Friday, September 26, 2008

Beijing, Beijing they finally let us in...

Hi all, well after the hairy few days Pete told you all about in Hanoi, we were finally on our way to China.  It's a country that I've wanted to visit for years now and as we set down in Beijing Airport I was beside myself with excitement.  The airport was filled with Olympic and Paralympic signage and scores of young volunteers practicing their English with the arriving visitors.  There was a real welcoming buzz about the place.  On leaving the airport we negotiated the subway and the streets with little difficulty and within an hour or two we found our hostel.  We were quite amused at our rooms ensuite bathroom, which didn't leave much to the imagination.  Instead of walls made of plaster or brick, it was made of glass, with a see thru curtain on both sides, slightly covering all angles except the actual loo.  This photo was taken from the bed!!!

Our not so private loo

But none the less, we were happy enough due to the fact that the hostel had actually overbooked our cheaper room with no bathroom and upgraded us to this see thru loo room without cost...

The next day we headed to Tiananem Square, our hostel was less then 10 min walk away.  As we passed through the Front Gate (Photo below), miles of Chinese history and culture lay directly ahead along this straight road...

Front Gate

Beyond The Front Gate is the infamous Tiananem Square.  Tiananem Square does exactly what it say's on the tin!! It's a Square! A very large square at that, well actually the largest public square in the world as it happens,but a 'square' non the less.  It's full of .... eh..... space... which is probably a good thing because 100's of millions of Chinese and Foreigners visit it every year....

Tiananmen Square

We continued north passing Chairman Mao's Mausoleum and up ahead you see his imposing portrait in the distance of 'The Gate of Heavenly Peace'.

Gate of heavenly Peace

The Square is very well protected with police at each entrance scanning and frisking every visitor and plain clothed cops patrolling the square listening for any word of discontent, in other words you need to be on your best behaviour.  

After walking through 'The Gate of Heavenly Peace' we entered the Forbidden City,

The forbidden city

so called because it was off limits for 500 years.  It is the largest and best preserved cluster of ancient buildings in China and was home to the Ming and Qing dynasties of emperors.  They only left these grounds when absolutely necessary and the huge Moat kept everyone else out...

Moat surrounding Forbidden City

Here's a birds eye view to give you an idea the huge scale of 'The Forbidden City'

Birds eye view of The Forbidden City

Our next biggy was the Great Wall, I couldn't wait to see it.  But as with all tourist attractions around the world we expected to be one of hundreds of tourists visiting the wall and the idea of seeing it in solitude seemed to be nothing but a false hope. However on advice of one of our hostel hosts we went for the lesser touristy and more rugged routes in the hope of this. And after a 2 hour drive and a very steep and inaccessible climb up to reach the wall, our breaths were taken away. 

DSCF2462

Yes the STEEP climb attributed to this shortness of breath but the shear beauty and amazement of the view of the snaking wall before us was so out of this world that neither words nor photos could do it true justice and to make it a once in a life time feeling there was no one else there.  Amazing....

DSCF2484

It was an awesome sight and continued to be for over 12km of steep climbs, wobbly descents and unsecured surfaces.  We passed through 30 watch towers to complete our hike.  As you can see in the photo above there is 3 watch towers ahead.... so only 27 to go.  Oh and it got steeper and steeper. 

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The last Watch Tower you can see in the distance behind us, was less then half way of our walk!!!

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Over the 4 hour hike we met no more then 10 tourists and a healthy handful of Mongolian touts selling the usual T-shirts and hats thrown in.  We also met a guy from London who was returning home from working in Japan on the Trans Siberian Railway and after a bit of chat we realised is surname was McGrath and his family was from Galway.. Well China may be big but it sure is a small world!!!  This was an amazing day, I feel privileged to have been able climb just a fraction of it virtually tourist free and to soak in it's stunning views, this was one of the most memorable experiences of my life...

On our last day in Beijing we headed out to The Birdsnest Stadium. 

The Birdsnest Stadium

It was the first day of the Paralympics and we had high hopes to get in and see some of the action, but unfortunately all tickets for the days events were sold out.  Some of the tickets for the coming days were going for as little as €5, not bad value.  As the games were happening they televised them live on these massive TV screens in the Olympic flame building adjacent to the Stadium.  Here's Pete watching a spot of Bowls..

Pete watching a spot of Bowls

So we left Beijing with very fond memories and were impressed with the city itself, it was easy to get around, the people were so friendly and helpful, the streets were surprisingly clean, there was less people spitting then we expected and best of all the food was superb.  However we're quite sure we would have seen a completely different city if the Olympics hadn't been hosted here.  So we boarded our 12 hour sleeper train to X'ian to see another one of Chinas must see sights, 'The Army of the Terricotta Warriors'.  Stay tuned for China Part 2 coming soon...

