The Adventures of Tai'an

Breakfast
On our first two mornings we had breakfast at the hotel. Breakfast basically was a continental breakfast with Muesli, fruit, toast, tea, coffee and juice. Of course they also had the traditional Chinese breakfast food such as noodles, pickles, lotus root, etc.

On our last morning we ate at 'Western Food pub Hyatt '. We had French toast and a fruit plate. I had coffee and Barbara had a Chocolate milk tea.
The French toast was not like anything I have had before. I think they spread the bread with peanut paste, fried it, dipped it in egg and fried it again. It was OK but as I said before not French toast as we now it. The fruit plate was huge and the presentation was outstanding. The latte I tried to drink but couldn't. It would have been the worst coffee I have ever had.

Lunch
We normally don't have lunch when we are travelling. That takes up precious time that we could be shopping or sight seeing. We normally have fruit or nuts to keep us going.

Dinner
On our first night we stumbled across a restaurant that really looked something like a family chain restaurant. There were heaps of people in the restaurant so we thought we would be fairly safe. Ordering was a challenge as they didn't have an English menu and no one spoke English. We toured the restaurnat with the waiter in hand and pointed out what we wanted. We ordered Chinese Pizza, Shredded Potatoes and Egg plant. The potatoes are fairly standard in Shandong Province excepts these ones had a bit more chilli. The Chinese pizza was great. It was on like a very thin pita base, that then had a egg cracked on top with ham, onions and capsicum. It was really nice. The eggplant we weren't at all excited about it and it looked like we hadn't touched it. The meal was very cheap. Even cheaper than what we pay in Tai'an.

On the second night we found a restaurant that looked I OK. Still had some difficult with communication barriers. Anyway we thought we ordered Egg & Tomato but ended up with Egg and Chilli. I did not like it at all.

On our last night we found this place call - 'Western Food Pub Hyatt'. The had an Western food, English menu and a student who worked there whose major is English. We ordered a Pizza - Supreme. It was just like at home. We decided we would go back for breakfast the following morning.

We went to book our ticket home and found out that there were no seats left on any of the trains. We didn't want to risk our luck and decided we would take a bus. After all the come every 30 minutes.

We arrived at the bus station at 3.30 pm. We sat on the bus until 4.40 pm before we departed. Yes whilst the bus can run every 30 minutes, the bus doesn't leave until it is full!

On route the bus then stops and picks up more people. These people sit on little camp seats in the aisle. We stop 5 times before we even leave the city!

By 6 pm I still didn't recognize anything and was starting to panic that perhaps we were on the wrong bus. Eventually I saw a sign that said Jinan. I knew that once we hit Jinan it was 1.5 hours until we arrived in Tai'an. We finally got home at 7.30 pm.

I would rather stand for 2 + hours then sit in a bus for 4 hours.

Barbara and I had decided to take a trip to Zibo to check out the sights. We went to the train station and booked our tickets. We were so proud of ourselves because we got the tickets without to much drama. Later that night Barbara was studying the ticket and rang me to tell me that she thinks that we don't have seats.

The next day we went to see the Chinese teachers who confirmed Barbara's suspicion. Apparently in China once the train is full they still sell tickets but these are standing. This was going to be a long journey. A little over 2 hours standing. Not much we could do about it. Explains why the ticket was only 29Y.

So off we headed to the train station on Tuesday. Train left at 2.31 pm. We left our apartments at 1.30 pm. Better to be early than miss the opportunity to stand for 2+ hours!

The train arrived we boarded. We really didn't know where we were supposed to stand. We decided we would stand between two carriages. A couple of moments after the train departed we got a whiff of the bathroom. Barbara said that if she had to stay here any longer she would be sick. I was already covering my nose.

We moved into one of the carriages. There was a seat that no one was sitting on. I told Barbara to sit down. With her best Marcel impersonation she asked if anyone was sitting there. There was really no confirmed answer so she sat. This Chinese boy on the other side of the aisle with English as clear as day said, "Someone is sitting there." Barbara said, "that's OK when they come back I will get up." The Chinese boy started a conversation with us. Before you knew it I had a seat. So basically the whole trip we had seats. We scored well.

Once again Barbara didn't want to be bothered with finding accommodation when we got there. I went on line and only came up with 3 options. We chose Hotel Ibis. It was the cheapest hotel we have stayed in and turned out to be the best hotel we have stayed in.

The Hotel is located downtown. It is about 15 minutes drive from the Train station.

When we arrived we were greeted by the FOM and the Hotel Manager. All the staff were Chinese but all spoke English - Some better than others. The Hotel Manager wanted to know our purpose for the visit. We told him that we were here to see the sights. We had a list of things to see. He had a look at the list and he said that we would never see everything we wanted to see in the 2 days we had booked our accommodation.

The Hotel Manager advised that we would be better of having a driver. He quoted us 300Y per day. We agreed to this. He wrote an itinerary for us. Booked the driver. The service was unbelievable.

We hadn't booked breakfast based on past experience. We were informed that the breakfast was international. We gave it a go on our first day and it was international. For 15Y it was an easy and convenient breakfast.

The next morning the driver arrived at 9 am as booked. The Hotel staff spoke with him in Chinese and off we went. We would never have found the sights travelling by bus.

That afternoon we decided that we would stay an extra night. We discussed this with the Hotel staff and everything was taken care of. We also asked if the driver could be booked for the following day.

After coming home that night we confirmed that the driver had been booked and we were advised that everything was in order. It was such a great experience that now when we go anywhere we will be checking to see if there is an Ibis. I'm positive a lot of hotels around the world could learn a thing or two from this hotel.

Basically we had our driver from 9 - 5 on Wednesday and Thursday.

We walked to most places when we didn't have the driver and normally caught a Taxi home.

On our last night we caught a taxi from dinner back to the hotel. The hotel was on the inbound side and we were coming from outbound. The hotel was on a 4 lane road with a traffic island in the middle. I was sitting in the front of the taxi when the taxi driver decided instead of going around the block that he would drive into incoming traffic. All i could see where headlights coming at me. I thought we were going to die!