Beijing

We said goodbye to Iain on the platform – he was off to walk the length of Japan, and Marty, Thibaud and I jumped aboard the Trans-Manchurian Express, next stop Beijing. Post Olympics and pre Para-Olympics meant the city was in mint condition. The majority of the signs were bilingual Chinese and English making life a lot simpler for ill-prepared tourists, and it was unbelievably clean. Weirdly clean, there wasn’t a blade of grass out of place or a building that hadn’t been recently re-plastered and tarted up. The peculiarity of Beijing came more from a lack of something than anything obviously apparent – there wasn’t one single beggar, a strange thing in a capital city – where were they all? I got the feeling there were things going on behind closed doors, what they were I’ll never know unless I spend a lot more time there and learn Cantonese.

We spent the whole week eating the most incredible street food and riding around on a couple of the fabled 10 million bicycles.

Peking Duck

Chairman Mao

Thibaud & Marty