The journey begins

Fast Plane to China.

Our official holiday began at just before 5:00pm when our good friend Deirdre drove us to the Airport to catch our flight.  We queued for our ticket and surprisingly there were a lot of Chinese people catching the same flight.

The whole tone of our trip was set by Jene when we reached the ticket counter.  The Air China attendant was printing our tickets when Jen's voice became softer and I wasn't sure what she had said. It turns out she was asking how much it would cost to bring back another suitcase from England!!!  Not long after entering the departure lounge I found out why as she had bought three gifts and we weren't even on the plane.

While writing to board I realised that I had forgotten to record the pin number for Euro cash card. Two happy finishes to this story as Brendan found the pin details in the safe along with Jen's card.  All the Euros belong to me!!

We were pleasantly surprised with the great service provided by Air China throughout our 11 hour flight.  We had good tasty food, great service and a wide range of inflight entertainment which saw us through to our 5:50am arrival at Beijing Airport.  Visa checks were quick and then we took a five  minute journey on a shuttle train to collect our baggage and straight through customs.

Our guide Sherry was waiting for us with her driver and we arrived at our hotel around 7:00am.  We went to our room and Jene inflicted her revenge for me not bringing her Euro Cashcard by leaving the keys to my suitcase lock at home. After she finally finished laughing she went downstairs to see if the Conceirge could help.  She came back with a pair of pliers for me to try and break the lock.  After five minutes of futile effort I chose to break the zipper tag instead and got it open.  Let the holiday begin.

After showers and amazing buffet breakfast we took our lives in our hands lol and took a taxi to the silk markets. I have never seen so many cars, buses bikes and people in my life there's 20 000 000 people and 5 000 000 cars in Beijing alone. Firstly they drive on the other side of the road to us so we have to be careful that we look the other way - sounds so simple but it's not!!  We know there are road rules but we have no idea what they are. There are pedestrian crossings everywhere but that doesn't mean that the cars stop for you and even when the green walk sign is on the traffic still crosses, it's manic.

Then if that wasn't bad enough - enter the silk markets. It's a very flattering place to be as they call you beautiful and Scott is very handsome ( now I know that but to have others say it - well what can I say). They grab hold of you and you just don't make eye contact which is really hard when you want to look at their items but you just can't as they grab you as soon as you do.  It works out that I am much, much tougher than Scott, I know when it comes to shopping really really hard to believe. I would be just walking through saying no, no, no and turn around to talk to Scott and they have grabbed him!! 

Now I know it's hard to believe but after a very short period of time I couldn't handle the hassle of bargaining with them. Just give me the price and give me the lowest that you want and complete the deal but this going backwards and forwards and then going to walk away and being grabbed was tiring and i couldn't do too much of that, but they did have some good stuff.  Will see if we can harden up and head back there if we have time, otherwise sorry boys postcards will have to do!!

Then the journey back to the hotel was just as interesting, trying to dodge the hagglers and beggars outside, trying to find somewhere for lunch and trying to get a taxi all very interesting. Finally after getting in and out of cabs or them just refusing to take us we managed to get back to the hotel safe and sound.  Exhausted by this time had a nice nap and then off to our next adventure.

Juggling our Duck

At 4:30 we were meet by our Viator guide, Thomas who was looking after us tonight.  First off to the theatre to see an Acrobatic Show.  The place was full and we were sitting in amongst the local tourists and managing to communicate in very basic terms.  The acrobatic Company was a youth group and while not polished were very good.  They had jugglers, tumblers, swinging on silk drapes, strong men and such.  The locals were hard to impress with only scattered applause until some of the tumblers knocked over the hoops they were jumping through then the whole audience broke into loud laughter.

The highlight of the show was a motorcycle act where the go inside a small metal ball and ride around.  The tension kept building as first one, then two followed by a third rider entered the ball.  This was great but when a fourth rider went in the crowd went wild.  It was pretty impressive.  We came out after the show to -4 degrees so Jene bought some fluffy ear muffs to go with her beanie, scarf and jacket.  All rugged up she was a crowd favourite.

We then went to a local restaurant for dinner.  Some very nice crispy pork, beef and vegetables with fried rice.  After this the chef rings out Peking duck and slices it very finely at the table.  The waitress then showed us the traditional way to eat it by dipping it in the plum sauce, placing it on to the pancake (rice paper) adding cucumber and onion and wrapping it all up.  It was nice but duck is an acquired taste.  Back to the hotel for deserved sleep.  Not bad for our first day.