Floral Plaza Hot Spring Hotel Beijing

... out where Brother Wen is," said Chen. "Please continue to dispatch capable men around all the Yamens, Brother Ma. This evening, I will ask Priest Wu Chen and the Twin Knights to go to the Commander-in-chief's Yamen to see what they can find out. It is important that we don't alert the Manchus to what we are doing so whatever happens, there must be no fighting."

... terrible sinking feeling in my stomach. After kicking my feet around for a bit (I later found out this DID NOT inspire confidence into the Swiss girl who went after me), I relaxed and enjoyed the ride. It was absolutely amazing. At the end, we boarded a boat and arrived back at the meeting point, where we got on the bus for the extraordinarily long drive back to Beijing.

Pictures to follow - the internet is slow enough, and I don't want to push my luck.

... hearts) affixed to the handrails outside the temple rattled in the wind. They symbolise love, security and wealth. On rare occasions you can see the phenomena known as Buddha's Light when rainbow rings produced by refraction of water particles attach themselves to a person's shadow in the cloud bank below the summit. Devout Buddhists, thinking this was a call from yonder, used to jump off the cliff of self-sacrifice in ecstasy!

We trekked along a river bed ...

... a fireproof overall. But the guy's a vegetarian, same as me, which in a way makes us brothers, I guess. And I'd say he's even got a thing or two on me, for when he walks on grass, not a blade gets trampled. I've not managed to pull off that feat yet. Anyway, the gate itself had three doors, and in times bygone the one in the centre served exclusively the emperor and the empress, whereas the two side doors were for nobles and ministers. Complete with red Chinese lanterns, one hanging at ...

... of the roofs. If you have read any of the Empress Orchid books you can imagine it was pretty cool to see the throne and the screen behind which she used to sit. After this we made our way out of town to the Summer Palace. This is where the emperors went to get away from the summer heat. It is set around a lake and has a huge long corridor along the lake side, about a kilometre long, that is all hand painted with all sorts of different scenes. After walking around the lake we caught a ...

... of 15 in our viscinity. I have some photos of me on the wall, by the wall, next to the wall, on the suspension bridge, on the slide thing (zip something) - basically a lot of positions. Unfortunately the internet here si so slow that I ahd no chance goign through my photos and uploading them at all. One photo would take me about an hour so I will do it when I get back. Anyway, I met some lovely people again but not locals. They are ...

... a competitive spirit) and gave them multiple choice questions to answer about us. It was fun! The guys hope to come up with a game for us... but we'll see :) MONDAY Regular morning schedule with language class, though I stayed in because I was not feeling well. At lunch we changed rooms and roommates, so I am now rooming with Stacey! I'm definitely looking forward to a great next 2 weeks! This day is boring because I stayed in all day :) TUESDAY Class Free ...

... once in their life. We saw the olympic swimming arena on the way to the wall... or at least the construction site that will be the swimming arena one day... they do know that the Olympics are only a few months away, right?! I wanted to travel to see the birds nest (Olympic arena) but its 1 hour out of town, so Im not paying the taxi for that... We had a really nice Peking Duck dinner after the Great wall, and since it was Natalia's ...

... horses (around 38km away from the city) Lunch in local restaurant. Back to the city, we will visit the City Wall, the most complete city wall that has survived in China, as well being one of the largest ancient military defensive systems in the world. Dinner in local restaurant. After dinner, transfer back to your hotel. Overnight in Xi'an. Day 06 Xi'an (B L) Breakfast in hotel. Morning tour to Big Goose Pagoda, which was built to store sutras and ...

... Tea House where we observed a tea ceremony. It was wonderful and during this tea ceremony we were able to sample various types of tea (Oolong, Jasmine, Lychee, and Pue-erh). Lunch was delicious as usual. After lunch we weaved through the streets of old Beijing and came to an area known as Hutong. Hutong as a word is based in Mongolian. It means small alleys. This community definitely is made up of small alleys which seemed like a ...