Visited the Terracotta Warriors Museum this morning. The Terracotta Warriors are not called the "8th Great Wonder of the World" for nothing. Unearthed in 1974 by simple farmers digging a well, these life-sized soldiers, horses and chariots were all individually carved...down to their fingerprints!!!! There are over 6,000 of these clay statues, all in battle formation and facing east, in order to protect China's first emperor, Qin Shihuang. It is aga...

We were met at the train station by another Gecko's guide Richard, who seemed to have his head much better screwed on than Tina! He got us all back to our hotel and informed us that we would see our leader and the rest of the group the next day. The weather was miserable in Xi'an. Some of us went to the Drum Tower, and then we walked part of the city wall. Normally you can cycle around the wall but because it was so wet they weren't hiring o...

Visited the Forbidden City this morning. This was built over 500 years ago and apparently has been off limits to commonners like us until 100 years ago!! Spent the morning there exploring the huge complex with a really good local guide. The buildings, with their intricate carvings are really something to be seen. There is also a path which goes from one side of the Forbidden City right through to the other side - this was the Emperor's Path. We were also told...

Got on a bus this morning and headed for the Simatai part of the Great Wall of China with a view to climbing. This is supposed to be the most difficult part of the wall to climb and Teresa and I found this out first hand! But this was an amazing experience, the surrounding views were absolutely amazing and the scale of the Wall is just beyond belief. Also beyond belief is the condition of the Wall, in some parts it's really dangerous and climbing becomes a st...

Arrived in Beijing on the 25th September at about 11pm. Got into a taxi after a long queue at the airport only to find that the taxi driver spoke absolutely no English!!! He couldn't even say 'okay, I know where this is' when we handed him the address of our hostel. After about an hour of driving on his part and an hour of back seat nail biting on our part we thankfully pulled up outside the hostel. If you have trust issues you should not visit China....