Pricey Duck and Blooming Tulips

Hello again everyone, we've got a few days to get you updated on, but it's also the very last blog we will be posting from sunny old Beijing, as we're off on our flight tonight to Bangkok. We'll be departing Beijing at 20.05 (or 13.05 GMT) and arriving in Bangkok at 23.45 (or 17.45 GMT). I'm certainly not looking forward to flying again - getting to feel all paranoid for 4 hours and 40 minutes until we're safely back on the ground again! Well, anyway, enough about my irrational fears, here's what we've been doing over the past few days.

TUESDAY 17th April

We just need to update you on something that happened after we blogged you last. We decided to go out and treat ourselves to a nice meal of real Peking Duck, as we'd had a bit of a naff day not being able to find anything we wanted to do. So we headed off to a nice sounding restaurant recommended by the Lonely Planet book, where it wasn't too expensive. However, when we reached the street the restaurant was on, a gentlemen told us that the restaurant has been moved/closing down, so he pointed us in the direction of the new branch. Moments later he had caught up with us again and said we were going the wrong way and that he would take us to the restaurant, he seemed a little suspect, but he also seemed fairly genuine as well. We tottered off after him and we finally entered the restaurant (Front Door Roast Duck) and he showed us to a table. We were then given a menu (which we later realised was very different to the one given to Chinese people, ours was very restricted in selection and also only showed very expensive dishes). There was only one duck dish on the whole menu, which was 108Yuan (it was a set meal of, supposedly, 3 courses), but we decided to go for it as we thought it would be a really nice meal. However it was RUBBISH! We didn't get 3 inclusive courses (as we ended up paying an extra 15Yuan for one of the dishes, which we hadn't even ordered as extra), the food wasn't very good, the service was terrible and we had to pay 6Yuan for using the chopsticks as well! So all told, the flipping meal came to an almighty 252Yuan (this is only about 15 or 16 pounds, but when we normally eat very well across the road for about 70Yuan, we were rather annoyed)!

WEDNESDAY 18th April

Today we didn't get up to huge number of different things. We caught the trusty old subway to the end of the line and then began our search for the 318 bus stop. However, after a long while of trekking down the correct road, in the correct direction the bus stop never materialised, so we hailed a taxi instead to take us to the Beijing Botanical Gardens. The grounds were quite pretty, but there wasn't a huge variety of plants in bloom, due to the time of year, but there were lots of tulips etc and it was very nice to be away from the cars, buses, smog and so on, but we didn't manage to escape the people, as it was very busy! It was another really warm day, even the shade didn't bring that much relief - some people had taken to having water fights at the top of a 'waterfall' flowing into the lake and in the water fountains to cool off. There was a really big tropical rainforest conservatory there, but it was really expensive to get into, so we didn't see that (but we've resolved to go to the Eden Project at some point when we get home), but there was plenty of other things to see. We did manage to visit the Temple of the Reclining Buddha whilst we were there - it was absolutely huge! The grounds of the Temple were actually very cool in comparison to the rest of the gardens, so we wandered around for a while cooling off. After several hours of wandering, it was getting to the point when we needed to think about heading back to the hostel. However, rather than trying to find the elusive bus, we decided to hail another taxi to take us to the subway station. We were soon pulling into our familiar stop and then climbing the stairs to take us back to the hostel and rest our very tired feet.

THURSDAY 19th April

We made our way back to our sight-seeing starting point today - we were back at Tian Anmen Square. However, we were absolutely amazed that we only got approached by a couple of street vendors - maybe they only prey on the weak tourists who look particularly weary like we did on our first day! Anyway, we managed to get some more photos, before heading across the street to have a wander around Zhongshang Park (just to the side of the Forbidden City). It was amazing how green the garden was, not just in some areas, but all of it, there wasn't a single arid looking spot, which is the first time we've seen a completely green garden since arriving in China! This is probably explained by the huge fleet of sprinklers they have working almost constantly! The garden was very pretty though, and we took a few photos, before heading back out onto the street to decide what to do next. After some discussion, we decided to go to the Chinese Art Museum, which was at the top of Wangfujing Street, we decided to be cheap-skates and walked rather than taking the subway or a taxi. We managed to find the gallery easily and we were soon wandering around the exhibition halls. The main display presently on, was of the American West landscape, as painted by American artists, which was a bit of a shame in a way, as we were expecting to see more Chinese art, but it was still interesting to view and Steve enjoyed it a lot. We were soon wandering around all of the other exhibits of Chinese artists work, which was also very interesting. We couldn't believe how quiet the Museum was though, there could only have been a handful of other people walking around whilst we were there. However, the silence was constantly interrupted by the 'click' of cameras, as people wandered around creating their own portfolios of work by photographing almost every piece of artwork on display! It was crazy, as there were signs up asking you to not take photos and there were attendants in every exhibit hall and they just completely ignored people's blatant disregard for the rules! We were soon back out in the hazy sunshine and wandering back down Wangfujing Street to get to the subway. We stopped off to have a fruit smoothie each and share a banana split on the way (it was really yummy) and then we were soon making our very last journey on the Beijing subway system and arriving back at our stop for the last time!

FRIDAY 20th April

We've not been up to anything today. We tried to eat in the hostel restaurant for breakfast, but the staff weren't very good and a woman just kept saying "no" to us, so we left and wandered up the street next to the hostel to grab some breakfast from the shop instead. We've then spent the rest of the morning packing our bags ready for our flight later, praying that our bags are within the weight limits, as we have no scales to check them on! It should be fine, we've not bought that many things - fingers crossed! So now we're just sorting out a few bits on the internet before we head out for some lunch and then make our way to the airport to check in etc. It should be good moving onto a new place - it's felt like we've been in China for over a month now, even though it's only just been over 2 weeks! It'll also be nice being ferried around for a month and having things organised for us more! Time for us to relax a bit now!

Just so you know, we're not sure how often we'll have access to the internet whilst we on the tour (until 20th May), so the blog may become a bit sparse and randomly updated. Missing you all still and looking forward to sharing all our photos with you all!