The warnings we had heard about the Chinese trains turned out to a be fallacy. Having previously travelled on sleeper trains across eastern Europe, the chinese carriage was relatively spacious and quite comfortable, at least on the bottom beds.

Consequently, we arrived in Chongqing more rested than anticipated. Arriving in a city where literally no one around us seemed to speak any English, and not having written down the hostel name or address in Chinese, we stood hopefully at the bus stop. Luckily, a helpful fella on a bike overheard us trying to reason with a taxi driver and frantically pointed us towards one of the buses. Without much more thought, we jumped aboard. Aidan pulled out the guide book and attempted to communicate with a friendly old Chinese man. Chongqing seemed to have changed a lot since our lonely planet was published and we think the old man was laughing at how entire bridges were missing from our map! In an act of fate, Jess just happened to look out the window as the bus literally drove past our hostel!

Chongqing was literally a breath of fresh air, with the misty high altitudes and flowing Yangze River creating a much more breathable atmosphere than the dry air and smog in north eastern China. We ended up in the central part of Chongqing city, built on a peninsular between two rivers, which was covered in a maze of steep and winding stone paths, fruit stands and hot pot eateries.

One particular hot pot, apparently Chongqing's signature dish, proved to be the most memorable part of our stay. We had been warned about the sichuan peppers and were looking forward to the challenge... Our chosen restaurant was small, full of hungry locals and very 'Chinese'. We claimed the last table, to the amusement of most of the restaurant. After stubbornly spending 20 minutes deciphering the Chinese menu to figure out what we were getting, we placed our order feeling quite pleased with ourselves. The food arrived and at first we didn't notice the spice, only a slight mustardy tang. After a while, we both looked at each other curiously. Our mouths had started to feel like we were sucking on mustard flavoured fizzers! The sensation continued to escalate and within minutes our mouths felt like a war zone, with teeth and gums firing strange mouth-numbing missiles towards our tongues and lips! Jess was ready to pay and run but Aidan, determined to not let food go to waste, forced himself to keep eating. Jess eventually caved in and we both struggled our way through. Wow!!!!!! This stuff should not be classed as chilli, and given it's own entirely different category of mega spice. Upon finishing, we were given a nod of respect from one of the locals which helped to ease the pain. As we were leaving, a few more smiled at us and exclaimed 'welcome to Chongqing!'