Lijiang Jan 08 We left Yangshou and headed to a city called Lijiang via a bus, an overnight train and then another bus. On the train we met a German guy called Jens, he seemed nice enough and was also going to Lijiang so asked if he could tag along. We arrived there early in the morning and went to the old town were everywhere was closed. The old town was very pretty with it's cobbled streets and small canals running alongside them with loads of goldfish swimming about ( We were to learn later that they are relased by the [View Full Entry]

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Chengdu - December 07 Chengdu is a enormous city but we hardly spent any time there, it was just a flying visit to go and see the panda breeding centre. The hostel we stayed in was quality, the rooms were good, it had a bar and a nice restaurant at the front. the only downside was that being the middle of winter it was dead! We played this to our advantage though with cheaper beds in a empty dorm room, saving us 3 pounds, cashback! We booked our panda trip for the following day and then I went out for a [View Full Entry]

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Xian - December 07 The overnight train from Beijing pulled in about 6am. We were knackered as usual. A tout took us to his hotel nearby which was ok. Our options were to get out straight away and explore a quiet city or .......sod that we went to bed 'til 11. We had looked forward to seeing the Terracotta Warriors probably just as much as the great wall. Getting there wasn't as easy as you would have thought. I just imagined every tourist there piling onto buses for the one hour journey. As it turned out with it being winter, not [View Full Entry]

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Simatai - 11th December 07 Whilst in Beijing we put off the trip to the wall several times, as it involved an early start and most mornings we had a hangover. On our final full day in Beijing we did manage to get up early enough. Luckily it was a perfect, clear day, although it had been snowing the day before so it wasn't exactly ideal walking conditions. We went to a stretch of the wall in Simatai, which is quite a long distance from Beijing compared to other parts but we wanted to go there as it has not been [View Full Entry]

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Beijing - December 07 We loved our time in Beijing. As I write this we are in Cambodia and have been to 6 countries so far. Beijing is definitely one of our favourite places. It was a massive plus that I had a friend there so after many dodgy hostels we stayed (probably overstayed !) at my friends apartment in central Beijing. Having friends who knew the city well was great, not having to look at the lonely planet for help on every subject was a nice change. We were taken to fantastic bars and restaurants that you would never find [View Full Entry]

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Everest Base Camp - Nov 6th - 18th On our 2nd day in Katmandu we met our guideand the rest of our trekking group. We were expecting there to be about 10 people but it was just us and another couple from Melbourne, Gary and Rachel. After speaking to them for just 5 minutes we were worried about spending the next 14 days with them. We did try, but first impressions in this case were correct ! On the plus side our guide Binud was really sweet as were the porters. Early the next morning we headed to Katmandu airport to [View Full Entry]

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Chitwan & Rafting - November 19th - 26th After returning from the Base Camp trek early, we had a few extra days to play with. We decided to first go tro the Royal Chitwan National Park to do a 3 day 2 night elephant safari. During the 5 hour coach journey to Chitwan from Katmandu we met some really nice people, 2 girls from South Africa and a Canadian fella. They were good company for the 3 day trip. Our bus journwy took us to the edge of the park, from there we got on a small boat to cross the [View Full Entry]

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Hong Kong - November 28th to December 2nd Hong Kong is a great city. After the Chaos in Nepal and India with the crazy roads and random cows everywhere it made a refreshing change to have a bit of 'western culture' for a couple of days. It was also a gentle introduction into China and some of it's 'culinary delights' on offer, ie chicken feet, fish head soup, boiled pigs intestines and a dish with the peculiar name of a thousand year old eggs! All very tempting. We arrived in Hong Kong in the afternoon and spent the rest of the [View Full Entry]

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Macau - 3rd December to 5th December From the bible (the lonely planet) we arrived expecting the Asian version of Vegas. A glitzy, glamourous gambling paradise. It didn't quite turn out like that, I think losing money on the first night always puts a downer on things! Plus the fact that I was cheated out of some winnings playing roulette by a big casino, i won't name names in case they sue me ! I don't play roulette normally, but Gill likes to, so we had a little gamble. Gill was playing the numbers and I decided to lump on black. [View Full Entry]

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Katmandu/Nepal - November 4th-26th 2007 Katmandu felt like our base for the full three weeks we were in Nepal. The trips we arranged never required all of our stuff so we were constantly leaving luggage in hotels, hoping it would be there when we returned. The Journey to Katmandu felt like it took forever. First was the bus from Gorokpur (India) to the Nepal border, This wasn't exactly National Express on the M1 ! The border was reached in about 4/5 hours, you then had to recieve a stamp to leave India and arrange a visa for Nepal. To be honest [View Full Entry]

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