Anna and Heidi Explore

We arrived in Beijing on Tuesday 8th April, only to find it shrouded in heavy cloud and drizzle – rather different to the 35 degrees we had finally gotten used to in India. The language barrier was immediately evident as we tried to get a taxi to our hostel. The cabbies are supposedly learning English in preparation for the Olympics, with only four months to go it seems they have left it quite late! A few looks at the trusty lonely planet and a few phone calls later and we were on our way, and to our surprise arrived at the correct destination.

We had a few days to relax before our guided tour started, so we explored the delights of Beijing. A highlight was wandering the narrow winding Hutong or alleyways that house a quarter of Beijing’s population. This was a great way to see the locals living their daily lives and we saw lots of surprising things on sticks ready to eat! As yet we haven’t indulged! Due to the Olympics much of Beijing is being remodeled and we suspect much of the original character has been destroyed in favor of flashy skyscrapers and modern housing in the hutongs. Another favorite in the Chinese capital was ‘798’.

A massive disused factory saved by the art community and transformed into a hive of activity…there are literally hundreds of galleries of all sizes displaying a wide range of modern art…we really appreciated this after a month of traditional Indian art, and felt more in touch with the world after a full afternoon. Anna's favorite was some amazing photography related to the Three Gorges Dam Project by Yang Yi, showing towns underwater. Heidi favoured the colourful bubble paitings by someone we can't remember!
We met with our group, 12 of us from all corners of the world (Aus, NZ, UK, USA and Norway) and our guide Amy is from Chongqing. We went for a group meal to get acquainted and everyone was great (and young…we had feared a group of oldies as that is all we had seen in previous days around Beijing!) And thankfully Amy doesn’t use the matching group hats and guide flag that is so common in Chinese tours! Group visits included the famous Tiananmen Square and Forbidden City, an acrobat show and the Great Wall. We ventured out of the city for a few hours to get to the less touristy part of the great wall, to walk from Jinshanling to Simatai, a very hilly 10km section…there were many, many, many steep, narrow and often non-existent steps between each of the 30 towers we trekked. An exhausting day but how cool to be able to say ‘we’ve walked on the Great Wall of China’!
Another afternoon in Beijing was spent visiting the 'Beijing Huiling', a community project for adults aged 16-45 with learning disabilities. We we're really impressed that this kind of work, helped by volunteers and donations was happening here. The trainees make arts and crafts to sell so they can make their own living and contribute to society. During our visit they cooked us lunch taught us calligraphy and performed some songs including jingle bells.

Our first train journey took us to Xi’an in Shaanxi province to see the Terracotta army…and those of you who said India would prepare us for anything we right! The trains in China are so much cleaner and comfier with a supply of fresh pillows and duvets – its very odd to be using duvets again - a cosy luxury we hadn’t realized we’d missed so much. After bland Beijing, Xi’an was a breath of fresh air, a smaller city with a buzz about it that the whole group loved. We explored the Muslim quarter and some great markets and celebrated a birthday in style with a fancy meal, cake and a Chinese karaoke disco! The Terracotta Warriors were pretty cool too…a few miles out of Xi’an itself they were discovered by accident by 3 local farmers in 1974, whilst digging a well. Now one of the farmers spends his retirement signing copies of the official book! Each of the warriors (over 7000 found so far) are individual, right down to the tread on their boots and once finished the artist and soldier they were modeled on were killed along with those who constructed Emperor Qin Shi Huangdi’s tomb – the man responsible for the new 8th wonder of the world. All of these people were killed to keep the location of the tomb a secret – it appeared the Emperor was slightly paranoid about his enemies in the west. The purpose of the tomb and warriors was to protect the Emperor in his afterlife as it is thought he believed he would continue his reign past death, which is also the likely reason for burying 3000 concubines alive around his tomb…nice guy! It all made or a great day.

