So back in November my friend J and I decided to lock in a holiday for this year. We perused countless options and narrowed it down to China. There were so many different tours on offer that we ended up quite confused, and just booked one.. and then, several weeks later, we read the description in full! It turns out that we did not book a chill and relaxed trundle around the countryside, but rather a full on adventure package! … possibly a tour meant for much younger and fitter bodies than us, but here we are!

Getting to Beijing was reasonably straight forward. We flew Southern China Air and have no complaints. The staff were lovely, the food plentiful and the seats about as good as you get on any plane these days. We made it to Guangzhou and found the most challenging part entering the country, was filling in all of the arrivals paperwork. From there it was onto Beijing, and we had planned ahead and organised an airport transfer (would 10-10 recommend!) … it was a bit of a scary ride at times, the driver did not seem to know where he was going, or how to stay awake, but eventually we made it to the hotel. … can I just say, how good is a translation app!? The concierge struggled to understand us, and we him, but keys were handed over and our room claimed. … at this point I do have to confess to questioning my life choices as well as my sanity, because it is only going to get wilder from here!

Day one saw us up at a reasonable hour, dressed and ready to hit the streets. Our destination – the Forbidden city. Navigating the payment apps (everything is done through Alipay with QR codes) took a minute, but eventually we had a lift sorted and took in all the street sights that we missed driving in the dark the night before. There was a lot to look at!! We were dropped off at the Meridian gate to the city and wandered around for a bit to find breakfast. The first thing that took our attention was a Door Nail pie… minced beef with spices, wrapped in pastry and the shallow fried! They smelled amazing, tasted great and afterwards, I managed to get my head around eating tripe! We also had some kind of jellied dessert, which was much less enjoyable, but filled our bellies.

Entering the City complex involved a whole lot of ID checks, bag scans and a pat down. The Forbidden City, located in the heart of Beijing, China, is a 178-acre imperial palace complex built between 1406 and 1420. It served as the home of 24 Ming and Qing dynasty emperors and the center of Chinese power for over 500 years. Today, it is a UNESCO World Heritage site and a museum, renowned as the world’s largest palace complex. It has 980 buildings and is an amazing place to walk around. We hired audio headsets to talk us through all of the things we were seeing – there is a lot to keep track of! The architecture and colours are amazing and we were lucky to have a blue sky -although very cold- day for our visit.

We found a restaurant for lunch – communal tables for the win, and ordered a bit of a selection. Super tasty and very filling! We did not manage to eat it all, and ended up being scolded (via google translate) by a couple of ancient Grannies for not eating all of our dumplings! … not entirely sure what went wrong with the return translation, but apparently our reason for not finishing was ‘stinky tofu’ – I’m pretty sure there was no tofu in the dumplings, certainly nothing stinky and in fact quite delicious!… but there was a whole lot of laughter about the whole thing

Our next stop was going to be Tiananmen Square, but we found out after some security checking that we should have pre-purchased those tickets too, and we were unable to go in. Instead we found a street vendor, someone very clever with sugar art, and got ourselves some beasties to eat… a dragon and a pig…and then navigated our way back to the hotel for a nap before meeting the rest of our tour group.

At 6pm we made our way down to the lobby to meet our new friends for the next two weeks. It is a very diverse group (definitely much more than I had expected) ranging from 20-80! England, Germany, New Zealand and Australia represented with a few young ladies travelling on their own, A single older man, a couple of brother/sister teams and then J and I! We did the obligatory exchange of information and then went for a walk to the oldest Peeking duck restaurant in the city! It has been operational since 1416! The food was amazing and plentiful, and we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves! Back to the hotel – via a quick 7/11 snack shop stop and then off to bed!

Day two started with another supermarket stop – just for a look and then some pastries for Brekky. Today was another mostly free day, but several of us went with our tour leader Gary to see some more sights. We took the metro to the Imperial city to explore Jingshan Park. Situated in the center of Beijing, it is a beautiful royal landscape garden located on Beijing Central Axis which is on the UNESCO World Heritage List. Covering an area of 57 acres, the park stands on the central point of the south-north axis of the city and faces the north gate of the Forbidden City. It is found on Jingshan Hill, which was built from the rubble of the original Forbidden city, which was moved after the reign of Kublai Khan. The mid summit of the hill is the highest point in Beijing. Looking from the peak, we had an amazing view of the Forbidden city. We have been super lucky with the weather to this point so the view was truly spectacular!

From the park, we walked about 1km to the Hutong area. Hutongs are historic, narrow lanes and alleys, primarily built during the Yuan Dynasty, formed by traditional courtyard residences known as Siheyuan. Representing the traditional “old Beijing” lifestyle, they are a blend of culture, food, and history. We had a fabulous time seeing all the sights and trying some new foods – particularly ‘hawthorn’ fruit dipped in toffee and served on a skewer – a really yummy blend of sweet and sour, and amazing for the digestion and clearing the stomach (ask me how I know!?) We also saw an older lady taking her duck for a walk, which was one of the best things I have ever seen! We got our tour leader to ask whether it was a pet or dinner, and were informed that it was a four year old pet named Lindsay! – an absolute highlight for me!

