The bike tour has been a positive experience for me as I got to cycle through the Chinese countryside and interact with the local people. The route that the tour took passed through some remote areas where the locals had not seen many foreigners to more touristy spots. My first impression of the Chinese coutryside is that it is very green and very hilly. Its really beautiful. However the small towns that we passed through were very old and grubby looking. One thing that you will however notice is that 99% of the Chinese people are very friendly, always smile at you and will almost always say hallooo! I think its a novelty to them to get a halloo back from the Westeners. I was impressed by the infrastructure though. The roads are good and the trains are great. Buses are pretty modern and very efficient. Cabs are dirt cheap in the city and there are plenty of them. The cycling was pretty easy for me as I expected it would be. I also took my own saddle, pedals and shoes. This made the riding easier and more comfortable. We were on basic mountain bikes, but most were new. It was good to help some of the group members get to grips with the gears etc. I remember how clueless a was when I first started riding. Our first outing on the bikes was for about an hour and we were initiated into the Chinese traffic system. In a nutshell there are no real rules other than staying mostly on the right side of the rode. Nobody has right of way, except for the person who is in front of you. Pedestrians and cyclists are far down on the foodchain. But well all managed to survive. Most of the cycling took place on quieter roads in the country. This did not stop the cars from hooting at you. It was either to signal that they were passing or just to say halloo to you. The first part of the trip the weather was overcast buit humid. It was fairly good cycling weather and so I did not complain. The group cycled at their own pace and evry so often we stopped to re-group. This worked out very well for all. We stayed mostly in 3 star hotels and so felt quiet luxurious. The travelling was easy as we had a bus that would do our transfers and a truck to load the bikes into when not being used. Getting used to Chines cuisine was fairly simple for me, but a lot of the group did not like eating Dim Sum for breakfast. The Chinese eat pretty much the same things throughout the day, so breakfast can look the same as dinner. Eating chillies at 7:30am is not always easy. We had some great evenings out and when you spend 3 Yuan (21p) on 660ml of Chinese beer, it doen't get any better. One of my favourite stops was a town called Yangshou. We got to see an water opera and light show which was fantastic! They use 800 people in the show and the effects that they created were amazing. We also did a walk up to Moon rock which looks like a half doughnut. When I manage to get my pictures uploaded you will get to see it. Four of us also went and did some rock climbing. We did 4 routes of which I only managed to do 3. Its pretty tiring, but I did love doing it. I think I need to start doing some climbing when I get back to London. Going to see the Terracota Warriors is a great experience. It was amazing to be there and to see such old artifacts. The more impressive part of the trip for me was to climb one of the mountains. (Will need to find the name and insert here). We climbed up to 2080m from about 500m. The whole way is stepped, which is either carved out of the mountain rock or built. It took us about 2 hours to get to our hotel where we were staying the night. Most of the walk up was on a knifes edge with the sheer sides dropping away between 1000m-2000m. The morning afterwards we climed to the highest point 2162m and watched the sunrise. It was an amazing experience for me and I felt very much alive being there and watching the sunrise. I was sad to leave the mountains and head back Xi An. In Xi An we managed to hire some Chinese bikes. Single speed with basket on the back and then cycled around the old city's walls. This was a 14km trip and was huge amounts of fun. I'm glad we did not do the first part of the trip on these bikes though! We did an overnight train from Xi An to Beijing. We were going hard sleeper and as such 6 people share a cabin, but there is no door on the cabin so all 60 people share the same train coach. It was better this way as the group could easily spend time chatting and eating together. We arrived in Beijing and checked into a 4 star hotel. Really posh. Am I really backpacking?? Oh yes that's why my tour was so expensive :-) Anyway I'll enjoy it while I still can. We went to see an acrobat show, which was good but not great. Probably a 5.5/10 and also got to see a Kung Fu show which was much better and would rate it a 7.5/10 One of the trips highlights however was the Great Wall of China. We drove 3 hours East to get to a less touristy part of the wall. We then had a 3 hour walk on the Wall. It was a very special moment for me as I have been dreaming about doing this for a long time. A group of us decided to stay on the wall and watch the sunset. Some more wow. After dinner a few of us decided to walk up onto the wall and climb higher up. We then had beers, wine and cigars sitting on the wall and chatting. What a feeling to be there and do that. I will miss it and would love to hike along the wall for a week, sleeping up there each night. China has made a positive impact on me and I could come back here again and experince more of what it has to offer. If you are thinking of doing it, I suggest you do come and see it.