The raid never happened and we had a great few days in Beijing. We visited the Great Wall an amazing experience but not for the faint hearted. The chair lift up was not my idea of fun but then I hate heights, Steve loved it. The steps on the wall are a challenge but there are thousands of people climbing it everyday. To see it stretch across the country is incredible and to imagine how it was built is impossible. Take plenty of water with you because it is hot and dry up there, although there are smmall stalls selling drinks. We walked all the way down beacuse I was too chicken to go back on the chair lift but met a donkey along the way, so that was nice.
We visited a Cloisionne factory, silk factory, tea house. all lovely cultural experiences. Several visits to the Silk Road Markets where you can buy anything you want for a fraction of the price you pay in Australia. It is very large and clean and everyone speaks English. There are great coffee shops outside the Silk Road Markets. This must be a legacy of the Olympics because when we visited Shanghai before the Olympics coffee was dreadful now in Beijing it was great.
We saw bugs, scorpions, baby ducks and all manner of critters on skewers for sale as snack food. We ate in the grottiest little restaurant in the Huong where I was certain we would get food poisoning or mugged on the way in. Instead we ate the most amazing Peking Duck. The dishes just kept coming. "Best Peking Duck" a must have experience at the "Li Qun" 11 Bei Xiang Feng Alley, Zheng Yi Road, off Qian Men Avenue
Beijing, China.
We bought our tickets to Mongolia from the ticket office in the large international hotel near the train station. Cash only so make sure you have a wad of cash. There is an ATM in the hotel so that helped. Tuesday we boarded the train for Ulan Bataar.The train station in Beijing is frantic as you can imagine and there were many people travelling with large laods of goods wrapped in all sorts of parcels. People squatted on the floor eating food I could not identify out of a range of vessels. There were young and old and all in between. I could see no other Westerners. As the crowd got up to move when were swept up in the current of people and just hoped we were heading for the correct train the K23.
We visited a Cloisionne factory, silk factory, tea house. all lovely cultural experiences. Several visits to the Silk Road Markets where you can buy anything you want for a fraction of the price you pay in Australia. It is very large and clean and everyone speaks English. There are great coffee shops outside the Silk Road Markets. This must be a legacy of the Olympics because when we visited Shanghai before the Olympics coffee was dreadful now in Beijing it was great.
We saw bugs, scorpions, baby ducks and all manner of critters on skewers for sale as snack food. We ate in the grottiest little restaurant in the Huong where I was certain we would get food poisoning or mugged on the way in. Instead we ate the most amazing Peking Duck. The dishes just kept coming. "Best Peking Duck" a must have experience at the "Li Qun" 11 Bei Xiang Feng Alley, Zheng Yi Road, off Qian Men Avenue
Beijing, China.
We bought our tickets to Mongolia from the ticket office in the large international hotel near the train station. Cash only so make sure you have a wad of cash. There is an ATM in the hotel so that helped. Tuesday we boarded the train for Ulan Bataar.The train station in Beijing is frantic as you can imagine and there were many people travelling with large laods of goods wrapped in all sorts of parcels. People squatted on the floor eating food I could not identify out of a range of vessels. There were young and old and all in between. I could see no other Westerners. As the crowd got up to move when were swept up in the current of people and just hoped we were heading for the correct train the K23.
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