I almost went there last summer, its a bit difficult to reach from Shanghai, unless you fly, which isn't a pleasant experience anymore, compared to the train anyway.
I went to Qingdao, which for me was a major disappointment, it seems to be stuck in the year 2008, and has all of the worst Chinese characteristics from that time period.
The beaches were nasty, the food was pretty disgusting, not clean.
NO BIKE LANES? That still irks me, whoever thought that was a good idea?
Prices were higher than average, yet the service was poor to non-existent at times.
Maybe it was just my timing though, it is a famous place and many people say great things about it.
The closest analogy I can think of is that Qingdao is the "New Jersey" of China, both are famous, yet there seems to be a love it or hate it attitude about it.
Sorry for the rant, I knew I should have went to Dalian instead.
I went to Qingdao before. I liked it. I visited the city on a business trip and from what I saw, the food was good and the atmosphere was uplifting. I went there last summer. It seemed fine for me. Nothing that really amazed or disappointed me.
The only thing I didn't like was the factory I dealt with for manufacturing some products. The quality was poor and I got screwed over. Now I've got a pretty big problem on Amazon.