http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Beijing/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from Asia , China , Beijing en-us Sun, 12 Oct 2008 19:19:06 BST Sun, 12 Oct 2008 19:19:06 BST ll http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/China/Beijing/blog-333503.html dfsd http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/China/Beijing/Tian--anmen/blog-333501.html sdas http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/China/Beijing/Forbidden-City/blog-333499.html Last day here before I head off to Xian tomorrow night. Had a lovely day in the city on the 7th. Wandered around the Hutong on a beautiful day. Unfortunatley the Bell abd Drum Tower were closed so I caught a rickshaw ride round the Hutong Walked down to Beihai Park and read my book in the sunshine with a cold coke in hand. By the time I walked back to the subway my feet were killing me in th http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/China/Beijing/blog-333234.html On day 2 it's our last day in Beijing so there is a bit of a panic among the group to see everything we possibly can The pressure We meet a local tour guide Kevin first thing in the morning and he takes us over to Tian'anmen Square. We can barely delay here to take pictures as Kevin is anxious to keep us moving there are loads and loads of guards around the place and Kevin tells us n http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/China/Beijing/Tian--anmen/blog-333193.html Finally we're making a blog entry of some significance......We started on the tour going from Beijing to Kathmandu anyway..........there are 9 of us in the group including the leader Zshoka who is Hungarian. There are 2 English guys a Canadian guy a Scottish guy Joe a Danish girl aFrench girl an Australian girl and an Irish girl me. There is one other couple apart from ourselves and http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/China/Beijing/Great-Wall-of-China/blog-333192.html My first Catholic mass in China. On a wednesday morning i woke up at 530 to catch a quick mass at the famous Wangfujing St. Joseph's Church and proceeded onto the train station to head to Tianjin to pick up my passport. The entire mass was in Chinese which was interesting. Most of what the priest said was understandable but without knowing how to say the 'our father' before hand it was difficul http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/China/Beijing/blog-333152.html October 1st is National Day a holiday to celebrate the founding of the PRC in 1949. Most people get a week off to celebrate and I was one of the lucky ones. When I say that I got a week off this is both true and misleading. We get a week as in 7 days. So I had to work on Saturday and Sunday the 27th and 28th to make up for 2 of the days that we would miss during the week. Make sense No. http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/China/Beijing/blog-332470.html Arriving in Bejing on a Sunday afternoon we dropped off our stuff at our friend Nicole's apartment and spent the rest of the afternoon registering with her building management and the local police. Nothing like visiting a communist country Kicking off Beijing in style we later feasted on a traditional Beijing meal of Peking Duck dumplings caramelized lotus root bok choy and various other http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/China/Beijing/blog-332403.html Days 34 38Arrived in Beijing around 1430ish said goodbye to everyone and attempted to get a cab to a hostel only to find the cab driver hadn't understood a word we'd said and kept stopping to ask people if they spoke english and help translate ended up getting out the cab and walking back to the station.. We phoned someone we'd met on the trans siberian rail and they met us and took us to thei http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/China/Beijing/Forbidden-City/blog-332154.html Day 38 Wednesday 8th October. Couldn't sleep so got up early for me at 9.30am Got showered and packed as we had to check out by midday. Then wandered out to find some aspirin for my head. Hot today. I came back and before anyone else was up just had time to order a jumbo breakfast. I didn't intend on spending any money today but that soon changed. I was bored so decided to wander off on http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/China/Beijing/blog-332142.html I left home on the 13th of September don't worry it wasn't a friday flew down to Heathrow then onto Shanghai. After an eventful taxi experience I finally made it to the hotel don't think i've ever been so happy to get to a hotel before. Shanghai was an interesting place if anyone requires some knock off goods its the place to go as everyone seems to have some to sell While in Shanghai http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/China/Beijing/blog-332093.html Day 37 Tuesday 7th October Not too much to add but we are moving on again soon so wanted to get up to date. Got up late around midday getting a bit too used to these lie ins. A day of sorting things out again really. Finally managed to withdraw money from my bank after 3 phone calls to HSBC. HSBC is shit and anyone reading this associated with them... you owe me at least 30quid in phone b http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/China/Beijing/blog-332090.html I tak to 24 pazdziernika 2007 wyladowalem w Pekinie okolo godz 620pm..Nie chcialem tu przyjezdzac. Chiny nie byly moim krejem destynacja ktora chcialem doswiadczyc na pewno nie Pekin. Pekin mialbyc moim przystankiem w drodze do Lhasy do Tybetu jak i baza wypadowa w kierunku Wielkiego Muru. I tak tez bylo. Choc jak czesto wychodzi plan nie zawsze pokrywa sie z tym co zycie zweryfikuje. Ciekwaws http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/China/Beijing/blog-331998.html