There was a pond by leifung pagoda - you could buy a turtle to release into the pond here for karma as you’d be saving a life for anything bad you’ve done.

Nice restaurant

As the sun went down, the boats came in.  Here, you can see where a lot of the boats were docked and with the light it made the scene look very serene

a lot of people were eating this black (or blue?) corn so I had to get one.  It was….dry and was not really any different than normal yellow corn except that it was weird to look at while eating.

One of the many bridges

Nice flowers and scenery really did surround the lake

There are also some nice little islands in the lake

On one side of the lake (across the water in this picture) you can see the modern city of Hangzhou - which has been voted China’s best tourism city

The lake was a lot bigger than I thought it would be - and surrounded the walkway here.  Water has been around here for thousands of years, but the area has been engineered by man to be more beautiful.  

Anyone can rent boats on the lake.  Here’s a stand to rent a boat

Like many lakes in China, there were a lot of lotus plants

On one of the walkways across West Lake

First off before going to West Lake, time for food! 

Hangzhou, just like Beijing, had large malls full of garment stores

Unfortunately didn’t have a seat on this train, but what was nice that if you bought a cup of tea in the dining car, you could sit there as long as you’d like!