Beijing..What can I say apart from the famous words of "Hello ladies would you like wallet, bag or trainer?" These are the words which ring in our ears as we pass around the fantastic Silk market.....This really is the place to bag a bargain, but you must be willing to barter hard to get what you want! Jo and I both brought swanky silk dressing gowns..Mum I have sent this home together with a few other things so I hope it does arrive home safely to sunny Bognor!

Beijing is one hell of a place to visit...We kicked off our week with a trip to Tian'imen Square which is HUGE square near the Forbidden City. We visited it twice, once together and again when we returned with my Chinese friend Lisa! I loved it there, the atmosphere is great but you do have to watch out for sellers who want you to buy kites and have photo's with them....A crazy policeman even asked for his photo with us (If he was good looking and about 20 years younger I may have hung around longer!!!). After numerous photo's we visited the Forbidden City....Agian a "Must see" site while you are in Beijing! Whilst at The F-City we decided to do abit of art work, Jo is an artist so I tried to do a few of my own sketches.....Within minutes we were surrounded by a 10 strong Chinese family who were taking photo's of us and even filming us! Quiet funny and AGAIN we felt like celebs!!! The mother of the group plonked her baby onto both our laps and took photos of us with her child.....perhaps they thought we were famous English celebs..It's possible we had both washed our hair that day!!!

The trip to The Great Wall was my personal high, the views were stunning and photos can't do it justice! We had the most amazing clear day so could see the wall for miles snaking in and out the hills! An experience I will never forget.... We also visited the Temple of Heaven and the Summer Palace...The lake at the Summer Palace was frozen over so people were ice skating and walking on the ice...it was mad as the ice looked VERY slippery and there were even signs to keep off the ice...Sensible Jo and Jen didn't go on the ice, we didn't want to risk breaking our necks as we want to complete this 9month tour!!

One of my favourite days was when we met up with my Chinese friend Lisa who I went to Southampton Uni with...Lisa took us to The Great Hall of People and for Chinese tea! The Chinese tea and mini cakes were better tasting than we both expected and Jo even managed to drink about 3 glasses of the stuff.... After this Lisa took us for a delicious Chinese meal! Was great having Lisa with us as she could order veggie dishes for Jo...Normally when we go for food me and Jo have to end up acting out what food we want, pointing to pictures or speaking very slowly with a hint of Chinese accent...its all good fun!!! On the subject of food I totally recommend trying Peking duck if you visit Beijing, it is yummy! The waiter showed me how to make pancakes which is fine using your fingers but rolling the pancake with chopsticks should be an Olympic sport. I tried but fingers were better!! If you don't fancy the duck you could try one of the back street restaurants where you can get many interesting dishes! These include frog ovaries served with salad and chicken feet soup! Hmmm im slightly tempted.....NOT!

Beijing is a great place, we are styaing right in the centre in a huge yha hostel.The location is brilliant as below us is Mcy Dees and a chinese restaurant and just in front is the train staion!

Today we booked a sleeper train onto X'ian in the west!