$250 Secret Cave Hotel Shanghai, China
I have just arrived in Shanghai China I am here for a 24-hour layover and I booked a very unique hotel room it's probably the most unique hotel room I ever stayed at the name of the room is secret cave the pictures look really really interesting so let's check it out and see if it's worth the $250 I'm paying for it okay the problem now is the last time I arrived here in Shanghai which was last year it was kind of a stressful arrival process and yeah I don't have a Visa yet should be able to enter Visa free with a German passport but you never know 100% so that's going to be the first step now to make it through immigration and then yeah I don't have alipay set up this time so I'm not connected to the online payment system here so that could also be a bit of a problem today and I currently also have many issues with my credit cards I only have one working credit card with me at the moment so if that one fails I literally can't get money here now and yeah the first step now is to actually get a train here probably over to another terminal and I remember this train from the last time I arrived here in Shanghai which was exactly the same and yeah a hotel where we are staying today is actually quite near the airport so I was looking for airport hotels or hotels that are very near the airport because I'm literally only here for 24 hours and then I found this secret cave hotel room so I'm really looking forward to that and now check out the beautiful skyline of changhai probably my favorite Skyline in the whole world and yeah I'm also really Keen to eat proper Chinese food later today it's been a while since my last visit to China and to be honest I missed Chinese food so let's see if we can also find some decent food later at the hotel but first things first arrival getting into the country and then finding my suitcase and we have the Foreigner fingerprint self collection area here which is nothing unusual the last time I filmed my arrival in China there there were many people in the comment section complaining about oh why is China collecting your fingerprints hey every country in Asia does this so you scan your passport first and then you place your fingers here they get scanned yeah currently there are still the rule that German passport holders along uh with some other countries can enter China Visa free for 15 days actually they just extended the period um in which this is possible to mid next year yeah okay thank you these are on arrival travel Document in theory I could also just get the the 144-hour transit Vis are because I am only here for 24 hours actually anyway so actually I have two options get the 144 hour Visa or just enter Visa free which is probably the easier option all right so here we have the the Visa the arrival section so here I'm not allowed to film so hopefully see you on the other side and I am in the country that was actually a very smooth and easy process although I have to say it took a bit longer than the last time now I had to wait for like 15 20 minutes which is still absolutely okay but the last time I arrived here I was literally the only Foreigner so I had zero rating time at all so I see a difference seems like more foreigners are arriving here in China these days and actually I need to check the screen where my B is oh actually there's a money exchange place here and I still have some money left from maau where I was a few months ago so maybe I can just change my maau money into Chinese money and then maybe that's enough for one day so I still have 120 maau Paka left hello can I change ma money this maau maau yeah yeah Chinese un I think the conversion from maau money to Chinese un is almost one to one so I should get uh almost 120 UN in return so you give me 140 ma yeah or 140 not 120 they rate 100 Ma you can get this Chinese money 100 can I add some Hong Kong dollar as well uh yeah Hong Kong dollar can change I have a 60 Hong Kong dollar I think okay I also have a 60 Hong Kong dollar left so I will add them now to get more in total and uh if you give me 60 and uh this one no commission you can get this Chinese money okay okay put that on the password please yeah that's why I usually avoid this current she exchange places because you always lose some money because of uh usually not the best rates and uh most of these places also I have a commission like now so usually I prefer to just get money from the ATM with my credit card where the conversion rate is much better and my credit card doesn't charge me for international withdrawals okay I have 135 Chinese un now that should be enough for one day basically all I need to pay is my dinner today I have breakfast included in this day and I also have transport included but more about that in a minute first let me actually get my B okay so included in the hotel is free airport transfer to the hotel now and then also tomorrow back to the airport the only thing now is I need to contact them so they wrote me when I booked the hotel yesterday they sent me a message that I should contact them as soon as I have my luggage and then they will send their driver the problem is I just need to contact them now so they gave me their phone number but I uh can't make phone calls I have a SIM card already more about that later as well but this SIM Card is only for mobile data not for phone calls but the hotel actually thought about that as well and they told me in case you can't make phone calls just ask the airpod staff uh they will help you out so let's see if I can find someone who will help me out to make the phone call unfortunately the hotel is not waiting for me here with a sign with my name on it that would be very cool but it's actually not a festar hotel so I'm not sure how good the service will be the room will be very special I'm really looking forward to that but it's actually despite the high price of $250 not a festar hotel today so I would expect a festar hotel would probably