Take a Ride on the Five-Story Slide

If you are currently residing in Shanghai, chances are that you’ve heard about the absolutely enormous slide that they erected inside a mall. Clocking in at an impressive five-stories tall, this slide is a most welcome addition to the always interesting malls of Shanghai. It officially opened on February 22nd, 2016 and of course, many eyebrows were raised in speculation about its safety. Just to look at the slide alone brings about feelings of unease……just a little though!

However, the speculative public had some real basis for being wary of this new snaking beast! According to what the Pudong New Area Market Supervision and Management Bureau have told media outlets, the slide does not fall into any special equipment category and therefore does not require a compulsory inspection. The management of the mall had of course realized that this would potentially raise concerns, and made sure they would test it thoroughly before opening the slide for public use. With that knowledge, all systems were go!

I’ve always wanted to check out this delightful slide and decided that a chilly Tuesday afternoon would be a great time to do it! Three of us set off on our journey to the ‘mall with a slide’ as it is affectionately known. We were all giddy with excitement both knowing and having absolutely no idea what to expect.

To get to the magnificent slide you need to take the metro to Tangqiao Station on line 4 which is the pretty purple circle line. Here is a Gif of the station for your viewing pleasure!

Once you arrive at Tangqiao Station you need to take exit 2 and outside of the exit on your immediate right is the Printemps mall or 巴黎春天 in Chinese where the snaking slide lies.

The slide itself is located on the fifth floor but the view of the slide from the first floor is super striking. It actually doesn’t look that scary when you first see it. It actually looks like quite a tame ride, which internally I was so thankful for! Alas, as you ascend the levels of the mall to reach the slide on the fifth floor, the way down starts looking, shall we say, terrifying! The sign on the exit door is however, without a doubt the most awesome piece of text I have ever seen!

With that statement and the fact that it’s called Happy Slide, it was time to ride this thing. The slide takes a total time of 16 seconds to ride from the fifth floor to the first floor. Up we escalated our way on the escalators to the top and made our way to the slide entrance. We were the only three riders at the time which meant it was now or never! We each donned our slide sack and one by one slid down the gigantic slide with our arms crossed. One word to describe this slide?

AWESOME!

It was so unbelievably cool going down. The twists and turns were really awesome. The speedy sections were so much fun too, speedy enough even for a cheeky ‘Woooooh!’, if you feel so inclined. It really is fantastic! The best part of all? it’s completely free! That’s right! You can ride this super slide as many times as you want all for free! I highly recommend giving it a go!

Full Details: Printemps Mall, 118 Pujian Road. Tangqiao Station Line 4,exit 2. Full details in Chinese: 巴黎春天浦建路118号。地铁4号线塘桥站2号出口。