"and there are 9 million bicycles in Beijing"

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Or 9 million and 2 with us! so the song goes, although Beijing today is definitely ruled by the car.
Still, we have seen some impressive loads being hauled around by bike, including house removals, mattresses and household effects on trailers pulled by bikes. Electric bikes are also very common and a practical alternative in Beijing as it’s very flat.
Beijing is almost disappointing easy to navigate, after Moscow, because of the dual labelling in Pinyin (romanic script) and also there are many English signs. Here I was expecting to have to match characters on a map to those on a sign, and actually that’s not at all necessary. Well let’s wait and see when we get to the country side, maybe things will be different and quite impossible and I’ll be eating my words!
In Beijing we managed to extract our bicycles from the underground coffers of the railway station the day after we arrived and enjoyed using the wide bicycle lanes next to the main road. We stayed in luxurious accommodation with our friend’s brother who is working for the British embassy. He lives on the 31st floor (though not quite actually as some inauspicious numbers have been excluded, such as 14 as the same words can translate to mean ‘I am death’ in Mandarin).
Mandarin as spoken in Beijing has a wonderful Devon accent about it.
And so we behaved as normal tourists for a few days and enjoyed the changing of the guard, Forbidden City, Summer Palace, and the Great Wall. Nigel passed on the Summer Palace and instead headed to electronics heaven, 1700 of electronics shops in the same district. Heading to the Great Wall we were a little nervous about what we were taking on as our somewhat dated guide book described 500m drops to the side of a decrepit and crumbling wall surface, with 70 degree ascents and descents where one had to ‘scramble’. Describing it as ‘not for the faint hearted’ I was wondering if I was in fact ‘faint hearted’ and would become frozen to the wall in panic! In the end it was a spectacular but not at all hair-raising experience and the 10km between Jinshaling and Simitai passed too quickly. There were surprising few tourists and some gentle touts (claiming to be Mongolian farmers) who were hopeful but not overly persistent that we should purchase some souvenirs.
So the bikes boarded yet another train (their 4th on this trip) and we are now sitting in a restaurant just inside the great city walls in Xian, waiting to collect them.

Trip notes

Oct 14 day 181
(Six months, 7435 km, 8382.22 euro, 46 euro per day, approx £33)

Disembarked train in Beijing. Staying with friend’s brother (Angela’s brother Martin) who is giving us star treatment.
Map $1 US
Phone call 2 RMB
Taxi = 20

Exchange rate 15 RMB = 1 pound

Euro = 3

Total Euro = 1121.05 (37 euro per day)

Oct 15 day 182
Beijing
Collection of bikes from train 6 RMB
Train tickets to Xian 520 RMB
Street food 33.5 RMB
DVDs 20 RMB
Metro tickets 8 RMB

Euro = 54.5

Oct 16 day 183
Beijing

Restaurants 110
Forbidden city with audio guide 100 x 2
Metro 2 x 4

Total = 318 RMB
Euro = 30

Oct 17 day 184
Beijing
Restaurant 100
Summer Palace entry x 1 30
Taxi 22
Metro 8
Hard drive 120 gig 510 RMb

Total = 670
Euro = 62.5

Oct 18 day 185
Visit to Great Wall. Walked from Jinshaling to Simitai with Shell and Tim (10km along the Great Wall)
Great Wall Entry (Jinshaling - 50 x 2, Simitai 40 x 2), Cable car 2 x 30 for one way lift at Jinshaling, return by flying fox and boat (35 x 2)
Driver 325 (650 for taxi rental for day)
Food and drink 240
Souvenir T-shirt 20
Book 25

Total = 920
Euro = 86

Oct 19 day 186
Boarded train to Xian
Bicycle carriage on train 120 RMB
Food and drink 160 RMB
Antibiotics for first aid kit 115 RMB
Post 185
Phrase book 50

Total = 630
Euro = 59

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