My second time to China and last stop for my East Asian adventures!!

I got in on Friday afternoon and right from the start noticed the lack of visibility because of the pollution. It was pouring rain by the time I got through immigration and on to the subway bound for the city. I was pretty stuck once I got to the city as I had planned to walk to my hotel and there was no taxi rank I could reach without being drenched! I asked the train desk for help and the two girls were super helpful - translating on their phones so we could figure out how to go, I ended up on a bus and it was all really good! For dinner I ordered room service and had a really good burger and a brownie!

Saturday morning I went to the tour of the Great Wall. It was a really good day! I had to walk a few blocks to the meeting points and the grossness of the streets was definitely noticeable but there were street sweepers out and about cleaning up. There was about 15 of us who caught the bus out to the wall. I linked up with a guy from Britain named Kyle who was from the UK but had been travelling for a few months, we spent most the day exploring together! Our tour guide was super lovely and gave us heaps of information on the drive to the wall. We went to Mutianyu which is a section that has been fixed up so it was easy enough to walk along. I was suprised by the size, I mean I understand it goes for like 21000kms but like it wasnt as big as I imagined haha still super impressive though! We took some pretty great photos and spent some time just sitting down taking it all in! About 6pm we were dropped back in to town and I headed off to my hostel. The subway is pretty easy to navigate with announcements in both english and chinese

Sunday I went in to the centre of Beijing exploring. I visited Tiananmen Square which was noticeably very clean and the gardens were well watered. I was annoyed there was only one english sign in the whole place so I didn't really get much on the history side of things by being there. To enter we had to get bag checked and there was heaps of security around, both cameras and police presence. The people were suprising - I thought it was a lot more respected than what I saw for example people littering and even a young child peeing in the middle of the roadway! I visited the National Museum as well which was adjacent. There were so many people! I asked a young chick for help and her english was really good so I was glad she was able to give me directions, I saw her inside later on and gave her a koala keychain as thanks! It was free entry, I just had to show my passport. My favourite was the porcelain hall!

Sunday I went to the Grand Hyatt for buffet lunch. The food was really fresh and there was a good variety! I went through the subway to get there and it was really funny as I entered the station they did a security check and the announcement kept saying "a one-minute security check means 100% safety, we appreciate your cooperation" because a lot of people seemed annoyed by it. From what I saw it is a norm at all train stations so I can imagine commuters would get sick of it!!

Monday I just relaxed at my hostel until the afternoon, I was pretty exhausted. My flight was late evening so I headed to the airport about dinner time and waited there. I'm glad I went and experienced China and the two cities were quite different since I was with the boys for one and by myself the other.