Saturday 30th - day 10 We take the metro up to the summer palace today and spend around 3 hours walking through the grounds. The palace was considered an imperial retreat where the emperor would come when they wanted to escape Beijing. The garden is vast and full of temples and pavillions which climb up a hill in the centre of the park. we walk through suzhou street which has a main canal and lots of overpriced shops. we head to the main temples - and even get t...

Friday 29th - day 9 After the hectic few days we decide to just to to the temple of heaven today. we stop at Beijing train station first and book our datong tickets quite easily for Monday (Sunday was sold out) so we will have to extend our stay in Beijing a day, which isn't so bad seeing as we are going out Saturday. The temple of heaven is located in large gardens and has the temple at the north end - which leads down to a smaller temple and the sacrifice cir...

Thursday 28th - day 8 Beijing We get up for the tour at 6am and have an 'American breakfast' from the hostel - which was included in the price. The breakfast is unfortunately not as impressive as t sounds. The sausage is minuscule, there's 2 spoonfuls of scrambled egg, 1 rasher of bacon and 3 triangles of toast with jam - but we both eat the lot. We get the bus at 7.40 and have a few pick ups on the way. It takes about 2 hours to arrive, the tour guide attemp...

Wednesday 27th - day 7 Beijing First day in Beijing and we venture to bei hai park first. It's a Massive lake with boats, surrounded by a decent few km of gardens. There's a few dance groups here, it's like a big exercise class, people meet up in a public place and all dance the same routine. It's a bright day - which is unusual for china so the parks busy. After a walk right through, we end up by the forbidden city, we take the option to to up the gate house...

Tuesday 26th - day 6 Suzhou - Beijing Even with leaving a hour and half before the trains due, we end up waiting ages for a bus and when we arrive at the train station, we are knocked back from the waiting room and directed to the train platform.. To get to another station!!! Apparently suzhou North is where we should have been. There's no way in hell we are making our train now, and we can only imagine the palava when we arrive to sort another train out - if ...