CHINA TRIP: Itinerary

• 03/09 – Leave Heathrow 20:00

BEIJING: 04/09 – 08/09

• 04/09 – Arrive Beijing 13:30 local time, go to Tina’s flat
• Beijing Duck dinner
• Summer Palace
• Forbidden City
• Great Wall
• Wangfujing Nightmarket
• 08/09 – Night train to Xi’an

XI’AN: 09/09 – 11/09

• 09/09 – Arrive Xi’an, day sightseeing in the city
• Stay at the Jinjiang Inn, Jeifang Lu
• 10/09 – Xi’an: Terracotta Warriors
• 11/09 – Early flight to Chengdu.

CHENGDU: 11/09 – 17/09

• 11/09 - Day sightseeing in the city.
• Stay at Sim’s Cozy Garden Guesthouse 
• Leshan
• Qingchengshan
• Panda Reserve
• Langzhong
• 17/09 – Chengdu. Late flight to Guilin

GUILIN/YANGSHUO: 17/09 – 24/09

• 18/09 – Sightseeing in Guilin
• Rice Terraces
• Cycling
• River cruise
• Village Walk
• Cookery course
• 24/09 – Guilin. Evening flight to Hong Kong.

HONG KONG: 24/09 – 26/09

• 24/09 - Stay at the Minden, Tsim Sha Tsui
• Victoria Peak
• Stanley Bay
• Lantau Island
• Star Ferry
• 26/09 – Hong Kong. Late flight back to London
• 27/09 – Arrive London Heathrow 08:00.

CHINA TRIP: Ready for the off (nearly)

According to the countdown on my Facebook page, we have precisely 5 days, 3 hours and 39 minutes until our China holiday starts.

After some initial suspicion by the Visa agency as to our suitability to enter the country, we now have our single entry visas into China, albeit on restricted conditions. Quite what the point of the restrictions is, is beyond me – a normal tourist visa allows you to enter the country up to 3 months after the date of issue. Because we work in the meedjah (despite having absolutely nothing to do with news content or journalism or anything dodgy/controversial of any kind), we have a restriction that says we only have one month from the date of issue to enter the country. But we can stay just as long as any other tourist. I’m not sure how this stops us doing anything subversive, if that were our intent. It’s not, obviously. We just want to go on holiday (PSB, please take note.)

Last-Minute Shopping Trip Part 1 was completed yesterday, when I struggled through the tail-end of the sales to find the last remnants of summer clothing still available in less than a size 22.

Last-Minute Shopping Trip Part 2 was this afternoon, where I purchased the rather natty Netbook wot I is now writing this blog on. The idea is to carry on throughout our travels, but I always intend to keep a travel diary, manage it for the first day, then get behind and give up. And if that weren’t enough, it’ll be a bit tricky to blog from China anyway – most blogsites are blocked, Blogger included. I’m currently using Windows Live Writer to write offline, in the hope that I’ll still be able to publish to Blogger through the backdoor. When that doesn’t work, check out my other blog, which is accessible from China, instead.

Wahey! China here we come!