Tea Houses
Cultural Experience, Good Place to Drink, Popular with Locals
Tea Houses Reviews
We've found 15 Tea Houses reviews from Viator.com travelers and members: what they loved, what they liked and what they think could be improved. It's all here to help you make the most of your next trip.
Hangzhou is a lovely city, and West Lake there is a must-see. The venerable Longjing tea plantation tour and tasting were excellent, if a thinly-disguised ploy to stimulate the buying impulse. The problem with this daytrip is that the majority of one's time is spent in a van, picking up and dropping off fellow travellers and going to and from Shanghai. Fast train might be the better transportation method. The lunch place was disappointingly mediocre and lacked a lake view. Lastly, our guide added little to the experience. His role seemed simply to be shepherding us to and from the bus and the boat on the Lake. All in all, the Hangzhou day trip served as an enticing but hardly satisfying introduction to one of China's top 10 destinations.
After a 3 + hours drive out of Shanghai we finally made it to Hangzhou. the traffic was horrible in town that day, riding in a small minivan that had A/C but the driver didn't want to turn it on made it even worse. After our boat ride we went to eat..Ok meal, then we went to the tea house for green tea. We made one more stop but only had about 10 minutes to take pictures. then we piled into the van and rode back to Shanghai. It was very hot in the van even with the windows open. Everyone slept except me because i saw the driver start slapping his face and shaking his head trying to stay awake. I was so happy to return to my hotel! Perhaps you could charge people more money and take the high speed train as a group and have a driver meet the group in Hangzhou. This would eliminate so much time on the road.
Beautiful gardens and the green tea village demo / tasting was interesting
A huge day with so much jammed in. We went unfortunately on a public holiday and got caught in traffic for hours. To see the traditional site of tea and to be educated in the fine arts of tea making was well worth the trip in the end though.
It was a very long drive (heavy traffic) from Shanghai. I would have preferred to travel by train to Hangzhou and be collected from the station by bus and shown around. Hangzhou, the lake, the pagoda and tea fields are all interesting. If you can avoid the drive and catch a train, then visit this area.
Hangzhou is a beautiful city, and I thoroughly enjoyed seeing the 13-tiered pagoda and gardens, as well as West Lake and the tea farm. We had a fun tour guide who led us through some memorable sites-
Eventhough I have a private tour (only me and my wife), it is not a good tour, the tour leader didn't explain the history of the places and/or he should show more interesting places in Hangzhou. He acted more like a companion to us, helped us with pictures taking. However, as we love tea, we enjoy the tea place visiting.
We have rated this low because of the incredible length of time 4 hours to get to Hangzhou in a tiny little cramped mini-bus, no good if you are tall! The tea gardens were very interesting but of course, the usual hard sell with increased prices for Westerners according to our Chinese friends. Hangzhou was incredibly polluted, as is much of China of course, therefore very dull and extremely hot in September. The drive back to Shanghai was interminable and increasingly uncomfortable. Sadly, we would not recommend this trip. The day trip to Su Zhou is much better!
If you visit Shanghai, you must visit Hangzhou. Although it is a long trip, it is worth it but I could see how some might think otherwise due to the fact that you're spending almost half of the time driving. The main reason I decided on this trip is the visit to the Meijiawu tea village where they specialize in dragonwell green tea. The tea from this region is not only difficult to find but extremely expensive outside of China it is still relatively expensive from the village as well. If you rented a car to visit, it would have cost more and you're probably going to get lost or into a car accident with the crazy driving going on in Shanghai.
Long drive but well worth it. We thoroughly enjoyed it and the scenery is magnificent especially West Lake. Tea Village is another recommended experience with genuine tea and reasonably cheap compared to central Shanghai prices. Well informed tour guide. Worth every penny.
It's true that the trip by bus is very long, 2.5 hours, but it worth it. The places are amazing, really beautiful. The pagoda is incredible. I would like to spend more time there to go to the top of the building, later you go to the Tea Village. I loved learning everything about the different kinds of green tea and its properties, here I only bought one bottle of the very good tea for 300 RMB. Now I realize that I had to buy more because in Shanghai it is more expensive, the good one. And finally we went to the West Lake, now I understand the name 'Heaven on Earth', everybody should go there. Our guide was great, really friendly and helpful!!! He made the trip very interesting because he explained to us a lot of stories and legends about the places.
I did not think the long trip just for the cruise and a short visit to the pagoda was quite worth it. The tea ceremony was a bit of a hard sell. The food was plenty, though, especially since it ended up being a private tour for just two of us.
This is definitely not a trip that you want to do in one day. The travelling time took 5 hours, 2.5 hours each way and there is not enough time to see much of Hangzhou in the time left. The visit to the tea plantation where they try to get you to buy all kind of tea and the boat ride took up most of the stay in Hangzhou.
This trip was good. I was lucky enough to be the only one on the tour, so my experience may differ from others. West Lake was very nice, but I would be hard pressed to call it 'Heaven on Earth'. It is definitely nicer than Shanghai, but it is still quite smoggy and crowded. The tea visit was nice, as was the garden. The lunch was pretty good as well. Still I enjoyed the trip it is a long time travelling about 3 hours each way.
I had a very short amount of time to see the sights while in Shanghai but at the same time didn't want to only see one city in China. As such, the Hangzhou Heaven on Earth tour was perfect. It is a great day where you see so much and come away with a really good experience of the China that lives outside of Shanghai. The boat ride, visit to the Pagoda and the Dragon Well Tea plantation were real highlights. Highly recommended!
3 Days in Shanghai: Suggested Itineraries Written by Viator
Tea Houses Written by Viator
