Day 14. To Dali

After breakfast at the hotel, we took a Didi ride to the our next destination, Dali 大理. We stayed at Yanyuan Inn, a small hotel next to the Erhai 洱海 lake. The full name on Ctrip for this hotel was Yanyuan Health Sea View Inn (Erhai Talent Village Branch, Dali) - 大理晏园·养生海景客栈(大理洱海才村店). This hotel was my top 2 favorite in this trip, with the other being the hotel in Dunhuang.

The service of this hotel was top notch. Three days prior, I bought a pair of car seat cushions from Taobao (Chinese equivalent of ebay) and contacted the hotel to get them shipped here. They really took care of it. When Claire wanted to have instant noodle that she bought, the kitchen staff gave us hot water and spoons and forks. They even offered to cook it for her and add some eggs to it, although Claire declined. On the last day when they knew that we wanted to leave before breakfast time, they heated up some dumplings and packed some yogurt in a box for us to eat. 

The hotel location was perfect. It was next to the lake, so very easy for a walk along the lake. One could get a very scenic lake view from the hotel cafe. I rented two bikes from a shop next door for $3 and we biked along the lake for the afternoon.

The hotel was also next to a street where there were lots of shops and restaurants. Claire liked the potato dishes from a store. She also liked instant noodles and bought some from a store. I noticed that a restaurant had lots of red mushroom, which looked poisonous. Claire asked whether I wanted to eat them, I told her the previous experience of trying fancy mushrooms was enough. There was another shop selling mushroom keychains, which I found interesting. 

That street also hosted a daily night market. There were all kinds of food stands. I got a skewer of grilled squid and asked the vendor where I could find these food stands during daytime. He said that the city did not allow them to be anywhere before 5pm. So these foods were dinner only. 

There were people selling flower balloons. Claire noticed that the balloons were in the same shape as a toy of hers. Her little toy was on the dashboard in the family car and melted to a blob.