Panda's was next on the itinerary so we travelled far and wide again to Chengdu in Sichuan (yep like the beef!) The Panda's we're amazing (although we couldn't help thinking they looked like humans dressed as animals!), we arrived for feeding time so a few of them we're full of activity...they spend most of their time sleeping so we we're lucky. The babies we're almost 1 year old and really playful and if you donated enough money you could hold one! We learnt that 9 baby Panda's were born at this breeding centre last year so help to save the Panda is on its way. The evening followed in true Sichuan style with the 'Sichuan Opera and face changing'. The show was great, the costumes we're very colourful and very ornate and they show delivered a range of Sichuan cultural performances from hand shadows to chinese instrumental solo's and th face and costume changing finale where the artists change the colour of their outfit and mask in a split second before your very eye's, it was most impressive.

After Chengdu we travelled to Leshan to see the Giant Buddha then onto Emei Shan to stay at the Bao Gao monastery. The landscape was now completely different as we had left the cities for the extraordinarily green and lush countryside. We climbed Mt Emei (by cable car!) to the Golden Summit that was 3100m above sea level and we could tell the air was getting thin. Heidi became a bit of a celebrity when about 10 chinese tourists wanted their picture taken with her. We then descended the mountain only to have to walk up it again to Hongchungping, the second monastery we were staying in. The walk was beautiful stepping through streams and up through the leafy mountains before it ended in misery... not really its just that we had to climb 1200 very steep steps to reach our destination. It is only after completing it that we can say it was worth every step because our location was so remote and swathed in emerald - it was breathtaking. Unfortunately the heavens opened the following day so our walk down was a bit wet! We spent the afternoon in the hot springs to recover - a treat we would highly recommend. Our journey took us onto Chongqing to board our accommodation for the Yangtze river cruise. The boat was much plusher than we had anticipated, and took us through the three gorges and to the Ghost City. The Ghost City decides the fate of your afterlife, whether you spend it in heaven or hell! All of us passed the tests to prove we were "good guys". In the evening all of us girls drank enough red wine to get Heidi singing 'Hotel California' at karaoke! The following day (a little fragile) we travelled through the five ship locks of the Three Gorges Dam, before we toured around it. The project isn't quite finished yet, but next year the water levels will have risen by a further 20-50 meters in some places submerging some of the beautiful landscape we have seen and displacing hundreds of thousands of people (the new towns built to house the displaced are completely uninspiring communist concrete monstrosities).

Yangshuo was our favorite place with amazing countryside covered with huge limestone peaks. We took a cruise down the Li river and a bicycle ride through the countryside to explore the landscape. One of the girls wasn't very confident on a bike so she hired a moped and cheeky Heidi a managed to blag being her chauffeur for the day, so had an easier ride than the rest of us! It was great to be out and about and the sun came out to join us, a rare sight on our Chinese tour. We also climbed Moon Hill, another 800 steps up (they love their steps) and then a half an hour trek up the steepest slipperiest muddy and rocky track to the highest peak. All this in three weeks, it has been tiring but an amazing adventure and we have made some great friends.

Hong Kong!!! Our trip finishes in a very diverse city, the buildings aren't beautiful but they are pretty staggering and the mountains make for a unique back drop. We said goodbye to our group after three very comfortable weeks, we all shared one last dinner together. Group dinners (company rather than food) has been one of the highlights of our trip. Our guide Amy always chose a wide selection of dishes, and we've tried goose, duck, pork, chicken, tomato, egg, beef, squid, lotus fruit, fish and lots of greens in every combination imaginable! We also tried the pork filled steamed dumplings for breakfast - not the same as a sausage! One of the most exciting culinary adventures was the Sichuan hotpot. A large pot sits on a burner in the middle of the table, half is a spicy sauce and half is mild. You choose your ingredients and cook it yourself before dipping in a self made seasoned oil, choices of seasoning included garlic, salt, and an old favorite msg!

Our stay in Hong Kong was longer than expected, due to the mayday holiday we couldn't get our visa's for Vietnam until after the weekend, so we kind of blew our budget a bit but it was nice to relax a bit more in such a chaotic city! And gave us a second opportunity to visit the top of Victoria peak and watch the city come alive after sunset.

Tomorrow brings a new day and a new country...

(p.s. check out our pics on http://picasaweb.google.com/annaandheidi)