We went back to the hotel and had some lunch before getting on a bus to head to Gobei Ku. It was a three hour drive into a mountain area, and the start of our Great Wall hike. We got there in time to watch the sun set behind the mountains, and it was a real ‘pinch me’ moment. What a privilege to be here and to see something that has existed since 220BC!

Our guest house is cute and comfortable – in fact much more so than we were led to believe! – and the dinner (shared by the group) was delicious and cheap!! $7 per person which is kind of mind blowing! The night finished with a whole lot of laughs and conversation… and for an enthusiastic few a ping-pong tournament!

Day three…Holy Moly what a thing to have done! This morning we got up and had breakfast in our guesthouse and then organised our luggage and day packs before beginning our Great Wall Hike. I’m not sure I was fully prepared for what we were in for! As we headed off to get started, there was a festival in the village ‘Rising Dragon Head’ so there were dragon dancers and all kinds of drums and colourful costumes. It was a really lovely and colourful send off.

Our treck started on an un-renovated section of the Great Wall. It was started in 220BC and continuously added on to until about 1644. It was built on the northern border of China to keep out Northern invaders like Gengis Kahn and the Mongols. More than 40000 people died during the construction, and their remains are buried within the structure. It stretches (zig-zags) its way over 21000km of steep mountain ridges. It is phenomenal!!! We walked, scrambled and pushed ourselves for just over 5km to the Generals 24 Eyes watch tower, at which point I could go no further!

I was a bit disappointed to not finish the next 10km part of the treck, but am really proud of myself for doing the bit I did. I rejoined our bus driver, and a couple of people from the group who chose not to walk at all, and we headed to the end point of this walk -West 5 Window Tower. The rest of the group were hiking here to watch the sunset, so I put my big girl pants on, and walked another couple of km on the renovated, and more touristy – but equally steep and painful section to meet them.

It is incredible to be able to do this stuff! I don’t take it for granted and I am incredibly grateful to have this opportunity! It was a real mind spin to walk on and experience something so vast and ancient… a real ‘world wonder’! From the Wall, we walked back down and got on the bus to go for our dinner. Another feast of all kinds of meat and veggie dishes – some VERY spicy, but all yummy! As we left the restaurant, the owners put on a firework display for us, which was super fabulous.

There was a lot of talk about aching muscles and excitement for hot showers! Our guesthouse for the night was probably the most basic one yet – and still better than expected with western toilets and hot showers. The beds did leave a whole lot to be desired. But no real complaints!

Day four started early, and cold -1°C! We loaded up the bus and went back to last nights restaurant for breakfast…. Lots more commenting about aching muscles and how proud everyone is of doing what we did, especially when we were driving past our starting point and saw just how steep the climb was.

We loaded up the bus and headed back to Beijing for the day before heading to Xi’an over night. In Beijing, most of the group joined Gary our illustrious leader to see the Summer Palace and the Temple of Heaven.

The Summer Palace is part of the Imperial Gardens and is a beautifully landscaped 300 hectare site that was built as a birthday gift for the Dowager Empress – also known as the Dragon Lady. It has buildings that have the most fabulous names, such as the garden of virtue and harmony, the studio of serene beauty and the hall of celebrated longevity. Our visit happened on a Saturday, so the place was super crowded!

From the Summer Palace, we ventured to a street full of restaurants to find some lunch. A small group of us found a noodle place and made a selection to share. They were pretty good and definitely filling.

Our Next stop was the Temple of Heaven, and rather than being one building, it was also a collection of different buildings set in a beautiful garden. Everything within the buildings is super symbolic and thought out. It references, time, calendars, seasons, zodiac signs and constellations. Blue roofs denote heaven worship and green ones are for the earth. Everything has to be in harmony.

Our final stop was at market to have a quick look around and for the enthusiasts to go shopping. There were some purchases made of chargers, snacks and in a couple of cases even phones. … and then the day got interesting! We made our way to Beijing Railway station .. platform 4 train D43 to Xi’an. We are in the ‘hard sleeper’ class, which are cabins consisting of 6 bunks in each, open to the corridor. We have been lucky enough to get bottom bunks (the climb to get to the top is challenging with ouch having done a huge hike the day before, and the space is not hugely spacious.

We have been particularly nervous about this part of the trip. We are sharing our cabin with 3 Chinese ladies and will be together for about 11 hours. Motion sickness medication has been taken and all things are crossed for at least a little bit of sleep (and no vomit!) … wish us luck!