18th April 2005

Loved beijing and having a great time, and its getting warm..t-shirt weather and getting warmer :-)

Went to the great wall which was 4 hours in a mini bus, including being pulled over by the police! 20 minutes of speculation of what was going on, only resulted in the failure of a toll being paid thankfully!

More interesting toilets!.. but I am sure they will get even worse before I finish this trip!

Great Wall was fabulous even though I only did a third of the walk due to Vertigo setting in (I'm sure the Larum made it worse!), so I got off it with the assistance of a couple of sellers that had been tailing us since we arrived at the start and had a very nice shortcut through a valley with peasants plowing the terraces with a plough and donkey and goats running across the hillside. As expected was subjected to a sales pitch for various souvenirs! Still not too unhappy as I arrived at the end an hour and a half before the others and sat drinking beer in the sun with the really fast walkers.. not a bad way to spend a Tuesday afternoon. Bizzarely I was able to take the aerial slide (in a harness attached to a wire and gravity does the rest)down from the wall to the carpark .. I am obviously happy with heights as long as I am strapped onto something!

Beijing is vast and my feet know it! Have got my first blister when I chose to wear my trainers instead of my walking boots! The usual wander around the Hutongs, Tianamen Square, Forbidden City, Temple of Heaven, the summer palace, various parks and obviously a shop or two! The night market was interesting but I chickened out of eating scorpians, frogs or beetles .. the sweetcorn I tried was disgusting enough!! Now I am out of Beijing without the option of Starbucks, MadDonalds and Pizza Hut I am sure the size 8 goal is merely a few weeks away!

Have left beijing via day train to Datong. Was the only westerner on the train and subjected to curious stares for 6 and a half hours.. pretty much standard chinese behaviour since I arrived! Visited Hanging Temples (half way up a cliff and supported precariously on stilts) and the Yungang caves a set of buddist grottos carved into a sandstone cliff, and unfortunately covered with coal dust from the coal mine opposite!

Still havent found anywhere to download any pictures, hopefully in Xian after another overnight train!

Mobile signal disappeared in St Petersburg, and is unlikely to return until Thailand (mid July???) so I am not ignoring any texts, I just cant get them!

10th April 2005

Mongolia was fantastic..will need to go back one day and see more of it Was in Ulaan Baatar after two nights sharing a ger tent with Rona and Anna from Scotland and Matt from the Midlands. Its off season so we had the camp to ourselves. There were more staff at one point than us.

The camp can accommodate 150 in the height of the summer. Basically it was a round tent with a wood burning stove in the middle which made the tent even hotter than the russian trains! The toilet was a hole in the ground covered by a tin hut, and hadn't showered for a few days..but as its so cold not smelling too much yet!!

Days spent predominately on horseback so we all had sore bums and backs! Scenery fantastic, company good...galloping across the hills to visit random ger tents and drink disgusting milk tea in Ger's with new born lambs in the corner and burnt sheep heads on the stove... cant wait to download the photos for you all to see as words cannot really describe. The weather has also been quite extreme from farily warm in the morning to sandstorms at lunch time and snow storms in the evening! Fabulous country and 3 days are not enough .

Got to Beijing on Friday afternoon with Anna and Rona and went out to eat in a chinese restaurant just around the corner from the hostel with no english menu or english speaking staff or customers (except us!)...managed to order via guide and a picture book I have..when I pointed to a duck I didn't expect to get a whole one!!!

The chef cut the meat off (it was crispy duck with pancakes) and took the carcass away..twenty minutes later a soup arrived with a ducks head floating in it..hilarious! needless to say I didn't eat any of the soup, however have converted a vegetarian Rona to a duck eater!!!

So far been to Tienanmen square, Forbidden City and just got back from the night market where you can buy food from stalls... rona ate scorpions .. I managed fruit and corn on the cob and then a MacDonald's!!! and a starbucks caffe Latte ... feeling a bit dodgy as started Malaria tablets today (larum - possible side affects include dizziness Hallucinations, Vertigo, diarrhoea, depression and in extreme circumstances suicidal tendency) Anna (junior doctor) and Rona are on the look out for strange behaviour over the next few days.. nothing new there then!!!

Not going to the wall for my birthday as need to get Vietnam visa and they weren't open at the weekend so going on Tuesday instead, so after a trip to the embassy we are going for retail therapy at the cheap markets .. North face jacket and fleece for 10 pounds apparently!!!! Probably a more appropriate place for me on my birthday anyway (retail therapy) and as I don't know how long it will take and you have to leave your passport there its necessary if I want to leave Beijing in the near future!

Will download photos soon

Sarah