And now for a bit of toilet humour...

Hoi An cafe

Tuesday, September 16, 2008

Hanoi-ing Chinese Torture.

 

Hanoi! Pronounced Han OI! is the capital of Vietnam and with a population of over 3 million it's a bustling place full of street hawkers, motorbikes, cyclos, and all the sights and smells you could imagine. It also was home to one Chinese Embassy where we had to get our Chinese visa before our next leg of the journey - more on that later - put it this way, it was a major pain in the wotsits. Here's an example of what you can expect walking down a street in Hanoi:

Rush hour

You wouldn't want to be in a rush anywhere. One thing you learn early on in Vietnam is that the footpaths aren't used for walking - their used for selling goods, parking motorbikes, drinking beer, or even burning fake money (if business has been bad recently), but not walking. That's what the roads are for - so you weave in and out of trucks, cars, motorbikes, and cyclos (bicycle propelled carriages) to get to your destination.

Cyclos

You also share the streets with the street vendors (usually women) who carry around weighing-scale type baskets on their shoulder selling fruit, veg, and all types of assortments (from chestnuts to snails!). It's very handy - you could sit around all day and people would come up to you selling stuff. Anybody for a hat?

A hat for all seasons 

They didn't have my size.

Now I must mention the food. I wouldn't really be one for making a pig of myself but when you see the likes of this you can't help yourself...

Babe and Ferdinand the ducks retirement

Well done Pig. There's a few ducks there aswell. The food in Vietnam is absolutely fantastic. I quickly became addicted to a beef noodle soup called Pho Bo (Bo being the Vietnamese for beef - same as home!). It's so good!! Hot bowls of soupy noodles with tender beef, coriander, chopped chili, and bean sprouts. All for about a 2 dollars - needless to say, happy days. However, you do need an open mind some of the time. Check out the items you can find on a Vietnamese menu:

Mmmmm

If you can't make it out you can find Fried Tortoise with Salt, along with Oyster roasted with grease and onion. I'm sure you'll have no problem figuring out what's wrong with this picture:

Mmmmm2

And we're not talking about the crab.

The only real downside to Hanoi was something that had been on our minds for a while. Namely getting in to China. We knew when we were organising our trip that the Olympics would be held in Beijing near the end of August so we purposely held off visiting China until the end of them. However, we didn't foresee the Chinese government changing the laws to make it extremely hard for people to get visas to visit their country from outside their own country. We did a lot of research about getting our visa all the way through Vietnam and basically it was all doom and gloom. Unless you were in your home country, there was no way a visa was being issued. The most you could do was get stamped confirmation from your hotel or hotels for every day you plan to stay in China, as well as your flight info and present it to the embassy. If they didn't like the look of you or you were improperly dressed, then tough luck. If you weren't at the embassy at least an hour before it opened, then there was no chance. People running businesses out of China were being refused visas so we were disheartened. Still, no guts no glory. We got to the embassy in Hanoi with every stamp and piece of documentation we could think of. We got there over an hour before it opened to see a queue of people waiting. Luckily an English couple at the top of the queue told us that we wouldn't be let in with flip flops so I left Su in the queue to hold our place while I grabbed the nearest motorbike taxi back to our hotel to get appropriate footwear. 20 minutes later we had our runners on an over three hours later (in stifling heat) we got in to make our application. All very nerve racking as we were supposed to be leaving on the Monday and the soonest we could find out about our visa was the Friday (the embassy being closed at the weekend). We got to the embassy even earlier on the Friday morning and....

Celebrating success with a bowl a Pho! #

Yayyyy! We got it! No surprise really as I'm sure most of ye know that we've been in China for a while. As you can see we celebrated with a bowl of Pho and a beer. Breakfast of champions!

Well, that's it - we checked out of our hotel on the Monday and splashed out on a cyclo to get our bus to the airport:

Home James!

Gotta say, we'll miss Vietnam and will be back at some stage. Such a great place!!! Look at the poor fella having to push me and my bag along in the cyclo. That's all leg power as well. Well done that man!

Back in action!

Hi everybody! Pete and Su here! Sorry for the delay in posting to the blog but we've been in China for the last few weeks and our blogs were being blocked! I'm not sure why - maybe in case we had something bad to say about the place (we don't really). Anyway, we've just posted a new blog about Vietnam. It's in three parts as we thought that the blogs weren't posting due to size restrictions. Enjoy! And keep checking for more updates!