pick you up here with the sign but I'm not staying in a fstar hotel okay let me actually figure out first where I have to go so they sent me the location some pickup uh area here so I have internet already so I can actually check the message that they wrote me if your phone is unable to contact you can ask any airpod staff around to give us a call they will be happy to help I have a question uh I need to uh uh contact my hotel can you help me to call I need to call my hotel but my phone cannot call can you help to [Music] call go ahead there's a tourist service center about 200 M away they can help you contact okay thank you so much okay thank you oh very helpful I had this experience many times before in China when people don't speak English which happens here in China not everyone here speaks English but many times they just get out their phone opening a translation app and then they're trying to help you with the app so he sent me over to the tourist information center he said 200 M over there and yeah I would assume that the tourist information center will be able to speak English ah check it out we have several different help desk digital payment help desk so probably they can help you to set up alip pay public transportation help desk information desk not sure if this desk was here the last time I arrived in Shanghai or maybe I just haven't seen it well let's see if the information desk ladies can help here hi s hi I don't need a SIM card no can you help me to call my hotel oh yeah sure I need to call the hotel to pick me up you mean you mean I call the hotel for you right that would be great yeah because I cannot make a phone call with my phone what's the like the reservation name uh k how many people just one so sounds like a complicated talk yeah so they asked you to go to um P2 the parking lot number two that's right right yeah and there's a there's a like the Zoom Zoom number is H H6 yeah so you you can you can tell them you are there at H6 and they will call Cap to pick you up they will send you the the the license play yeah the play number okay thank you so much for your help okay sh byebye okay turns out to be a longer process than expected I'm not sure she was literally talking with them for like 3 four minutes what I would have guess is an easy call hey Mr Ken is here please pick him up was a bit longer than that but yeah should be fine so I just texted them actually that I am at the meeting point and now they will send the taxi it looks like they're actually sending a taxi not not their own shuttle bus anyway I don't really mind who will pick me up okay meeting point H6 actually it says H9 is this now the number to follow H9 or this one number six but yeah I see H over there so this is definitely the H area so I think this should be the right one and yeah while I'm waiting for my pickup let me tell you why I don't need a SIM card you'll probably know this when you arrive in a new country one of the first things you have to do is getting a SIM card and that can be stressful take some time and it's just annoying especially if you have a long flight before and especially here in China I remember last year I also went to buy a SIM card and I actually had to go to a proper shop in the city and then I had to register myself I had to sign some documents so it was quite a long process until I was actually able to get the SIM card but yeah now I don't need SIM cards anymore because I started to use eims and an eim is basically a digital SIM card you can install to your phone even before you start the journey so I got myself a China eim yesterday evening I installed everything and then I was able to connect with the internet right away after I landed so that is of course also really great you are connected with the internet right away you don't have to wait until you find the SIM card shop and yeah the app that I am using to get my eims is called Nomad and they have over 170 countries available in the app it's very easy you just choose the country then you choose a data plan the app tells you exactly step by step how to inst install everything you can get it done in like 2 minutes so I did everything yesterday evening very easy and if you want to check out Nomad eims as well there's a link in the description or on the pin comment and if you enter the promo code that you can see on the screen right now you can get 25% off your first purchase on the app just use this promo code right here and yeah make sure that your phone actually does support eims but most phones nowadays do okay update a few minutes later they have replied apparently the driver drove into the wrong entrance so I have to go to L level okay this is the L area you can see it over there L 17 18 I think it's this one right here and yeah in case you're wondering this is the name of the hotel Shanghai pong airport Mundo Hotel it's even pet friendly and it has an average rating on booking.com of 8.9 which is is quite high so I think that the driver is actually just like an like an Uber driver she's not a part of the hotel oh yeah over there okay that was a quick ride maybe like 12 15 minutes something like that the hotel doesn't look too special from the outside to be honest but I think the room will hello good afternoon good afternoon I would like to check in sure is that your most special room here yes it looks very very special on the pictures that's right that's the only reason why I booked this place because the pictures of the room look so special thank you for your Fab why do you have such a unique room here just a kind of trend just like to have something special yes experience a different feeling yeah it's only one secret cave room or you have several we have three three of them okay okay how would you like to pay uh credit card cred card sure let's hope my credit card Works CU I had the issue before in China that my card is not working the receipt oh it's working yeah okay okay thank you bye-bye you know what