I should point out that there is no Facebook access or any access to Twitter or YouTube in China. It's possible but hard to get around, so I'm not going to bother and you'll need to contact me by email or through the offexploring site if you want to make comments.
So, my first two days in Beijing have been fairly nice given the disastrous start. I woke in my overnight hostel at 11:30am and checked out just in time at midday. A brisk walk through the Beijing traffic (which does not stop even at crossings with a brightly glowing green man) and I got to Tian Rui hotel where I'm spending three nights. It's lovely - the showers are great, we get our own toothbrushes and mini toothpaste! We met the tour group who all seem nice and we went out for a good dinner which I needed. I'll be sharing my rooms with a nice bloke called Max, who has been in Beijing for a few weeks now. It's nice to have an experienced campaigner around!
Today we went to the most obvious of Chinese attractions: the Great Wall. And it is indeed great. We were mobbed by a group of Chinese dance students who all wanted their picture taken with us. They had more energy than we could comprehend so we stuck with them as we climbed up and down the wall, which is incredibly steep in places, almost like a flight of stairs to climb. For some reason I imagined the wall to a little flatter and gentler, but it really is anything but! We finished the evening by going out for Beijing noodles.
The next day began with Tianenman Square and the Forbidden City and our guide took us quite slowly through each area. It's really impressive, if a little repetitive with the architecture. The most incredible thing was how the Chinese public jostled and scrummed for a good position for the photographs. It was like going to a Slipknot gig sometimes. I became more interested in them than the exhibits most of the time.
When we were done, I began my journey to the Apple Store in a bus that led to the point I had searched for on my google map. Except the point on the map was deep in a residential area - the Apple store wasn't there. In fact it wasn't anywhere nearby as my broken conversation and gestures with the locals revealed. My next aim was to find someone with knowledge of the area who spoke English i.e. a hotel. They gave me a map in mandarin and pointed me on my way. Still no luck. I eventually asked another local and a security guard and I finally found it! I bought my overpriced earphones with a mic for Skyping and took a sneak peek at the way back to the hotel using Apple's wireless and google maps. The bus went almost from door to door. Result. But it had taken me almost 4 hours to do the round trip! I got back in time to join some of the group for Beijing duck or Peking duck - the local specialty. I ate a lot again, including duck brain, which tasted like dry liver.
The next day was to be a marathon. I wanted to go to the Temple of Heaven to catch the locals getting some exercise, and Angela joined me. We saw people ballroom dancing, flying kites, doing tai chi, choral singing, and kicking some kind of springy shuttle c*** around "keepy-uppy" style. I was invited to join in on the last one and I was predictably rubbish, though I still blame it on the fact I was wearing walking boots.
In fact, the day was a lot warmer than we'd prepared for, so my fleece and jacket were open or off for most of the day. It seems like Beijing is finally thawing out.
We paid a visit to each of the points of interest as we'd paid for them. A lot of the parks charge for entry then add "tourist attraction" entry fees on top for around three attractions. You can also bundle it into one to save money, as we did. Another way of Beijing making a bit more money out of the tourists.
Next up was the Olympic Park and we were already behind schedule by about an hour. We wandered around outside the bird's nest and the water cube before spotting an exhibition hall tucked away near the tube station. All we had to do was show some ID and we were allowed access for free - I like free. Even better was that the exhibition was really good! We actually walked around as pretty much the only visitors there, and we were treated to a special cinema experience to show all the effort that went into building the Olympic structures and making it happen. London certainly has its work cut out. The olympic park is a bit weird. It's almost like they haven't bothered to clean up and move on after the olympics finished. It still seems like the olympics could happen next week and they'd be ready. So much open space. Eerie.
So, now we were properly late. The last stop was the Summer Palace, and we arrived there at 3pm. Lonely Planet had suggested half a day. We reckoned you could spend a full day there and still not see everything. However you'd also be subjected to the extortionate coffee and food prices, so there's a trade off. We got an entry only ticket this time and got a look at the outside of the palace. But what was really worth the ticket price was the view out over the lake. Beautiful. It was quite busy though, so we kept walking. When it got to 4 o'clock we had a decision to make: turn back and go to the tube station we came from, or walk on around the lake to another tube station on a different line. We walked on along the West Promenade or whatever it was called. We caught the sunset and before we knew it it was 5pm. We needed to be back at the hotel around 7pm and we were miles across town! We marched on and thankfully found the south gate of the palace gardens. We then followed the river and one extremely busy road with no hope of crossing to the other side to find the tube. It was getting dark and close to 6pm by the time we'd found our way over and were heading to the tube. We hit the tube at rush hour. Luckily our stop was the first in the line, so we were relatively comfortable until we had to change. We got back just after 6:30 and then managed to order some food in the local hutong cafe by miming a chicken and pointing at someone else's food. It's amazing how that sort of communication becomes commonplace in China. I was proud of getting Kung Pau Chicken, another dish and a shared beer for 27 yuan. Not an English menu in sight.
Right, so Angela and I had completed our mission of having a long day and food so we were tired out for the train journey. This would be my second ever sleeper train and I hoped it'd be better than my first experience. It shouldn't take much beating. Next stop, Shanghai.
Things I've learnt so far: The green man means nothing when crossing the road. The zebra style crossing also means nothing. Everyone in China walks at half the speed of me. I am the tallest person in the country.