Woke up at 8am without any alarm so I must have had enough sleep so got up and uploaded a few more photo’s onto facebook (got a lot of days to catch up on). Had breakfast at about 9.15am and it was probably one of the best choices etc so far. They do eat some strange things for breakfast though, there was chowmein, dumplings, stir fired vegetable, as well as the usual eggs, ham etc. Set off to do some sightseeing and found the metro station quite close to our hotel.
The metro was immaculately clean and very modern with all the latest technology and had info in both English and Chinese. Onboard the trains were TV’s that gave you the info of where you were and also what the next stop was. There was also a station plan but it was all digital with a traffic light system showing all the stops you had already stopped at in green and then the next stop in yellow and the stops coming up in red. EVEN I could follow it (hahaha or so I thought then got the red and green mixed up and thought we were going the wrong way lol), The metro was only 20p a trip too, so not even worth wearing yer shoe leather out walking ;-).
The first stop was the Lama Palace, which houses lots of different temples for all the different Buddha they worship. On the streets leading up to the temple were loads of shops all selling boxes of incense stick and nothing else. When we got inside we found our why as every temple had a fire burning outside where people would drop in their sticks. Inside you couldn’t burn them but instead had to offer them in front of the gods and kneel down to say a prayer etc. (proper money earner that is if you ask me they were going through like a dose of salts lol).
After the palace we found a local food place out of the main tourist area so we could get a proper meal at a bargain price ;-). Between us we had a pot of jasmine tea, egg fried rice, shredded pork in garlic and sweet and sour balls of some sort. The lot came to £3.10 each, Happy Days !! Phil is probably gonna eat 2 weeks food in 5 days so he doesn’t have to spend
anything in Tokyo LOL.
We then went round the corner to Confusious Palace, as it wasn’t far from where we were. I preferred this one as there was a lot more to see and it looked better on pictures (it’s good being 800 years old if you look naff on a pic I say lol). Bought a few postcards and a small painting to take home and then headed back to the hotel for a quick download of the photo’s in case we lose our camera’s.
After a quick freshen up we set off on the subway to meet the guys we’d met on the trans Siberian railway as we had arrange to meet at Chinamen Square at 7.30pm to have something to eat. It took us a while to find it after we got off the tube but we eventually got there about 15 minutes late but the others were still waiting for us. Luckily Peter from Holland had already met Hayden, Tracy and Jason so he wasn’t stood on his own waiting for us. We headed over to one of the restaurants that was in the lonely planet guide and had to fend off Tut-tut drivers who kept trying to give us a ride rather than give us directions. Eventually we found it though slap bank in the middle of all the tourist part.
When went in they tried to fob us off with the take away menu but we explained we wanted to sit down. They said take away only until we started to walk off then suddenly found us a table for 6. Then the waitress brought us a menu but then was handed a load of cheap looking menus so gave us those. She was trying to whip away the posh menu and give us what I can only think were tourist ones as they were more expensive for the same stuff. We just kept hold of the other one and asked for more of those type of menus which she wasn’t too happy about lol (foiled miss thing). They then kept trying to make us order the set menu for £9 each which was basically duck and pancakes with a soup. When you looked at the separate dishes you could get dim sum for 30p, pancakes for 40p, duck for £1.50 etc so I think they just use the set menu for tourists too as it’s the easy option. I ordered duck, pancakes, bit n bobs to go with it and fried rice and a bottle of Chinese liquor, came to which came to £4.00.
When my drink came it was quarter litre bottle of what looked like Chinese vodka but tasted like rocket fuel. I tired a shot on its own but it was like paint stripper, so did another measure in my cup with a full can of coke and it still tasted way too strong. I think I will keep that to put in my hip flask to use when I want to make friends in Australia LOL. The food was okay but to be honest the place we went to today was better quality food and more authentic. Everything at the restaurant was on plastic plates etc and felt like fast food for Brits.
After the food we got the tube back to our stop with Peter and Jason and looked for a bar that might be open as it was only 9.30pm. There doesn’t seem to be any bars as such where we are so we just got 4 bottles of beer for 30p each (and they were like the size of a large Magners bottle). We took them to our hotel and drank them there and then the guys had to head back to their hotels before the tubes stopped at 11pm.
So far I am loving Beijing, it’s really clean and the people seem friendly. The only thin I can’t get used to is everybody constantly hoiking up flem and spitting in the street every two minutes lol.
Got a long day of sightseeing tomorrow as going to try and do a full day and then the night market where we can buy food from the street traders who cook at the side of the road (you have to try everything don’t you lol).
Turning in for the night now as it’s 12.30 am.
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