Beijing

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We booked our flight from Tokyo to Beijing using China Eastern airlines with some hesitation. In the end, we were swayed by the price of the ticket which was far cheaper than the alternative options, choosing to ignore the somewhat dubious airline reviews.

In what appears to be true China Eastern style, we spent almost 2 hours without explanation on the runway in Shanghai, and finally arrived at our destination after almost 10 hours of travelling, topped off with a hair-raising taxi ride to our hotel.

In an attempt to get a quick, safe meal, attempting to give our bodies time to adjust before trying out the numerous street food stalls, we went for dinner in a hotel restaurant. Staring wide-eyed at the menu, we were greeted with pictures of whole turtles in stew, roasted pig ears and snout, eel in blood soup and jelly fish face, to name but a few of the delicacies on offer.

First on our Beijing to-do list was Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City. Tiananmen Square is huge, enlarged by Mao Zedong to enable him to have an audience of 500,000, and even though we arrived there fairly early it felt like it couldn't of been far off its maximum capacity. In all directions spanned a sea of tourists, brightly coloured umbrellas fending off the already fierce rays of the sun. In the clamour to get from gate to monument, mausoleum to the Forbidden City, it was difficult to reflect on the significance of this vast space and the buildings within, let alone the events of 1989 which scarcely seemed to gain a mention.

Finally reaching Tiananmen Gate after passing through security checks and a network of underground walkways, we were greeted by a large portrait of Mao Zedong. Displayed in a gold frame, a painting of Mao has looked over the square since 1949, replaced briefly on only a few occasions such as when a portrait of Stalin was hung there to commemorate his death in 1953. Chinese tourists jostled for a photograph with the Chairman and while there was a military guard present, there was no hint of ill-feeling or unrest, although we did learn that a protestor was punished with a 17year jail term for throwing some eggs at the portrait in the 1980's.

Continuing on from Tiananmen Gate we approached the Forbidden City and joined the back of a scrum for tickets, only to be greeted by a somewhat dismissive young man who threw several scrunched up notes and a couple of tickets at us in response to our greetings and cash, when we finally made it to the counter.

The scrum continued around much of the Forbidden City and we were repeatedly elbowed out of the ways we tried to get a glimpse inside the countless numbers of temples, living quarters and elaborate gates. There's no doubt that its a beautiful place, and the scale of it is staggering, but quiet corners were few and far between.

The following day we got a bus to Mutianyu, home to a small and easily accessible section of the Great Wall. Although not too far in distance from Beijing, the roads were clogged with traffic and the air thick with smog, dramatically reducing visibility across the city and beyond. Despite this, we managed to arrive before too much of a crowd had formed in Mutianyu and we were dropped off a car park close tower number 8. The wall is divided into sections, your ticket type and starting point determining which sections you can explore. Ours was from tower 8 to 21, but we opted to take a cable car as far as tower number 14 in an attempt to get a bit of a head start. Coupled with a bit of pace on the earlier stretch, we were rewarded by having the latter, and much steeper, section of the walk to enjoy by ourselves, aside from the occasional vendors selling refreshments and photographs.

A mixture of smog and fog had settled over the hillside so visibility was restricted, but there's no doubt that seeing the ancient wall stretching as far as the eye could see was a magical experience.

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