I'm actually quite hungry so let's get dinner first early dinner and after that we're going to check out the room so I just had a quick look on Google Maps uh yeah Google Maps is not really uh reliable or big help here in China I wanted to see if I can find some restaurants nearby but I couldn't but I think it should be possible to just have a walk around and find something while we have Burger King here but that's definitely not where I want to end up today I want to eat some proper and delicious Chinese food yeah we are not really in Shanghai City Center this is like 15 minutes away from the airport so we are like on the outskirts of Shanghai so we have some uh small town Vibes here I would say no big city Shanghai City Center Vibes Shanghai one of the biggest cities in the world about 26 million people are living here but this certainly doesn't feel like that we have a convenience store here as well where will maybe grab some snakes for later but let's see what are we having here looks like a like beef noodles okay this might be already a good option I see many locals inside that's definitely a good sign hey I'm not sure what I really want to eat just something Chinese and delicious we have Ching Jang chicken here and Brace noodles with potatoes that sounds good actually and then race beef noodles I think I found my spot uh Lano beef noodles maybe let me take a picture of this and let me make sure that it's not spicy still cannot eat spicy especially not when I'm having a flight tomorrow I would like to eat this this one yeah one spicy no maybe this spicy okay okay I hope he was telling the kitchen uh please don't make it spicy well actually check this out we have some uh some barbecue on the stick here what is this uh let me translate this because it looks actually delicious ah there's lamp here kidney and chicken wings oh can I get this one yeah one one uh barbecue stick okay okay yeah one please okay okay let's get a a lamp meat stick as well on the side oh and I got a little tea here already oh as usual in China the portions are actually quite huge check it out wow this looks like a big and decent portion so we have the noodles here here we have potatoes we have uh onions here and then of course the beef I just asked my Chinese friend actually if he knows the food and he told me it's food from Northwest China actually so nothing typical for changhai then I guess let me take a picture for Instagram if you're not following me on Instagram yet feel free to do so kabro on Instagram I'm posting daily stories behind the scenes live updates okay this portion should definitely be enough for me it's huge let uh of in the case when you go eat in China most of the portions are actually quite huge and you can easily eat them with two persons oh you can taste they boil the potato for quite a while it's very soft and yeah where I'm from in Germany we also eat a lot of potatoes I would even say potatoes are more popular than noodles definitely more popular than rice in Germany oh let me try the beef as well oh Chinese graced meat is so delicious oh oh thank you so much okay okay he was bringing me uh the lamp the barbecue lamp oh that's the flavor I was missing braced meat flavor from China by the way if you're new here I traveled around China a few months ago I have about 15 videos from China on my channel so if you haven't seen my previous China videos where I traveled all around basically feel free to check out my China playlist and yeah it's not spicy at all I'm not sure if it's usually like this or if he actually told the kitchen don't make it spicy this reminds me a lot about the the barbecue lamb I ate in Ching Jang in Rumi maybe this is a chang style actually very nice Chinese food is probably my favorite cuisine in all of Asia and yeah from all of the different Chinese Cuisines usually I like the Cantonese cuisine the most and I was able to finish everything and it was super super delicious okay let's see how much I actually have to pay for this because I have no idea I don't see any prices here I want to pay two 27 okay okay thank you very much thank you that was very H delicious H very good thank you so much okay bye-bye byebye bye-bye oh I feel happy you know this feeling when you just had a really good meal you feel properly filled oh great feeling but yeah now let's check out the room that's what we're here for right so we're going into a cave now but the cave is not somewhere on the lower floor it's actually on the second floor so I'm actually curious how they um how they build the room so they not only have the cave room here they also have regular rooms here which are way cheaper actually I think the cheapest room here was about $80 or $90 so less than half of what I'm paying now so you obviously pay for the for the unique room here definitely here we are okay are you ready for the secret cave room okay first of all oh wow let me make proper light for you guys okay oh this looks special Wow Wow have a look at this guys oo first impression I'm wondering how they built this what is this material here actually seems to be pretty solid but first I think I need to make a bit more proper lighting okay unfortunately I can't make more light this is the maximum amount of light we have in here but let's explore the room so you come in here and then the first thing you see is a tree actually a fake tree of course but it looks pretty solid and add a great atmosphere to the room right so you really have the feeling you're somewhere in the cave right away and then yeah we have the double bed right here which they actually decorated quite nice pretty romantic with some hearts here and then the swans so nice bed and then what is really cool here is we have like cave mual all around the room so you actually really feel like you are in like a 2,000 years old cave here so these mues that you can see all around here they actually look pretty pretty cool and then there's a TV here as well in case