798 Art district

If you are ever in Beijing, make sure to check out the Art district.  It is a bit outside of the city and not easily reached by public transportation, but it is well worth the trip.  We went with Rebecca and Tim, a british guy we met at the hostel, he had just arrived in China via the Trans-Siberian Railway.

Since it was Monday, most of the art galleries were closed, but some smaller galleries were open and the really cool stuff is the street art anyways.  Here is what we saw (click on the image to make it bigger):

Ai Wei Wei's art gallery, but it was not open. 

 

Beijing yogurt 

Tim, the british guy 

For dinner, a large group of people (mostly American, plus Tim) went out to a local restaurant and shared lots of different plates of food.  We had a blast talking and eating.  It was bittersweet since Andy and I had to catch a taxi to the airport at 2am later that night and we didn't want to leave now that we had met people we liked.  But such is the life of a traveller.

After hanging out in the common room of the hostel (we didn't want to pay for a night at the hostel when we would be getting so little sleep anyways), when 2 am rolled around we walked out to catch a taxi to the airport and thus ended our travels part 1.

Stay tuned for Travels part 2 which will start up again in the middle of August, or if we're particularly motivated we'll write a bit about our travels here in the U.S.

Lama Temple and dumpling making

On our sixth day in China we decided to head to Lama temple with Rebecca, an American who just arrived in China the day before.  Lama temple is officially known as Yonghe temple and is the largest and most important Tibetan Buddhist monastery in the world (so says wikipedia).

We did not burn film inside the building, but only because they said not to.

 This buddha is 18 meters tall!

We spent a good hour or two walking around the temple before heading out to get lunch.  We ended up eating at a food court at the first restaurant that offered us food (a guy showed us a bowl of plastic vegetables with an egg or a bowl of plastic meat, we choose the vegetables).  It was incredibly good, partially because we were starving.

Since the pollution had cleared that day we decided to head to the hill overlooking the Forbidden city.  It was quite a climb up the hill but worth the effort.  We had a clear 360 degree view of Beijing.

Back at the hostel, they were offering dumpling making and hot pot for dinner.  Making dumplings was a lot of fun, rolling the dough out into little flat discs (the trick is to make the disc a little thicker in the center than the edges), then stuffing them with either pork or egg and shaping them to look like a dumpling (the hard part).

All the dumplings were eaten (although not as good as traditional dumplings) and then hot pot was set up.  Hot pot is where there is a pot full of boiling flavored broth and meat and vegetables are put in the pot to be cooked then fished out and eaten.  It was a fun night sitting around the hostel with a group of people making and eating dinner.

Summer Palace and other relaxing things

We wanted an easy day after our big day at the Great Wall, so we decided to head to the Summer Palace.  This is where royalty used to go to escape the summer heat of Beijing.  Luckily for us it is now connected to city center by subway.  It really is a lovely place to walk around.

At one point a school group (most likely from outside the city) walked by us and started to take our pictures.  We waved and they all started yelling "Hello" and "Hi."  It is really fun to see how excited kids get just because we are foreigners.

Took the ferry across the man-dug lake for $1

Afterwards we headed to Steph and Brian's place, a couple who graciously hosted us through couch surfing.  If you don't know what couch surfing is, it's an online community of people offering their couches or floors to other people in search of a cheap (free) place to stay.  Because Beijing was more expensive for lodging than we realized, we wanted to try and couch surf at least one night to save money.  And Steph and Brian were excellent first time hosts.  They walked us to a dinner place, helped us order and then headed out to their own pre-planned dinner.  It was so wonderful to feel like there were friends in this foreign city to help us get around if needed.

The next day was just a hanging out day.  We hung out at Steph and Brian's until noon, then headed to our new hostel where we had lunch and unpacked.  During long term travel, we sometimes need a break from being a tourist and time to refuel, and that was what we planned on doing.  We met a couple of Americans at the new hostel and ended up going out to dinner with them to a Tibetan place close to the hostel.

The Great Wall of China

The Great Wall of China.  Possibly the most famous tourist destination in all of China and our most anticipated destination.  There are several restored parts of the wall to chose from and we picked Mutianyu.  Neither of us realized that walking along the Great Wall would include lots of up and down, as if we were on a ridge of a mountain or something.  Luckily the day we picked was gorgeous and clear and not too hot.  We started at tower 8 and made it to tower 18 before turning back and hiking all the way to tower 1.  The distance between tower 1 and tower 24 (all of the restored section) was 4km.

Now, enjoy some pictures:

 The wall was very sloped

These are the stairs from tower 2 to 1.  There are tons more stairs between the other towers. 

China, you're doing it wrong

Flying over China and into Beijing is pretty odd. There are clouds below you, but you can't really see down to the ground through the breaks in the clouds. Once you get down to cloud level you can't really see much and I guess flights/pilots are always under instrument flight rules.

We landed and made our way through immigration without a hitch then through the massive terminal. Airport train to line 2 to line 5 and on to Happy Dragon Hostel. We didn't do much the first night but get settled in and have dinner.

With only about six days in China we quickly realized we were doing it wrong. The Chinese visa was the most expensive of all the countries we had visited but China was now one of the countries we were spending the least amount of time in. Six days wasn't really enough to go anywhere besides Beijing. We had originally planned to go to Xi'an for a few days, but when we arrived in Beijing there were no train tickets to be had. Oh well, next time we drop the money on a Chinese visa we'll spend a month touring the country.

