Los Angeles -> Beijing -> Shanghai Weather: Rain in LA, Cloudy, very smoggy and 47* in Shanghai
We start the day by getting on the plane at LAX at 1:30 AM. An hour later than scheduled because the plane was late in getting to LA. It is a long 13 hour flight and with the time difference we go from Day 2 (March 7) to Day 3 (March 8). Rick does have a window seat and I am in the middle. We are served “dinner” at 2:30 AM. We arrive in Beijing an hour late. We have an hour to get through customs/immigration, security checks and go from the International Terminal to the Domestic Terminal. We go as fast as we can with only one wrong turn. We lose John and Nancy going through customs. We make it on the plane as the last ones, at the last minute! John and Nancy miss the plane, even though we tell them they are coming and would they please wait – nope. We get into Shanghai at 10:15 AM their time and it is now Friday. We get off and go through customs again. I am fingerprinted but Rick is not. We go to pick up our luggage and no luggage! We go to the Air China desk and fill out the form for lost luggage. We find Gate 1’s representative, “Scotty” and he confirms with them that our luggage will be delivered to our hotel by 11 PM.
A driver drives us through Shanghai traffic for 1 1/2 hours to get to our hotel, The Courtyard Marriott. This is one huge city with terrible smog and traffic.
I am amazed that the city is made up of skyscraper apartment buildings and how they hang their laundry out the windows. The city is 25 million people! Shanghai has the largest port in the world.
Besides a lot of cars there are electric scooters and bikes everywhere. You don’t hear the scooters coming until they ring their bells.
We check into the hotel and find out John and Nancy ended up on another flight and beat us here. And with their luggage to boot, what a deal!
We find out in China you can’t access WhatsApp, Google, Youtube, Gmail, Facebook or Twitter. Oh well, we will survive without them.
We go to dinner and then back to the hotel. It is time to hit the sack early after a long 48 hours to get here.