Today was BLOODY COLD!! We'd only booked one tour today, but our guide recommended a couple of extra things to tack on - a tour in a rickshaw and an acrobat show. We started the day with the rickshaw tour which was good but we think we got ripped off! It was much shorter than the 220 yuan pp suggested and then we had to tip for us and our guide as well! Next we went to the Temple of Heaven where the stand out was how bloody cold it was! We took a photo of a ther...

Big day today - Tiananmen Square, the Forbidden City and the Great Wall. We set off with as many layers of clothes that we could stuff under our jackets after learning our lesson yesterday. Nice and toasty today! Started in Tiananmen Square which apparently is the largest city square in the world. The Forbidden City was just a short walk from the square. Very interesting learning how the city was used and closed to all of the common people until the early 20th ce...

Another travelling day today - stupid o'clock get up (5:30 - ouch!) for a flight to Beijing. It was snowing when we landed and bloody cold! Met by our next tour guide (another Lisa; we're starting to see a pattern here!) who took us to the hotel. Another afternoon nanna nap before venturing out to find some more warm clothes, ear warmers, ugg boots, gloves… in preparation for a day in the cold tomorrow. Sampled the famous Peking Duck for tea - two words, 'blood...

So today began with me getting up at 5:45am and checking out the resort gym which I was pretty impressed with and was excited to be able to spend 40 minutes using all of the cardio equipment and another 40 lifting some weights, all while Troy was still curled up in bed like sleeping beauty... We then headed down to the restaurant where there was a massive buffet breakfast, too much food to pick from so Troy and I decided to sample a little of most things. At 8:30...

Day for travel and rest today. Left the hotel at 7:30 for our flight to Xi'an. The domestic terminal at Shanghai is the biggest terminal in China, so a bit chaotic! We didn't realise we couldn't take liquids as carry on, so they made Case throw out her perfume - she was pissed! We lucked in to a flight carrying 30 7yr old school kids who all wanted to say hi to the round eyes! After getting swamped by the kids trying to get onto the plane (they push more than the...