China

We have been back five days now but by 2000 hrs I am fighting to keep out of my bed for at least another hour before giving in to the jet lag. We have been almost continually tired since the start of the holiday as our itinerary involved travelling long distances across China in order to see the main attractions. We had booked through Wendy Wu tours, a name which always brought a smile to my face, but explained by the use of familiar English names by all involved in the tourist industry. We had decided to have a private guide rather than join a group and I think we made the right choice, all of our guides were excellent and nothing was too much trouble for them, this was also true of the crew of our cruise ship on the Yangtze.

We arrived in Shanghai late on the Saturday night and on the way to the hotel we got a flat in the middle of a bridge with the only road works I saw in our whole trip until we arrived back in the UK, not a great start thought we, sure enough the four star hotel left a lot to be desired, the room was grubby and it was a fair distance from the centre of the city. The next day we toured Shanghai, a financial centre with an ultra modern heart sitting along side the Western buildings in the Bund, relics of the pressure put upon the Chinese to trade with the outside world. We took a detour to go to the top of the Shanghai Tower, the second or third tallest building in the world depending on where you look, the lift ascends at 55m a second and your ears pop. The light show on the buildings along the Huangpo River at night is very impressive. We were let loose later that night in a shopping district on our own and had great difficulty finding a restaurant and had to resort to, yes, fish and chips, I couldn't believe it.

The next day was lost as we had to catch a flight to Wuhan and then a bullet train to Yichang, thence a bus to meet up with our cruise ship. On the bus was a particularly vocal bunch of Chinese from Shanghai, we were the only two Foreign Devils on the transport. We arrived quite late at the ship and asked to see the selection of cabins in case we wanted to upgrade, as we looked in on our original cabin amidst the banshees from Shanghai I only got out "Eve..." which was returned with "I know!" We upgraded to one of the two staterooms at the front of the ship which was lovely and had it's own large deck rather than a balcony, and it was quiet. We met the only other two Westerners at breakfast the next day and they had not slept a wink due to the noise from neighbouring cabins and could not enjoy their balcony due to underwear flapping on the adjacent handrails having been washed and hung out to dry. Noise, no, not a peep, slept like logs.

The ship may not have been lovely to look at as it was a bit top heavy but it was well up to standard inside and the crew were fabulous, each day we were taken on a morning tour with an optional tour available in the afternoon which was extra, we took advantage of two afternoon tours. We became firm favourites with our fellow travellers on giving up our seats on a cable car so that two elderly ladies could sit down, it also helped that we joined in the evening entertainment and afternoon lectures while our two companions disappeared to their cabin at the earliest opportunity, catching up on sleep perhaps. The highlight of this part along with the scenery was the Tribe of the Three Gorges, a paradise of a place and one of the most beautiful and tranquil areas I have ever visited.

On leaving the ship four days later we caught another bullet train to Chengdu the capital of Sichuan Province, we had a classic spicy meal on our first night there, I have never seen so many chilli's on a plate, thankfully you didn't have to eat them, just pick out the meat. The next day was the Panda's, something the wife had been looking forward to, I took an instant dislike to the large, pandered monsters, all they seemed to do was eat and sleep. They are looked after so well that they cannot be bothered to procreate and are shown 'Panda porn' and given Viagra in their bamboo meals, smarter than the average bear Boo Boo. It was back on the trail again after the Panda's, a flight to Xian and what I had been waiting for.

Xian was lovely, the hotel was in the inner city behind the enormous walls, I expected more of these on our travels but most had been destroyed due to war or modern construction. The highlight of this part was the Terracotta Army, this simply takes your breath away once you enter the huge building built to protect them from the elements. You immediately notice that there are more still to be uncovered, these are left for the moment as contact with the air causes the original colours to fade and they want to find a way to preserve these. I met one of the farmers who found the site while digging a well. We were bombarded by facts but the one which stood out for me was that only one of the figures unearthed so far was complete, a kneeling archer, all the rest had to be rebuilt. The four large pits on this part of the grave site are only a taste of what else lies still buried, the Emperor's tomb is being left alone for now due to the fear that it contains large amounts of mercury. A dumpling dinner finished the day.

The next day was a visit to the Muslim Quarter with its local stalls, narrow lanes and food shops, after which we again headed to the airport to transfer to Beijing. We had upgraded our hotel for the last few nights and it was very impressive, we had a contretemps due to overbooking but which turned out in our favour as we got a suite upgrade free of charge for our stay, the icing on the cake so to speak. The Forbidden City was stunning and the history imparted by our guide was fascinating, in the afternoon we toured the Summer Palace and this again was a wonder, set in beautiful gardens covering a huge area and containing its own lake, a favourite hide out of the imperial family. In the evening we were taken to an acrobat show, we were not keen and toyed with giving it a miss, as it turned out this would have been criminal, the show was breath taking in parts, the highlight was six motorbikes crammed into a large metal ball, all going at speed and crisscrossing with abandon, I was on the edge of my seat.

Our last day and a trip outside Beijing to the Great Wall girding the Juyong Pass, the scenery was again beautiful, other parts of the wall are more popular but this part has been restored and has excellent facilities. I was dismayed by the climb to the top, it was hard going, ten to fifteen steps at a time and then a rest, every time we got to a watchtower, there was another higher up, I called a halt after four of them. From our height we could look across the ridges and see the line of further fortifications and the large walled area protecting the pass below. The afternoon was spent at the Temple of heaven complex and our trip was topped off with a Peking Duck dinner.

 What was it really like you ask. Well the Chinese people were lovely and friendly although not many speak English, but you can get by with gestures if you have to, you do have to learn to push your way to the front anywhere we would normally queue, especially at the train stations and airports. The food leaves a lot to be desired as they like it served lukewarm, only in Beijing did we get piping hot food, the street food looks delicious and I was sorely tempted but only once did I test some little fried fish. After the horror stories about toilets I found I had no problems, most along the tourist route are far cleaner than our public toilets and although there are a lot of squats there are also seats in some cubicles and always in the disabled toilet. There were only one or two times I found them in a bad state but these were not on the tourist route. There was not as much spitting as I feared, this was confined mainly to the older generation and there were not a lot of these on the tourist trails. The country is a powerhouse, the cities are generally like high rise farms always with more buildings being built, I did not feel crowded however, no more than I would do in London or Glasgow.

So there you have it, a superb holiday with everything you could ask for, a real adventure, albeit a comfortable one.