Hangzhou and the West Lake

Hangzhou is a "town" (with 13 million ihabitants and 12 subway lines) located 150km south-west of Shanghai. It's famous for its scenic beauty and impressive parks. This is where people from the big city on Shanghai come to recreate and enjoy a smaller, and greener environment. So did we. We took the fast train from Shanghai Hongqiao railway station. We booked our tickets via Alipay, so we took plenty of extra time to figure out how the system works. First you need to clear identity check to enter the station. For Chinese citizens it's just an easy scan of their ID, for us with German passports it was a manual process. Next we had to clear security check with our luggage. That was easy, we do this every day when entering the subway system. The luggage gets x-rayed and we're getting looked at. The tickets we purchased were on our names. So for checking in to the train platform 15 mintues before departure our passports were scanned again and the system showed green, and we were let board the train. Shanghai Hongqiao Railway Station: Inside the train travelling with 300 km/h:

Map of the West Lake:

Bai Causeway and the Solitary Hill:

Boat to the island and the Three Pools Mirroring the Moon:

Liefeng Pagoda and view from the Pagoda:

Jungci Temple: