Nihao from China

It has only been 5 days, but it has felt like a whole lot more.

We were the first Qantas flight to fly into the new Beijing airport. Yay! It was absolutely huge, and our flight was the only one there. We got in at 10.30 pm... took a monorail to collect our baggage and transferred straight to our hotel.

We spent 3 days around Beijing
1: We took public transport (2 yuan=20c) to the Summer Palace - breathtaking - and got ripped off in a taxi on the way back (50AUD) Ha! Foreigners. Met our tour group (6 Aussies and 1 American) in the afternoon and tour leader Rocky. After dinner we went to a local grocery store with Rocky for supplies.

2: At 6.30am we took a 4 hour bus trip to the Simatai section of the Great Wall. This is not the usual tourist section of the Wall. On the way the driver (who reassuringly had a noticeable head tic) had to stop for some goats to be herded across the road. This was perhaps the calmest moment with local drivers turning 2 lanes into 5. After disengaging our fingernails from the seat, we started our trek up the wall. It had snowed the night before, so the wind was freezing. Quite honestly, I was not expecting the trek to be that hard, having only seen pictures of the easy tourist area. We each had a local farmer follow us, with the intent to sell us something at the top. After 2 hours we had made it to watchtower 8 - the chinese auspicious number - before deciding to turn back. Mum stayed at the hotel while I went to the Shaolin Monk's Kung Fu show. Overall it was a very enjoyable day.

3: Mum's birthday and half our day was spent at the Forbidden City. It was just phenomenal. We caught a taxi to the bird's nest stadium... and got a taxi straight back. The only picture we could get was from the taxi. We therefore decided to collect our wits with a traditional tea at Laoshe Teahouse. We then caught an overnight train to Xi'an. Six to a room with no door, but a TV. Luxury. Don't ask about the amenities. Mum was given a cake on the train and everybody sang. The train ride would have been fine, except for the cigarette smoke (even in an non smoking cabin) which set off my asthma.

4: Xi'an arrival at 8.40 am. Needless to say, today was spent relaxing with a quick visit to the Muslim quarter markets.

As a final note, it has been quite unusual to have everyone staring, and asking to take photos with us (what? do we have a third head?)

l
R
and Judy
x

P.S. Pictures to come when we can have more than one window open.