We Ate Dog!!

That's right folks, we ate dog. And we liked it, tasted a bit like a cross between bacon and beef actually. Since being here in Beijing we've also dined on such delights as donkey, snake, cockroach, scorpion and silk worm. We had the dog and donkey at a restaurant just down the road from our hostel and both were tasty. The rest of the interesting morsels we tried at a night market a few minutes taxi away.

The night market was quite cool, really vibrant with a lot going on. There a was a guy making edible figurines by blowing up and shaping liquid sugar blobs. Another lady was demonstrating Chinese opera, which is really not a pleasant experience. Chinese opera is not even remotely related to Italian opera, or singing for that matter. Instead they warble and screech at the top of their lungs with an ear splitting yell. At the end of the night market there was a long set of stalls and this is where you find all the strange stuff. The only thing we actually liked were the scorpions, they weren't bad at all. The silk worms, on the other hand, were absolutely disgusting, texture, taste, everything about them was horrible.

The Wall

Well you cant go to Bejing without going to the Great Wall. We fortunately met some people at our hostel who were heading out to one of the more remote sections of the wall, as you can imagine the main sections are somewhat of a mass tourist trap. The drive out took a couple of hours, made entertaining by our driver who drove in typical Chinese style: fast, dangerous and irrational. The wall was amazing, it just goes on and on and on (and on) and to think that there is about 6,400kms of the thing is pretty mind blowing, they really didnt want those Mongolians coming in! The part we walked on has been restored, but still looks very authentic. We did a 10km trek which was pretty steep in places but the views were amazing! Unfortunately the weather was a bit average and there was some mean thunder rumbling above. About halfway through the walk lightning started hitting the wall. One bolt of the stuff hit the wall a few cms from my foot. A spark came off my toe, it felt a bit like kicking an electric fence, exciting times! I was hoping for the onset of some mystical super power after an incident like this, but it's yet to reveal itself... After this the rain started coming down pretty hard which put a bit of a damper on the rest of the walk, but still definitely one of the coolest things we did in China.

Forbidden City vs. Summer Palace

As a lot of you will be aware, one of the major highlights of Beijing is the Forbidden City. Unfortunately, for the second time this trip we ended up feeling a bit disappointed. To be fair, it wasn't so much the Forbidden City itself that disappointed though. Like a lot of places in China (and especially Beijing), they are building, renovating and refurbishing everywhere. As a result, most of the place was covered in scaffolding and netting. It was also a crappy day weather-wise, with grey skies, fog and rain. The other annoyance, which is to be expected of course, were the masses of tourists as far as the eye could see. All this aside, the Forbidden City was still impressive and yet another testament to the Chinese desire to build everything as massive as possible. The huge walled area is a collection of large, open squares, decorative halls and manicured gardens. There were also some interesting collections of artifacts in the surrounding anterooms. But unfortunately it just wasn't enough...

The following day we headed out to a lesser know attraction that Beijing has to offer, the Summer Palace. To start with, the rain of the previous day had cleared the smog from the skies and during the night the clouds had all disappeared. So the sun was shining and the skies were blue as we headed out on our rented bikes. The Summer Palace is set on a large lake, with walkways and parks surrounding the water. We headed towards the palace via the west side of the lake. The views were fantastic and the whole atmosphere was quite relaxed. The actual Summer Palace sits up on a hill that looks out over the lake so we wandered up there for nice views and a short climb. In the palace there were quite a few tourists but the walk up had been much more pleasant than at the Forbidden City. This was the definite winner of the two and I'd recommend it to anyone going to Beijing.

The Silk Market

Despite the name, there wasnt a lot of silk on sale here. Instead it's a massive six story complex full of small shops selling every type of clothing available. We walked in there not intending to buy much but ended up coming away with: 2 T shirts, 2 shorts, 2 pairs of shoes and 2 pairs of flip flops between us, meaning we had to jettison some of the older clothes from our packs to make room. The fun part of these markets is the bargaining. The Chinese in their shrewdness will give you a ridiculously high starting price, usually about 5-6 times higher than they are expecting. To reach a decent price involves a certain amount of faux anguish from both sides, walking away, coming back, screaming, pretending to cry... But in the end though we got some pretty good bargains! Good times!

Other places we've visited around Beijing include Tienanmen Square, The Temple of Heaven, The Yellow River and numerous bars and restaurants (of course). Tienanmen Square is unbelievably vast and the building at its centre apparently contains Mao's actual head (although we didn't get it see it because it too was being refurbished, the building, not the head). The Temple of Heaven was nice but we were nearing our temple limit by this stage so we didn't spend too long here.

The Yellow River was crap. For a start it was brown, and the Chinese have attempted to create some sort of theme park out there which just ruins everything. There was quite a big bar street in Beijing, which was a bit dead during the week but good times come the weekend. As for the restaurants, we made sure to try the local dish, Peking Duck, a couple times and it didn't disappoint. It comes as a set, the skin is fried crispy, with the meat on another plate, then these are rolled up with cucumber and scallions in thin wraps and dipped in a soy-based sauce.

Shaolin

We just finished the blog and realised we forgot about this! En-route to Bejing we stopped at this city called Zhengzhou. We had never heard of this place before but its a city of 6 million people, on a Chinese scale this is just a "town". A few hours from here is the world famous Shaolin Temple and the Shaolin Monks. We tripped out there one day for a wee looksee. The temple grounds are really tranquil, set in amongst these really nice hills. This tranquility however is somewhat ruined by the 10,000 odd tourists who come through here each day. Most people come to see the performances by the Shaolin Monks which is very impressive. These guys are trained from the age of 4, there isnt a scrap of fat on them and they are extremely disciplined. These guys can do a back flip as easily as the rest of us can snap our fingers. The shows consisted of a ton of acrobatics, sticks and swords spinning at high speeds, kung fu and and loud yelling. Unfortunately we couldnt take any photos....

The Beards

Well the beard growing contest is over, and to be honest Im going to have to give it to Marcus for superior facial coverage. However, growing a ginger beard is just plain wrong - Marcus, you're disqualified.

The Marcus and Kev Travel Awards - China

Best Beer Category - 1. Tsingtao, 2. Hahn, 3. Baiju

Best Food Category - 1. Muslim BBQ'd Lamb, 2. Chilli Chicken, 3. Explode the Donkey Casserole (actual name!)

Most Impressive Category - 1. The Great Wall, 2. Shanghai's Architecture, 3. The view from the top of Hua Shaun

Worst Experience Category - 1. Trying to swallow a silkworm, 2. Waking up in a puddle, 3. Baiju Hangovers

Best Value Category - 1. Alcohol and Food, 2. Shoes and Clothes, 3. Trains and Buses

Best City - 1. Bejing, 2. Shanghai, 3. Xi'an

The Stats

Days: 21

Money Spent: 7,000RMB ($1270NZ) each

Beer Consumed: 40.5 litres each

Distance Travelled: 3042kms

Photo requests from Chinese: 38

Days of Rain: 15

Different Types of Animal Eaten: 11

Shampoo and Shaving: 0

Cars built before 2001 (excluding taxis): 0