Hi everyone, Well it's been a few days now and we are getting the feel of China. Have been enjoying the sights of Beijing, Forbidden City (above), Temple of Heaven, Silk Market, etc. in about 45 minutes we are off to the Great Wall - we are really looking forward to this, but will be a long trek and climbing steep hills, so it will be interesting. Met up with the other members of the tour on Friday and we are the 'mothers' of the tour = no-one above thirty. ...

Hello everybody The adventure has begun. We had a good journey to Beijing but needed to sleep for a couple of hours once we got here. It is VERY hot and VERY humid but we are safely installed in the YMCA hostel near the main railway station. It's actually quite a nice room. We haven't ventured out very far yet as it is DEFINITELY a big culture shock - although very exciting. We managed to find somewhere to eat where we understood exactly what we were orderi...