We have been exploring Hongkong islands for the last few days and finally today I got my first day at the beach which was lovely even though it rained a tiny bit!! We spent the first day and night walking along the harbour and avenue of stars on Kowloon. There is a cool laser show in the evening from all the buildings but it was a tiny bit cloudy, (still good to watch though!) We have been to loads of markets which seem to run well into the night, the do like to shop here! Yesterday we caught a train up [View Full Entry]

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We have spent the last few days in Shanghai. Its a really developing city, with loads of sky scrapers flying up all the time...We have walked along the Bund loads which travels along the river through the city and has a great view of all the buildings of the city. We had a drink in the swanky bar cloud 9 at the top of the Jin Mao Tower but now there is a taller tower right next to it, although i'm not sure that its open to the public or not?! To cross the river to the towers you can take [View Full Entry]

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We climbed the mountain!! We started out at 10pm and made it to the north peak at 1615m at about 1.30 in the morning. It was still really warm there and we wish we had stayed a bit longer! On the way up were steep rock stairs that you have to pull yourself up with a chain...To travel from the north to the east peak is up to 2100m. There is a 3 foot wide staircase with a 1000m drop each side. Going up in the dark was not too bad, coming down was a but scary!! Also to get onto [View Full Entry]

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This is an experience....not one we would like to repeat in a hurry! It's almost unbelievable that this kind of thing still exists...I'm not really sure what i'm allowed to write here so i'll have to edit this later...the most depressing thing i have ever seen!! Not really what you would picture in terms of a wildlife reserve..and not just pandas, black bears, large birds etc To purge the guilt we ran around the city walls in the pollution and are nearly dead! A very strange day indeed!!! [View Full Entry]

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We arrived safely on the train and walked around the city. The pollution is really bad here much worse than Beijing and you can hardly breathe!! We visited a Big Goose Pagoda and a smaller pagoda and museum and then realxed with some beers in the bar! Today we went to the Terracotta Army with a group of Mexican students which was very funny and really an amazing place!! The soldiers really havent been dug up very much at all, I wonder if it ever will be as not much work seems to be going on and its too much of [View Full Entry]

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We went to a really quiet location on the wall and walked up and down stairs for 6 miles. It really is huge and goes on and on for ever but it really is amazing!! We walked with some Australins and a guy we met on the wall from Streatham!! Most exgitingly Steve nearly trod on a snake!! We think it was a python but even the Aussies werent sure!! I was all Steve Urwin and managed to photograph it!! Eventually we will get pictures up but you are not allowed to do it on the computers here!! boo hoo!! Also [View Full Entry]

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Hi everyone!! We are in Beijing at the mo and finally its really hot!!! It's very different to Japan and nowhere near as safe, but we love it! We are staying in a converted house in a Houtong which is really nice. We have visited Tian An Men Square, Forbidden City, Bei Hai Park, Temple of Heaven, and 2 temples, 1 buddhist and one confuscian (really weird!) We loved all the sites desite the touts who arent as bad as they could be!! We also learnt to line dance with some lovely folk in the park aka Paul Merton on his [View Full Entry]

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We have spent the last few days relaxing and looking around temples and shrines and generally enjoying ourselves, Kyoto is really cool! They seem very taken by the orange gate, so much so that we walked around 4km worth of them earlier in the week! If your an orange gate fan then the Inari shrine is for you!! We have seen cool Budhas and beautiful gardens although they do like gravel and sandcastles! Last night we visited a cool bar and were perplexed by ancient wooden puzzles, in the end the bar closed and he had to show us how it [View Full Entry]

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Osaka aquarium is the best aquarium ever!! There is a massive tank that you can view from 7 floors with a 9mm whale shark with tons of others stuff including giant crabs and otters and seals etc. its really cool! Afterwards we went on the worlds biggest ferris wheels with cool views over Osaka Bay. Steve was a bit scared as its was a bit rikety especially after i mentioned that episode of Bottom!! [View Full Entry]

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Hiroshima is absolutely breathtaking. Its so hard to imagine that the place was flattened by the worlds first atomic bomb. The atmosphere is really peaceful and the people are so relaxed. The history is fascinating and we did spend 3 or 4 hours in the museum just reading about the events of that day. It was truly horrifying. you have to visit this place. I think its been our best place in Japan... The city is totally reconstructed apart from the A dome which sort of survived as it was directly under the explosion. They have chosen to leave it untouched. [View Full Entry]

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