Hotel, and it is near a cluster of similar hotels like it. 

The lodging, bedding, and amenities looked okay, too. The room looked like a place I could comfortably and quietly spend the night on my computer, writing and researching. 

 

However, the stay in this area went down hill as soon as peered out the window. It really wasn't encouraging. 

This whole area is one massive construction zone. Hongqiao, in general, is basically a part of Shanghai that's being developed as an area supporting a national airport and one of the city's two critical high speed railway hubs. While America is stuck in a sense of paralysis and not even talking about building new infrastructure, China is doing exactly that. The Hongqiao area of Shanghai is an example of this.  Still, this is not "sexy Shanghai" at all.  This is like thinking you are staying in a New York City hotel, but you end up at a partially built New Jersey or Staten Island construction site instead. 

Not only are the roads undergoing massive expansion and construction, but there are more elevated highways going up in this area. Since this is China, there are 5, 10, and 20 year plans likely in place. In each of those three time frames, this area WILL look profoundly different. But, now, it really is in a construction zone, and who want's to stay in a hotel in place like that? There is nothing really to do but to stay in your hotel, watch TV, do some work, and listing to the banging and clanking of construction workers next door.  Right now, it is really limited. 

Besides hotels, there is only one supermarket in this particular cluster of hotels.   

The dining options are extremely limited. For example, the above restaurant actually didn't have pizza on its Chinese-language menu. And, besides a few other places, there really is nothing to walk to in this area. My hotel, Baolong Homelike, did not even have a restaurant, for example. Hotels like this are also smoke free, now. 

Sure, people didn't like it. The above is a "no smoking" notice that people have treated like an ashtray.  This wasn't the only one like this, too. However, this isn't the issue of the hotel itself. This is a very Shanghai central issue. The city has gone the way of other international city and has banned all smoking in public places. The most obvious indicator of this policy change are the airports and train stations. The smoking rooms are gone. So, basically, Shanghai, like New York City, is not a smoker-friendly city anymore. Deal with it. I have. 

But, this is really a question of "What part of China do you want to live in?" The developed part? Or the the developing part? It comes back to what I started with: planning. You can venture off into the unknown with a backpack and nothing else, and that is actually a lot of fun. Trust me, I have done it quite a bit and will do it again many times again. But, there is also a case for making actually real plans. Here is big reason for that ....

This this is in  currently being developed, area I had trouble withdrawing money from an ATM. No cash machines actually seemed to work. And I spent so many hot, sweaty hours walking around and looking! At one point, it even got surreal. I would open a door of what was promising to be an ATM machine, and I would just see my own shadow on a bare wall. 

Remember, I was not wandering, roaming, or out looking for remote bits of China. I was trying to find a convenient stopping point between Hongqiao and Pudong. This wasn't that. In fact, this was a big cause of stress. So, backpacking is not always a good approach to traveling. In fact, it sucks. Make a plan when you actually have to be somewhere by a certain time. That sounds like common sense. And it should be. It's a lesson I learned a hard way.