Having moved to the new dragon hostel down the road from our finishing hostel for vodkatrain, we set out exploring our new area and found all the essentials we would need. As most of the others from the vodkatrain group were also staying in beijing for a while we met back up with them and went to the silk market which was quite an experience. You are hassled continuously and dragged to the stalls to haggle fiercely for a variety of fake goods...however we did manage to get some bargains. We also visited Beijing zoo with a couple of guys from the group which was good as we got to see some giant and baby pandas at feeding time...they were very cute! and we walked away wanting one. However, the rest of the zoo wasn't as impressive as some of the enclosures were rather small, the only advantage being was that you could see big cats and various other animals very close up. We also went into the aquarium which held numerous interesting fish, rays, turtles and dolphins. The next day we had a rest and in the evening went to the local night market which sold various bugs and animal parts deep fried on sticks to eat. We both tried some bee cacoon and scorpions which after some reluctance we realised tasted quite nice...altho one mouthful was still enough! A week after our arrival in Beijing we went for dinner to say goodbye to the last few people that were still here from the vodkatrain group. It was quite sad as we all felt we had become very close in a very short space of time and our adventure together was coming to an end.

During our second week on our own in Beijing we visited bei hai park with richard and james and hired a pedalo and went out on the lake for an hour to see the park. We visited tiananmen square, the birds nest olympic stadium and water cube and we also went to the lama and confucious temples which were very peaceful and beautiful.