Day 1 ~ Saturday 21st August, 2015

Helloooo, is anyone there... Internet in Beijing is very limited... More to come soon, we fly to Canada in 12 hours, so updates will start flowing soon...

Long flight! Air China was great, but the seats are tiny and NO leg room! Food was really yummy and the service you couldn't fault. The flight was very full, not one spare seat! Steve didn't sleep at all, and I managed to get the odd hour here and there.

Met a lovely girl – Alex who was on the same flight, and heading to Mongolia to live in a YURT with the locals for 12 days!! OMG – how awesome is that – she's traveling alone and doing something amazing and off the beaten track and she's only in her 20's! She's already travelled to all the continents. I feel so boring with the travel I have done. (**must be more exotic and adventurous with ones travel plans for the future) There were only 6 Caucasians on the flight, we were starting to feel like the odd ones!

Made it to the hotel after an hours delay getting in. The airport is enormous and spacious, although it seems to be built for the future and not necessarily today.

We caught at Taxi to the hotel. WOW – now that was an experience! Steve sat in the front seat… even he was nervous! We now understand why they drive like they do on our Australian roads – its because there is NO rules here. They'll stop when and where they want to, even if it is in the middle of a highway. The only thing missing from Asian drivers in Australia is the use of the horn – this taxi driver basically drove with his hand on it the whole way. He spoke great english when he met us “Good Afternoon, welcome to Beijing, I'll be happy to Drive you”…. Thats ALL the english this guy knew – hilarious! Steve tried to have a conversation with him, but to no avail.

We made it to our hotel alive!

Thankfully our Hotel let us into our room early – 8.30am – so after a shower and settling in, we slept like babies till mid afternoon where we got up and wandered around INDIGO the huge shopping centre attached to the hotel. We ate some lunch and then checked out the hotel and shopping centre and took at look at the Subway & what entailed with using that.

Our Hotel Room View..

Vicki Deciding which turtle to bring home from the supermarket...

The East Hotel is really lovely. Its Asian with a western influence and is very modern. The staff all speak great english and nothing is too much trouble. Our room is an “Urban Corner Suite”, so we are on the corner of the building, facing the urban sprawl – we wanted to see the pretty lights at night time. We can see a tiny bit of the mountains off to the distance, but alas there is another huge building in front of us that is blocking more of that view.

We ate a light dinner from the supermarket and were both fast asleep very early, hoping to feel better in the morning.