I took an overnight flight from Bangkok to Beijing and arrived on Wednesday 3rd at 6am. I took a taxi to my hotel which is in a very good central location (just a short work from Tian'an Man Square and next to a subway station). As the hotel is normally used by Chinese tourists, none of the staff spoke English, which was a little difficult (especially trying to communicate having not slept all night). I got to my room lay on my bed and "zonked" out for a few hours, waking up at 4pm. I went to explore a little and then went back to bed and "zonked out" some more.

Using the internet is a bit of a hassle here. Quite a few internet cafes will not let foreigners use their machines. The ones that do ask to see your passport and note details like Visa number, Passport number etc. All the machines are in Chinese and tourists are generally unable to change the regional settings which is a hassle sometimes.

After advice from friends who had visited China, I decided to book on an organised tour , rather than going it alone with the travelling. This is mainly because it's quite hard going with the lack of english and I wanted to see what I wanted to see as efficiently as possible in a relatively short time. As it happens, I found a tour that's very flexible. Basically, it's in a "roam" style trip where you travel together as a group, but the activities are optional. This mean that you can decide to go places as a group once you arrive at a destination or you can simply explore on your own - it's up to you. The last thing I wanted was a regimented trip, where every minute of my day was accounted for and I believe that I have found the happy medium. I have the security of travelling with a group, but the flexibility to explore as I see fit.

I arrived in Beijing 2 days before the tour started. My arrival in China was a bit of a culture shock (but not as much as Vietnam was a couple of years ago). The first thing that struck me was that nothing was in english (or had english translations i.e signs, menus etc.), the second thing, that virtually no one here speaks any english (unless you go to specific tourist areas) which amazed me because it's China's capital city. Goodness knows what it's like out in rural China. I know this is typical of a westerners selfish observations, expecting everyone everywhere in the world to speak English but chinese is pretty hard going, even from a phrase book.

I spent the first couple of days orientating myself and deliberately avoiding the main tourist areas. I just wondered around the city on foot with my tourist map and guide book, going to chinese markets, shopping areas and restaurants in a relaxed way. I felt a bit lonely and strange on the first day but I think that this was partly because I was absolutely knackered. I felt much better on day 2 and started to feel excited about exploring Beijing. I've been watching Chinese TV in the evenings as there is one Chinese channel in english. It's biased beyone belief but quite funny to watch and there are some interesting programmes especially about Chinese ethnic groups.

The tour group was due to meet on Friday 5th at 6pm. I spent the day visiting the Temple of Heaven as it was not on the itinerary for the tour. It was an amazing and fascinating temple surrounded by masses of lovely gardens and as it was a lovely day weatherwise,I explored a little, sat in the gardens a little and then explored some more. It was a lovely relaxing and interesting day.

I was walking back to my hotel 30 mins before meeting my tour group and I bumped into someone I knew from Leicester. I just couldn't believe it. It was my friend Lee's ex boyfriend. Not only that, but it turned out that he and his boyfriend and two friends were on the same tour - what were the chances? I hadn't seen him or Lee for the past 3 years so was amazed (well we were both amazed but it was nice to see a familiar face).

Despite my initial apprehension, the tour group has turned out to be a really nice bunch. Our tour leader Michael is Chinese and is a cool guy. There are English, Irish, Scottish, Canadian, American, Norwegian and French members and they are all friendly and approachable and I know it's going to be a great tour.

First optional activity was on Saturday which was to the Great Wall of China, approximately 2 hours drive from our hotel (leaving at 6.40am groan!). Despite torrential rain and low cloud it was an amazing day and I can at last tick off the great wall from my "to visit" list. It is an amazing feat engineering and is very deserving of it's entry as one of the seven wonders of the world. In the evening, some of us went to see famous Legends of Kung Fu show at Beijing's Red Theatre. It was amazing (so amazing in fact that I bought the DVD as a memory). We braved a crazy public bus for the journey there (on which one of the group was relieved of $300 by a pickpocket). We caught the subway back which was a little less crazy.

We met as a group this morning and spent the day exploring Tian'an Men Square (which is massive) and The Forbidden City (which is vast). Some of us then chose to do a Rickshaw tour around old Beijing City whilst the others went to see other things that they wanted to see. The Rickshaw tour was great and we called in to have tea with a family in one of the Hutongs. They showed us round their house and told us about their lives and allowed us to ask questions which was fascinating and once again made me realise how lucky we are in the west, living in absolute luxury compared to these people. We then went to a local chinese restaurant and had a feast as we had not eaten all day.

We have a packed day planned for our final few hour in Beijing tomorrow. We're meeting as a group to go to the Summer Palace. Then one of my fellow tour members (Rachel) and I are going to Beijing Zoo to see the Pandas. Rach and I are then going to see the Olympic Stadium and then back to the hotel to meet the rest of the group to head off to the train station to catch an overnight train to Shanghai at 6.20pm.

Beijing is an amazing city. It's very modern, extremely clean (apart from the air which suffers from an atrocious pollution cloud overhead most of the time). I've enjoyed my time here and have loads of photos to upload which I'll do in the next couple of days.