东方明珠塔 is a major tourist attraction of Shanghai. At 468 meters, it is the tallest in Asia and the 3rd tallest in the world. There are several types of tickets, and how many place you can go in the tower depends on the one you bought. For e.g. the RMB 100 one which I bought allowed me to go up to 263m, and then back down to 90m, before it takes me back down to the basement to visit the Shanghai Heritage Museum. Of course, if you decide you want to go further up at 263m, there’s a ticket booth which allows you to ‘top up’ your ticket.

At 263m, there isn’t really very much to see when the skyline consists of buildings and more buildings, shrouded in mist or smog. I walked around snapping a few photos and then head off to the next stop at 90m.

In reality, the lift stops at approximately 110m when you come down from 263m, in which you take a walk through their space exhibits. There is really nothing much to see at this level, even though there is a roller coaster which was claimed to be the highest in the world, and some other games that would make you feel sick if your stomach is weak (for e.g. the F-14 Arcade Module). Following the route leads you downwards and you now get a view of Shanghai at 90m without being behind the glass.

I was a little disappointed, but fortunately there is much more to see at the basement at the Shanghai heritage museum, in which you get to learn the history of Shanghai and get to see replicas of what old Shanghai looks like from the late 19th Century to the early 20th Century before the Communist Liberation in 1949.

It took me about 40 minutes to walk through this museum before my growling stomach forces me to depart for lunch.

My next destination was the Shanghai Museum [上海博物馆] (not to be confused with the Shanghai heritage museum at 东方明珠塔). It is located near 人民广场, which is near my hotel, and just 2 metro stations away from 东方明珠塔. If I remembered correctly, there are 6 levels with different exhibits. That includes artifacts from the Bronze Age up to the early Han Dynasty era and the barbarian tribes, ceramic / porcelain artifacts, to more modern stuff like calligraphy and also a history of Chinese coin making. I also learn a bit more about Chinese history from there.

After 2 hours snapping photographs and reading stuff that interests me, I gave in to my tired legs and took a short walk back to my hotel for a rest before I head off to my next destination: 城隍庙, a Taoist temple allegedly built since the era of the 3 Kingdoms by Sun Quan [孙权] of Wu in memory of his late mother.

According to the Shanghainese, if you did not go to 城隍庙, then you have not been to Shanghai. That simply means I will need to go to Shanghai again because when I got there the temple has closed for the day. I couldn’t do much except to walk around the area in the vicinity and took night view photos of the shops.

So here are the photos. And yes, you won’t see me in them. I don’t usually take photo of myself.

* Click on the picture to view the album
And it doesn’t work in Opera so give up…