Beijing

We’ve been in Beijing now for 3 days and I’m starting to think that the Chinese Government have removed the sky! Perhaps it leads to discent or people thinking of far off places so replacing it with a low grey blanket of smog is better, thus allowing you to only ever see about 300m in any direction!
The city itself, in the old parts, is lovely and still has a certain amount of charm to it with it’s old buildings and temples, plus the old districts called Hutongs – these are very narrow streets which are bustling with life and people. Some have been renovated and are now full of cafes and bars whilst others are just full of lots of old Chinese men playing cards or board games and selling random things from bits of metal to cigarettes. The rest of the city is typically city like and modern with big business centres and commercial districts. Whilst in town we also headed out to the Summer Palace, which is just on the outskirts of town and is a lovely walk round a big lake with some impressive temples and bridges around it…but once again, shame you can’t actually see for the mist/smog/cloud whatever it is.
Anyway 3 days was enough time to leave us wanting to escape to the countryside and find the sky again! Plus we know we are heading back to Beijing after Mongolia.  One last thing…..if most big cities have a China town what do Chinese cities have?!?