Checked out of the hostel first thing and got a taxi to the hotel where we are staying for the remainder of our visit. I am surprised at the lack of snow around - I expected there to be several inches of snow everywhere, but instead it is just ice around the pavements where it has snowed at some point and not fully cleared. We met up with Kirsty, Pete, Alexis and Dave at the hotel - 3 of whom we knew from the teacher training, and went to a cafe we knew that di...

Arrived in Beijing this morning at 8 and then overdosed on MacDonalds hot chocolates whilst I waited for Hannah to arrive at 11:30. When Hannah arrived we went for a Starbucks and a Subway sandwich then got our return tickets for Thursday. The journey to Harbin was very nice - we had only been able to get first class tickets so there was plenty of room. We arrived just before 10 and got a taxi to our hostel. The cold was surprisingly not as bad as I had expec...

Spent the morning on the internet trying to sort out accomodation for next week. Hannah and I were hoping to get the overnight train to Harbin on Monday night, but we couldn't get tickets and have to go Monday afternoon. I had made the hotel reservation for Tuesday and Wednesday so I was trying to change it but Hostelworld say on their website to contact the hotel directly and when I wrote to the hotel they said to speak to Hostelworld. I then tried contacting...

Decided to spend the whole day today exploring the Purple mountains which are just a couple of miles to the East of the City Centre. It was a bit of a mission trying to find it, but once into the park you would not believe you were so close to a city populated by 5.6 million people!! The park is divided into 3 sections - The Ming Tombs, Linggu Temple and Dr Sun Yat-Sen's Mausoleum and each section has many places of interest to visit and scenic views to enjoy. ...

An early start this morning to catch the train to Nanjing. It was a shortish journey (2 hours) and I arrived at mid day and got the tube out to the hostel. Got off at the tube station and walked for about half an hour before I decided I was going in the wrong direction so turned back and started again. This time I gave up after 15 minutes and asked someone. I was on the right road now but had been walking in the wrong direction! Finally found the hostel and ...