Dressing up in Vietnam - Pt 1

Hi all Su here again, so after we dragged ourselves away from the party city that is Saigon we decided a bit of peace and quiet was in order, so where better to head for a bit of R & R than the central highlands and wine making region of Vietnam: Dalat.  No we didn't think Vietnam made wine either but surprisingly they do, I can't say it's the best we've ever had but a treat in South East Asia all the same. 

During the French reign many would come to Dalat to escape the heat of the cities, resulting in a strong French presence.  The town wouldn't look out of place high in the Alps, they even have their own Eiffel Tower.

Dalats Eiffel Tower

It is one of the few towns in Vietnam that wasn't bombed during the American/Vietnam war.  Reason being, like the French, the high ranking North Vietnamese (Northern Communists) holidayed in the North of the town while the high ranking South Vietnamese and Americans holidayed in the South of the town, so no surprises why no one chose to bomb it. Peaceful Dalat

Dalat is a slice of heaven in hot and manic Vietnam.  It's unusually quiet and the temperature feels like a cool Irish summers evening (in other words I had to wear a fleece and a rain jacket). Along with wine, it also produces fruit and veg more commonly seen in the western world, peas, carrots, spuds, avocados even strawberries.

Fruit and Veg Farms

We took a Cable Car ride over the farms, they have a very impressive set up.  Unsurprisingly the towns markets are bursting with tasty treats

Avacadoes anyone

and awash with colour...

Mmm Strawberries

With our lungs filled with country air we headed back down the mountains to the coastal town of Na Trang.   With it's endless beautiful beaches and good weather it's a hit with all visitors and Vietnamese alike.  We stayed here for a couple days and were so lazy we didn't even take a photo. Sorry!

It was back on the bus for us and we braced ourselves for a gruelling 12hours over night journey to Hoi An (Where we planned to stay for a week).  Much to our delight our bus was a state of the art sleeper bus and even Pete fit (snugly) in the seat as you can see from the  pic (yep they're his legs!)

Bus to Hoi An

Unfortunately a few hours into the journey the ride was nothing short of a rollercoaster.  The potholes on the road where bigger then the width of the bus!  No joke, the road looked like the surface of the moon there was that many craters!!  So needless to say not much sleep was had....

(continued in part 2)

Dressing up in Vietnam - Pt 2

 

Ancient Streets

After a days rest we hit the streets of Hoi An, like Dalat, it wasn't bombed during the war.  The old streets are full of beautiful ancient bridges

Japanese Covered Bridge 

and Street Sumo!!?!!?

Street Sumo

The food here is next to none with local delicacies like 'Cao Lao' noodles, greens and pork, 'white rose' shrimp dumplings and my favourite 'spring rolls', fresh or fried and all of the above for less then €1.50, we were in food heaven and with the local draught beer selling for less then 20 cents a pint who could complain! We ate and drank like kings.. Here's a pic of Pete just having a light snack in between lunch and dinner!!! :)

Hoi An Feast

Vietnam is famous for it's inexpensive tailoring and Hoi An is the tailoring capital of Vietnam and our plan was to have some clothes made while we were here. A suit, 2 pairs of trousers, 3 pairs of shorts, 2 dresses and 2 shirts later we were all shopped out.  Mr. Xe, Pete's tailor was hilarious. 

Mr Xe

As you can see he was half Pete's size and we think he 'batted for the other team' but he was great fun and a great tailor, he will even accept orders for the next 4 years and post them back home. Now that's good service.

Hoi An is also known for its Lantern making and the many lantern shops fill the streets with colour...

Lantern Heaven

Every evening we'd have dinner at a riverside cafe and watch the hectic world go by.  It makes for interesting watching as life by the river never sleeps or even stops for a cuppa tea!

Rush Hour in Hoi An

Ferry after ferry transfers motorbike after motorbike from one side of the river to the other.  We would watch in wonder at the speed and the sheer organised chaos of getting the bikes on and off the boats not to mention all the near misses with the boats themselves.  But somehow they always seem to pull it off without a hitch or a safety net in sight!

(Continued in Part 3)

Dressing up in Vietnam - Pt 3

And with all this madness going on just a few meters down the river we saw this!

Hoi An Wedding

Loved up newly weds going for a post wedding boat ride while the photographer snapped away from the safety of dry land.  I cant quite see any Irish couple attempting this at home, I'm sure they'd be swimming in the Liffey before long! But our onlooking man in Pyjamas seemed to be enjoying the fuss...

Old man in PJs

So needless to say, we LOVED Hoi An, the sights, the food and of course the humour, check out our local laundrettes business card...

Hoi An laundry2

Hoi An laundry1