Beijing - The first time around - 21-23 January

We arrived in Beijing shortly after 2pm and caught the underground to our hotel. The underground is cheap as chips and is very easy to get around (the English signs help enormously). Checked into our hotel where we are staying for 2 nights which is a 3 star business hotel. Its clean, modern and comfortable and situated very close to a fabulous shopping area, Tienanmen Square and the Forbidden City (Imperial Palace). We crashed out for a couple of hours (and had some much needed showers), then headed out for some Peking Duck and a nice bottle of wine (otherwise known as overpriced German plonk re-badged as Chinese!).

The following day we headed off to Tienanmen Square and the Forbidden City where we spent the best part of the day seeing the sites. The square itself is deceptively large, the construction of Chairman Mao's huge Mausoleum slap bang in the middle of the square makes it feel smaller than it actually is. The entrance to the square (the South Gate) is also pretty impressive.

We were planning to go into the Mausoleum but unfortunately we were a bit too late as it closed to visitors at midday so we headed straight to the Forbidden City instead via the North Gate (which is actually Tienanmen itself) where you see the iconic picture of Mao above the gate.

The Forbidden City is great to wander around (and it was only -1 C which was much more bearable than the -25 C of Mongolia). There are lots of different buildings housing various artefacts and items of historical interest. I (Sue) particularly liked the Ming and Qing dynasty ceramics - nice pots! - and the Treasures (including various bits and pieces of jewellery and head wear). Overall we spent about 5 hours ambling around the various palaces.

After our cultural overload we headed back to the main shopping area for a bite to eat then back to the hotel to get organised for our early morning flight to Hong Kong. We ventured out again briefly to the outdoor evening market which was basically a long row of food stalls selling all sorts of weird and wonderful delicacies that they cooked for you on their grills. I (Sue) had a snake on a stick waved at me but fortunately I had already eaten!! The other delicacies included scorpion, starfish, octopus and an assortment of other unrecognisable creatures and meats. Yummy!

Beijing has been a bit of a rush, but has been a great taster ahead of our return here in 5 months time.

Back at the hotel for a good nights sleep I think, looking forward to 4 nights in Hong Kong to charge the batteries before heading down to India for 5 weeks..

Goodnight.

Dan & Sue