We made it to Beijing and made it to our hotel for only 4 rmb thanks to our new friend we met on the train whose friend gave us a lift. Thankyou Cicily The train ride was comfortable and we cruised to Beijing from Hong Kong in 24 hours. From what we've seen so far of Beijing it is a modern metropolis a far cry from the villages we passed by on the train where corn was being laid out on the pav http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/China/Beijing/blog-331887.html Right firtly apologies for the extreme lack of posts since Moscow but we've had a little trouble finding internet... So I guess I'll take off where we left in Moscow. Well we made it to the Red Square on my birthday and saw St Basil's cathedral which was everything to be expected... except a little small... Still pretty big in terms of ordinary sized houses but not cathedrals. Glad we saw it b http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/China/Beijing/XiCheng-District/blog-331833.html A wideeyed group of students from the Gymnasium Johanneum in Germany came to Beijing last week. China Study Link www.chinastudylink.com gave them a taste of China they will never forget. Irsquove included a number of pictures to give you a feeling for what we did. The expressions on the studentsrsquo faces show it all.I enjoy doing this so much. It doesnrsquot feel like work. I know http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/China/Beijing/blog-331797.html Day 36 Monday 6th October Had to get up early as our tour guide was coming to meet us at 9am. Got clean clothes to wear for the first time in 2 weeks. Hmm underwear it's been a while Our guide English name 'Wendy' met us and it was about an hour and a half drive to the part of the wall we were going to visit. Along the way we got to experience more crazy Chinese driving as well as pe http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/China/Beijing/Great-Wall-of-China/blog-331530.html Day 35 Sunday 5th October Woke up at 9am and thought i'd have a few more minutes kip. Next thing i know it's midday Seem to have this constant feeling of tiredness now. I think i'm just becoming lazy. First of all we headed to the shopping centre and spent a couple of hours sorting out things we needed. I've now got enough books to see me through to Australia and a new memory card ready f http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/China/Beijing/Forbidden-City/blog-331524.html Some pics to be getting on with... http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/China/Beijing/Forbidden-City/blog-331375.html Gisteren teruggekomen van een weekje Urumqi. Vanuit school hadden we de hele week vrij omdat het national holiday was. Mijn neef Daan die woont en werkt al bijna 3 jaar in Urumqi en afgelopen week is hij daar getrouwdVorige week dinsdag heb ik hier in Beijing op het vliegveld de rest van de familie getroffen. Vanuit daar zijn we met zijn allen naar Urumqi gevlogen. Urumqi ligt helemaal in het noo http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/China/Beijing/Chaoyang-district/blog-331364.html Ik zit ondertussen alweer bijna 5 weken hier in Beijing. De studie gaat hard en volgende maand hebben we al de eerste midterms. Maar eerst hebben we nu een week vakantieAfgelopen vrijdag begon de vakantie met een door school georganiseerd badminton evenementje. Dit is ter voorbereiding op een toernooi dat gaat komen. Hier doen alle universiteiten in Beijing aan mee gelukkig is het wel alleen vo http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/China/Beijing/Chaoyang-district/blog-331362.html So we finally arrived in Beijing.............Joe and I were picking our jaws up off the ground arriving at the airport. It is beyond belief. Talk about creating an impression of a place We had to take a train after getting off the place to collect our bags and the journey was the equivalent of Dundrum to Ranelagh on the luas. No exaggeration. We may have something similar in Ireland on a smalle http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/China/Beijing/blog-331285.html The Great Wall needs no introduction. It was built rebuilt since the 5th century BC till Ming Dynasty. The one found in Bataling outskirt of Beijing was bult during Ming Dynasty. It stretches over approximately 4160 miles 6700km.For more info go to httpen.wikipedia.orgwikiGreatWallofChina http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/China/Beijing/Great-Wall-of-China/blog-331128.html Alan and Gemma from the tour are blogging on the same site and have uploaded some pics from Mongolia....so if you'd like to see them have a nosey at the camp we stayed....httpwww.travelblog.orgAsiaMongoliaUlaanbaatarblog330102.html http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/China/Beijing/blog-330912.html Day 33 Friday 3rd October Got up early for breakfast. Our transfer was at 7.20am and we only had 20mins to eat so i opted for non melted cheese on toast. Our train for Beijing departed at 8.05am. It was a much better journey this time as all the people we had met were in our carriage so we felt like we owned the place. There was this one guy there though who juggled a lot and was always pr http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/China/Beijing/blog-330736.html Holy cow today is the 4th of October. Its October already. Really Zhende maP.S. HAPPY BIRTHDAY GABBYSo as per my title I have a really cool story about one of my best friends. For those of you who don't know our little Traverse City Survivor celebrity Michael is a busy guy and travels the world doing parkour and dance performances. Last Friday night I was walking down Sanlituin a great ba http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/China/Beijing/blog-330668.html