you want to watch TV and then we have a swing here which also looks quite cozy unfortunately the sign here says maximum weigh 50 kilo which uh I'm a bit above that so I'm not sure actually I want to try it out not going to uh put my full weight on it now okay maybe I'm not going to try that okay but then we have a bathtub here which looks pretty cool it's right underneath only window which is up there so what do we have here we have probably tourism onetime bath bag okay some uh Al like like salt here like bathing salt I guess okay and then we have a mini bar here let's see if there's something inside no nothing inside just an empty fridge but we do have uh water here and coffee as presso and tea and then there's also a bottle of rine here which I would assume if you're paying $250 a night this is going to be included then there's a little box here what's inside the Box oh wow this is funny there's a costume in here so you can dress like a like a caveman or a cave girl that's funny should I put on the the costume maybe not and then we have a little drum here and uh some chocolate also lovely looking forward to try that and then the view to the room is just like this very very cozy very special very unique and then here in the back we have the bathroom which is like an open area like this so the sink is here we have soap we have two little towels what are we have in here probably a soap uh a mask and then we have a big towels down here and middle siiz towels here a haird dryer here's an AA where you can leave your suitcase and then we have the toilet right here nothing too special about the toilet and then the shower is right here looks like this okay and yeah look at the design here as well this is so nicely done so many little details here and there and yeah this it's not proper Stone I guess but actually it feels pretty pretty proper and solid so this is not like like cheap plastic or anything if you bump your head here that would really hurt a lot I guess okay anything else here that we haven't explored actually I want to try the chocolate let's try the chocolate right away maybe this uh chair here is comfortable oh yes it is oh the chocol was actually very good oh okay fast forward a few hours and I am in bed now I just did my laundry actually they have the option to do free laundry here so that was pretty cool and yeah I have to say the atmosphere here now is actually very very cozy I really like it it really feels like staying in a cave and not a regular hotel room definitely not so I'm going to rest now and then tomorrow morning we are going to check out the breakfast that is included in this day and then I will give you my final review so uh good night guys and see you tomorrow morning okay thank you so much that looks really good she thank you oh I got some freshly made onon soup here for breakfast and Spoon yeah okay thank you I think there's shrimp in here tastes really good and yet the Auntie just made it fresh over there and yeah there's not only one ton soup available here there's also a big bouet with plenty plenty of options so everything I need to start the day very good was very delicious yeah thank you thank you I just want to mention that yes I will leave China again in a few hours but my next videos will actually be about China as well I'm starting a series which is not in China but it's related to China we are going to visit different places in different countries in Southeast Asia and it will be related to China that's all I want to say for now so stay tuned for the next videos okay I'm doing the final review now here in the bathtub first of all the sleep here was amazing the room is super super quiet and I am a very light sleeper so if there's a noisy main road in front of my window or a noisy airon unit that's already quite annoying to me and here there were absolutely zero noises so the sleep was very very good to be honest I feel that I am not 20 anymore so if I don't have a proper rest I really feel that in the morning now that I over 30 that was definitely different 10 years ago but here I feel very well rested I didn't wake up once in the night so that is actually pretty great and then yeah how would I Rate My overall stay here so first of all I have to say it feels a bit weird to pay $250 and not stay in a luxurious five-star hotel you saw me here on the channel doing hotel reviews before where I spent less money and stayed in like fancy luxurious five-star hotels all around southeast Asia and also here in East Asia it's definitely possible to get luxury fstar hotels for less than $200 where you get uh top amenities a nice pool awesome service nice restaurants attached to the hotel and all of that you don't have here so you're paying $250 and you're not staying in a festar luxury hotel but you're paying for staying in such a unique room and that was definitely the case it was probably the most unique hotel room I ever stayed in the room here is really welld designed so many little details you can really see that they yeah wanted to make something special here and I think they did a really good job with that so overall I would say is is it worth $250 um for one night yes I wouldn't stay here for more than one night imagine if you stay here for four nights and then you pay $1,000 that's not worth it I think but for one night it was a cool experience and I also love that it's so close to the airport it's like 10 15 minutes from here to the airport so I'm heading back uh to the airport after I check out very easy very convenient for layover and like I said earlier they also have normal rooms here for less than half the price if you want to check out this hotel as well I will leave a link where I booked it in the description and if you haven't seen my previous video where I was still in South Korea on the biggest island there then feel free to check out the video right here stay healthy stay positive and then see you on the next episode ciao guys
2024-07-30 09:10
