In Beijing we had the opportunity to see more of the new mixed with the old. but there it was the most striking than any we’ve seen so far.

The government has made a large effort to restore and preserve many of the historical sites in and around Beijing. I’m not sure how much was in preparation for the 2008 Olympics, and how much has been ongoing, but there are some spectacular sights to see there.

We arrived early in the morning and took the subway to the guest house we were staying at and promptly took a nap, then went out to look at the Olympic structures and wandered around out there until we were freezing cold.

The next day, we met up with our new friends Peter and Anna, and took a train out to the Great Wall. It’s an amazing piece of work, and a tribute to the ancient civilization of China. Still, like a lot of things we’ve seen here, I felt almost schizophrenic with the old, old voice of history speaking in one ear and the chattering of modern tourists mixed with the insistent offers of touts trying to sell me a picture of myself, or a trinket engraved with my name, etc, in the other ear.

Even so, it was fascinating to see stones worn down from hundreds of years and millions of feet as we climbed the stairs from one tower to the next. A wonder is still a wonder.

While we were in Beijing, we got a grand tour, visiting the Summer Palace, the Forbidden City, The Great Wall, and the Temple of Heaven, not to mention being introduced to the best street food in Beijing, and all manner of food that our hosts insisted that we just had to try. Peter told us that his goal was to make Beijing our favorite city in China, and I think he succeeded.

We have pictures up from our excursions to the Great Wall, Forbidden City, Summer Palace and Temple of Heaven. Take a look.

We only stayed in Shanghai for two days and one night, because most of our Chinese friends had told us that there wasn’t a lot to see there, so we cut down our stay from the original 3 days we had planned.

We arrived on the train Monday afternoon, and took the subway to our hostel, which was located in an older section of Shanghai. We always get curious stares when we get on the different metro systems with our backpacks, which is funny to me, because when we first came to China I was intrigued by the size and variety of stuff that people would pile into the subway cars with. I guess our backpacks are novel to see, but after only four months I was no longer surprised by anything I saw, so I thought local people would be fully inured to it.

Amber does her best to imitate a Chinese girl getting her picture taken

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Train travel is a huge industry in China. One estimate that I read puts the number of people on trains at any one time at ten million. I believe it. We haven’t been on a long distance train yet that wasn’t absolutely full. When we were living in Guangzhou, I had to take the train to Shenzhen, about 90 minutes, every week. If I took first class, the car would sometimes be only half full, usually if it was at an odd time of day. The standard seats were always full, and the entire train would be filled up between 7:00 and 9:30 am and again from about 4:00 pm until the last train.

I needed a nap.

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Is what the menus said in Yangshuo. Check out a few more pictures by clicking on this one.

Menu in Yangshuo

After we visited the terrace farming village, we took a boat down the Lijiang River to Yangshuo, which is a kind of haven for backpackers and weary types from all over. It’s a lot more laid-back than Guilin, mostly because it’s smaller, and the main industry is tourism. And if by laid-back you mean people trying to sell you stuff at every turn. But that’s sort of par for the course to us by now, so it’s eyes ahead at a swift pace, muttering ‘bu yao’ until we can get out of the narrow street that they funnel us into as we get off the boats that took us down the river.

We didn’t know any better, so we booked a trip down the river from our hostel, and were herded onto one of more than a dozen cruise boats that were all tied together at the tourist docks. If we would have had more time, it would have been better to take a bus down to Yangshuo, only a two hour ride, and cast about until we found someone to take us upriver on one of their bamboo rafts. That looked like a lot more fun. But, as it was, we were stuck in a line of boats, loaded up with both Chinese and Western tourists, and we floated on down the river.

The scenery was pretty amazing, and I’m afraid our point-and-click digital camera just didn’t do it justice. You can check out a few I’ve uploaded to our gallery. One of the fun parts of the boat trip was watching the men on bamboo rafts set an intersect course with the tour boats, grab on to the lower deck, and commence with the hawking.

After Yangshuo, we took the slow train to Shanghai, which I’ll write about soon. Only two weeks ’til we get home, and we’re really excited about seeing Tibet next week. More about that to come.