Qingdao is located in the Shandong province somewhere between Shanghai and Beijing on the Yellow Sea. It is full of German-style architecture in the old city, as well as many popular streets with food, clothing and coffee. Plus BEER!!! The most important thing is the signature namesake Tsingtao beer! The city itself was vast, filled with plenty of buildings and large parks, but it was also absolutely beautiful. A proper beach is something that I haven't seen in a very long time and Qingdao did not disappoint.
My friend Jonny and I toured around the city seeing the old district, getting a lot of coffee, meeting people by mostly drinking beer and doing the brewery tour (OF COURSE!). I also managed to try some super strange seafood things like starfish, something squishy and something pointy, which is the best descriptions I can give.
Food Street
Starfish eating attempt, where I pretty much went through all that work to only take one tiny bite!
Nitro-frozen ice cream was delicious!!
Brewery/Beer Street
This was an awesome experience to just walk up and down the street trying different outdoor places with all the same beer, that I am pretty sure is just pumped directly from the brewery across the street. The best part was beers in a bag almost anywhere along the street within a few KM's of the brewery. (Disclaimer though: not always the best quality beer if you were further away)
Art/Cafe Street
Went to Art street and saw a million cafes... went to cafe street and saw less cafes, so I don't really know if the naming was off or if I just got conveniently lost. Had multiple coffees in one day just to be able to try out every single one, but then the problem came with wanting to choose 3-4 cool things off the menu and having to restrain myself. They were both beautiful places to get lost in and roam around though and the street art was amazing.
Laoshan Mountain
Was a real mountain!! Although it was absolutely huge and I could barely get to this little corner of it in the time limit I had, but there are amazing tours and easy ways to travel around the mountain if that is your kind of thing. I opted to just be dropped and roam around, but be careful... because a lot of the places are blocked off unless you pay a fee.
Ba Da Guan & Beaches
This city was all about weddings... everywhere on the beaches, parks and even some of the local buildings were used for insane photos (including art street). This general area was a good to just roam around and feel like the locals do on a relaxing day... taking the bus, seeing the flowers, struggling on the crowded bus and watching the sun go down!
