We went ( me and Wijbren) together.It was November 2008 .We stayed there 5 days.
Dalian is located in the North East of China and pretty cold in the winter .It might reach to minus 10 at least ,by the time we were there it was almost 0 and we had flurries for few days which was surprisingly nice and lovely for us as we missed snow for few year.We used to live in South part of China.
Dalian has its own culture.Maybe the way I describe sound a little weird ,but China is a very big country and has variety of cousins and clothes and dialects ,which better to correct it" Languages".There 56 nationalities who live in China ,beside 2 autonomous regions in China( Tibet and Xingjiang).
Dalian has been affected so much by Korean and Japanese culture as it is very close to Japan and Korea border.
If you want to visit there you just need to get a jetty and it might take 2 hours to get there.There are few beaches which worth seeing and rocky,rigged cliffs for rock climbers .
There is one part of on the peak of harbor which is forbidden for foreigner to go there as has so many arson ,army equipments and literally army's base camp.
Dalian enjoys of having lovely seafood restaurants and cozy beaches.In fact locals go for swimming even in winter.When we arrived there ,unbelievably saw too many locals jump into the frozen water and we were wearing jumper and coats and shivering.Such a shame !
Hot pot is one of the delicious food in most part of CHINA and especially in Dalian has its own style.
There 2 famous beaches there one is tiger beach and another one is stone beach which are located on the North West of city....Anyhow,I did enjoy of eating cheap,fresh and toothsome seafood there.There are few Korean restaurants there though but mostly Chinese ones,which worth trying them.
The city I used to live on that time(Hangzhou) has different types of restaurants ,but with some reasons I loved the ones in Dalian.It was such a peaceful,tranquil and primitive life compare to cosmopolitan cities and people much friendlier.
People there, were so polite and not staring at us as usual Chinese do in so many cities and still pissed me and Wijbren especially has an allergy towards that.
There is a street near train Station which is called "Russian Street" where you c an buy so much crap related to second world war,photos,arson's symbols ,statues,paintings,sticks and a lot equipments for hiking and mountain climbing and too many white ,blue eyed dolls.
In fact we found a nice pool Pollard was not so crowded and reasonably cheap. which was really good though.
We saw so many Russians there and it is basically a Russian resort for summer .
The main reason to go to Dalian is having relaxing time and eating fresh ,cheap sea food and this city is enjoying of glamorous nightlife with open bars and variety of drinks and charming people around.
There were plenty of water sport activities and bungee jumping and boating and sailing .Most of resorts were closed that time,but I liked so much and was refreshing Sometimes you don't want to see so many people ,maybe that due to being in China for 6 years and streets are like parking cars full of people .Everyday I feel there any demonstration?
Anyway,There are 2 parks or better to say one is a Forest park which one is like a nice small zoo and another one is a real forest and approximately takes 3 or4 hours to walk around.It was so amazing ,as no one was there almost empty due to cold weather and we both were freezing and walking all the way to see all wide animals.
Personally I don't like to go to the zoo espcially in China ,cause it give me a deep sorrow and bad effect for atvleast a week after that.The poor animals mostly suffer from malnuration and low ,poor facilities ,but I should say I did love the Forest zoo in Dalian which was great.
I dare to say I loved it more than any other ,glamorous places and other zoos That I have been to.
most of the animals were free and so many huge birds and ostriches ,dromedaries,were hanging around.
I try ed to be so brave and take some photos with zebras but unfortunately no attention I had received from them,just their nice asses showed up.
There are plenty of performances in the hall of aquarium which is like small circus.
In one of the photos we were in zoo and I was feeding pets.In DALIAN ZOO'S YOU COULD SEE FARM ANIMALS AND PETS AND A BIG AQUARIUMS AS WELL.
There was another aquarium which has the reputation of being one of the biggest in East Asia.
We could see and play with dolphins and polar bears,but was so shame to keep them in such small place though and polar Foxes and seals and sea lions were so amazing though.
I have had a great chance as It was off -peak to take so many photos from Aquarium