The next day we relaxed in the morning then headed to the Forbidden City in the afternoon.  It took several hours to get through and we only glanced across the road at Tianamen Square then started walking back towards the hostel.

A guy asked to have his girlfriend take his picture with us. A group of three people chatted us up for a while and we walked with them. It sounded like they wanted to get food or drinks and I didn't particularly trust them so we parted ways and made our way back to the hostel. The smog, heat and humidity were oppressive.

Tiananmen Square, celebrating 80 years of the Communist party

Summary of Cambodia

Just realized we forgot to summarize Cambodia, so here you go.  China posts are coming this week!

Time shift: 10pm Friday in Cambodia = 10am Friday on East Coast USA

Exchange rate: 1000 riel = $0.25, but mostly used as change, the US dollar is the main currency

Price of a 1.5L water bottle: $0.50

Average daily cost of lodging: $7

Silliest transportation: bamboo railway

Best people to meet while traveling: Fiona and Brenda (miss you guys!)

Biggest party town: Sihanoukville

Katie's favorite experience: All of it.  I really had so much fun traveling around Cambodia with Andy, Fiona and Brenda that I can't pick just one day.

Andy's favorite experience: Battambang. I really loved talking with all the various Cambodians - guy that worked at the Smoking Pot restaurant, our tuk-tuk driver and the guesthouse employees.

Nationalities of people we met in Cambodia:  Irish, Dutch, British

Lamma Island

Our third day in Hong Kong we decided to take a ferry to one of the many islands littering Hong Kong, Lamma Island.  This island was suggested to us by friends and feels completely different than Hong Kong because of two reasons: 1) Buildings are not allowed to be taller than three stories and 2) Cars are not allowed on the island.  There are two towns on the island that have ferry ports to Hong Kong and a walking trail from one town to the other.

We were dropped off at Yung Shue Wan, the northern and seemingly larger of the two towns (there are other towns on the island, but not many).  It was early afternoon when we arrived and decided to eat immediately.  I got a roasted vegetable sandwich which was fresh and tasty while Andy had a chicken sandwich that was pre-made and not very good.  We also split a small pitcher of fruit ice tea, which was delicious.  The trail to the other town takes approximately two hours on foot.  It took us two walkthroughs of the town to find it because of an ill-marked detour but it was a cute little town.

Once out of the town the trail is paved all the way through the island.  The trail passes by a beach that overlooks the power plant, heads over a mountain with gorgeous views of the ocean, and back down to the other side of the island.  The second ferry town felt deserted with very few tourists present.  We arrived just 5 minutes before the ferry left for Hong Kong and the next ferry to leave wasn't for another hour and a half.  Sweet!

Back on the mainland we headed to downtown Kowloon to watch "A symphony of lights."  We were worried about being late to it and rushed downtown to arrive just at the beginning.  It is hard to describe because it was amazing and corny and silly but a lot of fun.  Also, it's free and lasted 13 minutes.

For dinner we ate at Branto, a vegetarian Indian restaurant suggested in Lonely Planet and by email from a friend of a friend.  It was on the second floor, not very well sign posted, and we were the only non-indians in the restaurant.  We ordered a Masala dosa and vegetable curry with rice.  It was incredibly tasty.  For dessert we stopped at a grocery store on the way home and picked up some snacks.

The next day we headed to the airport and eventually left for Beijing, an hour later than scheduled due to heavy rain.

100th Post and Photo Extravaganza

This is our One Hundredth Post. Wahoo! Technically we had a handful of posts from our trip to South Korea, but wow, we've still written a lot. We were gone for 86 days on this first half of our trip, so that's
almost a post a day!  Here are a few of the places we've been:

*Edit: We haven't finished blogging about the first half of our trip, China is still to come. We were just too excited about this post*

First official flight of our trip

Starting the Routeburn track in New Zealand

Key Summit on the Routeburn track.  If you are ever in New Zealand, do at least this part of the hike (it's close to one end and doable as a day hike).

Our shadows at Punakaiki rocks in New Zealand

Our footprints at Nelson Beach in New Zealand

Mount Doom!  New Zealand

Sydney Opera House

Great Ocean Road in Australia

In a freaking tree in Australia

The twelve apostles at the end of the great ocean road in Australia

Our first footie game

Sailing the Whitsundays in Australia

A shipwreck on Fraser island in Australia

Eating in Bangkok

Us being birds, like you do.

Riding an elephant in Chiang Mai, Thailand

In a waterfall in Chiang Mai, Thailand

Angkor Wat, Cambodia at sunrise

Our driver Socheat who spent three days with us, taking us around to the Angkor temples in Cambodia

Bamboo railroad in Battambang, Cambodia

End of the day with our amazing tuk tuk driver, Mr Touk

Brenda trying to frame our faces in a heart in Sihanoukville

Biking before the monsoon hit.  Yes this picture is out of focus.

Our motorbike in Kampot, Cambodia

A tuk tuk ride in Cambodia

Some heart thing at the top of Victoria peak, Hong Kong

The Great Wall of China.  It was amazing.