While yesterday I stumbled upon a garden by accident, today was very much planned.
It's a Sunday, and that means that you have to buy tickets in advance to enter the most famous garden of Suzhou, "The Humble Administrator's Garden."
I picked the 10:30-11:30 bracket, which meant I had plenty of time to make the 40-minute walk over and get some coffee/breakfast in the process.
The route took my again past some of the Suzhou canals.
The garden was quite busy, so patience was required to get some nice shots without a ton of people on them.
The garden was built around 1150, and changed hands a few times, until a retired official decided to make it the nicest garden in the area.
You can rent traditional clothing in little shops nearby; they do your hair and makeup as well, so there are a lot of people posing in traditional dress.
These gardens would have been an amazing sight in the olden days.
After about two hours, I made my way to the exit; there was another garden nearby: "The Lion Grove Garden." Might as well pop in for a look.
This garden is a lot smaller in size, but not less interesting.
Well, maybe a little less interesting.
But not less busy.
After slogging around in the gardens at a snail's pace, I started to feel my feet, so I headed back to the hotel for a quick rest and a shower.
(This dude walked around for a good hour with this mask on his head in the 30-degree weather. Scared the shit out of a lot of people in the process :D)
In the evening, I headed back out again to get dinner, just wandering around and getting snacks where I found them.
I almost made it back without getting drenched by rain... almost. Luckily, I bought an umbrella today.
