Day trip to Suzhou from Shanghai

My husband %26amp; I will be in Shanghai in Oct and planning to take a day trip to Suzhou. Our travel agent is orgainsing a private tour (by car) for us and it includes :

- Zhou Zheng Garden,

- Wangshi Garden,

- New Suzhou Museum,

- Silk Making Factory.

We would also like to stop at one of the water towns eg Zhou Zhuang or Tongli.

There%26#39;s probably not enough time for all of above in 1 day. Any suggestion on which item from the agent we should drop? Perhaps the museum as we%26#39;ll be visiting the museum in Shanghai?

Thank you!

Day trip to Suzhou from Shanghai

Hi,traveller_from_perth,

First you need to decide zhou zhuang or Tongli you will visit.

If you visit Tongli, Tui si garden is a must-see place .(It is the best place in Tongli to visit and I visit there last week with white snow. it is fantastic even it is cold).

If you have to choose, you can skip New Suzhou Museum.And if you like , you can consider to choose suzhou canal cruise.I like it for personally.

Enjoy!

Bdgs%26amp;Tks,

Susan

Day trip to Suzhou from Shanghai

Eh... drop the factory visit!!

I would choose Tongli over Zhouzhuang with no doubts at all. In Tongli, my favourites are the S*x Museum and Tuisi Garden. If you do that one, I would suggest dropping perhaps Zhuo Zheng (Humble Administrator%26#39;s) Garden in Suzhou.

The new Suzhou Museum was designed by I.M. Pei and should be worth a visit. But then again I%26#39;m very much a museum person.

Wang Shi (Master-of-Nets) Garden is a small one but very much worth a go.

Thanks for your valuable feedback everyone. We have decided to go Tongli.

I expect the silk factory will include a visit to their shops. Besides this commercial aspect, is there anything interesting to see in the factory? eg demonstration , silk worm farming etc? I am thinking of dropping it in favour of the new IM Pei Museum.

Thanks !

I agree with the first reply - try and do a canal cruise (cruise is not quite the right word, you go on a little boat (covered) that can hold about ten people). If you do go to Humble Administrators Garden there will be many college students eager to be your guide. You should use one, they are pretty cheap and having a guide makes for a much more interesting viewing. Also you could ask if they could go on the canal cruise with you as translator. Go through all the smaller canals, it%26#39;s interesting.

October is a good time weather wise.

concealer