Some Aussie pics...

Rainbow at Mystery Bay yesterday.

Jack saw the sea and jumped in, even though it was in the middle of nowhere, with not a person to be seen for miles around.

Sarah at our site on Phillip Island

Jack on a completely deserted beach, that we only found by getting lost and trekking through some scary woods.

Out on the highway!

Sarah's shell.

Evening on the beach

Kangaroo Jack!

Our favourite beach, South Durras (we know the photo is blurry. Oops.)

Sazzly at Kiama Blowhole!

Jack driving the campervan for the first time.

Storm at Sydney Harbour!

Sarah's beloved Uggs.

At the Opera House! (The baby's not ours....)

The calm before the storm...

On the beach again!


That's all for the moment, but no worries, we still have HUNDREDS of photos to delight you with when we get back!

J&S

xx

South Durras

Hi everyone. So, we've got the van and have been on the road a few days. By far our best stop so far has been at a place called South Durras. The beach there was empty, and stretched for about two miles. The waves were amazing- Jack exaggerates them to be about 6 metres high. But they were really big! We went for a bit of a swim anyway, which was really good fun, we had to watch out for the strong 'rips', which were amazing because they really did pull you into deep holes which we discovered towards the end.
It was absolutley beautiful. TOday we're on our way down to Eden, which is our last stop in New South Wales before we cross over the border into Victoria. Sarah's phone lost any signal the moment we left Sydney, but we'll try to stay in touch when we can.
Lots of love
Jack and Sarah
xxx

On the road again...

We're off this morning to pick up our campervan and begin our drive down to Melbourne! We think we've worked out our main stops and stuff; first stop, Nowra! Eeek!
Our plan to go to the zoo yesterday was ruined by the most awesome thunderstorm- we were having lunch at the Harbour when suddenly the sky just clouded over, and within 10 minutes the storm was over us and the Opera House was almost hit by lightning! The tourists standing on top of the Harbour Bridge got down pretty quickly!
It's a shame we didn't get to go to the zoo and see the Opera House from the water, but maybe another time.

Write again soon
love
Jack & Sarah
xx

ps. How do you clean Uggs?
x

Sydney, Australia

So, we've been in Sydney a couple of days and thought we should update you on our adventure.
The hostel is nice enough, it's very lively and backpacker-ey. We also get free breakfast and internet, so that's good.

When we first arrived, we thought we'd just wander to the end of the road to see what was around, and were met with a view of the Harbour Bridge and the top of the Opera House! Made us realize we were actually in Sydney. So the next day we decided to walk to it, through the Botanical Gardens. We were wandering through the park when we heard some very noisy birds; we turned a corner and the sky was almost completely blotted out by huge fruit bats, circling the trees. It was a pretty amazing sight and they didn't mind posing for photos as they hung around in the surrounding trees!

We walked a bit further along the harbour when, again we turned a corner and discovered the Sydney Opera House, right in front of us! We hung around there for a bit and looked at Harbour Bridge (with some very intrepid tourists climbing the side of it!), before moving on and walking through the city to find the shopping area!

When we found the shopping zone (how many shopping centres can one street hold?!), we decided to do our one big splurge each, and both splashed out. Jack bought himself some very nifty Bose headphones (even Sarah was impressed by their quality, and Sarah is not a gadgety person), and Sarah bought herself some genuine Aussie Ugg boots! Smiles all round.

Today we went to Bondi Beach (some pronounce it 'Bonsai'...) It was lovely but not quite hot enough for a swim!

Off to Taronga Zoo tomorrow, see you all soon.
J&S
xxx

Just so you know what you're missing... 3

The Great Wall...

...and the zoo...

Aw.

Just so you know what you're missing... PART DEUX

Sarah insisted on taking a photo of this little girl at the Temple of Heaven, just because the colours and the frogs were so cool.

At the Temple of Heaven

The Temple

The '70 year old door'.

Some sort of flag-waving-dance-type lesson in the Temple's park.

Just so you know what you're missing...

Off we go!

Outside the Forbidden City, posing in exchange for food!

Inside the first courtyard of the Forbidden City, being happy.

Jack met a Zea look-a-like.

Australia, here we come!

Flight to Kuala Lumpur was pretty nice; Malaysian Airlines get a thumbs-up from us! The plane was practically empty, so we had lots of room to spread out.
The hotel, even though it was just an airport hotel, was heaven. Outdoor pool, nice restaurant, helpful staff and above all, a clean, gorgeous room.
Just wonderful.
We're now at the airport again, our flight's not for another 8 hours, so we have a fair bit of time to kill! We're all caught up with this site now, and we'll just update it whenever we can from now on!

Love to everyone.
Jack and Sarah
xxxx

Day 6, last day in China!

We decided to go shopping for our last day. We asked the hostel staff to write the name of a shopping centre in chinese to show to the taxi driver. After some confusion, they wrote something down, and off we went. We got kicked out of three different taxi's.
Eventually we got to a shopping centre, and it was pretty bizarre. There were two HUGE centres across the road from each other; one very posh, designer clothes, air conditioning, open spaces, with Western prices. The other, cheap, thousands of tiny stalls packed with designer clothes, most of them fake, many of them with humourously misspelled slogans. Sarah did manage to fins a genuine Betty Boop handbag, made of real leather, and fell in love with it. We also bought ourselves a new memory card for the camera, as we'd almost filled up the first one.

Confession: we went to MacDonalds for lunch.

Day 5, Beijing Zoo

We spent the whole day at Bejing zoo. It was not as bright and sunny as the other days, but that was fine as we were outside a lot! It was a great day to test out our camera, as many of the photos we took of the animals from quite far away look fantastic when zoomed in. We saw loads of beautiful animals; giraffes, zebras (Sarah stroked one!), monkeys, a HUGE lion, tigers, tortoises, a Burmese python, rhinos, hippos, elephants, I could go on...

Sarah liked the brown bears- the way they walked ("plodded", says Jack), reminded her of Bruce! It was really weird, there was a 'Dog' section in the zoo- our strong advice to Brits is to avoid this part. Dalmatians, German Shepherds, Afghans, even a huge St Bernard, all in stark horrible cages. We saw a guard kick one of the dalmatians and were very unimpressed.

To tell the truth, we were quite shocked at the condition of many of the animals and their enclosures. It was obvious that many of the animals were very agitated- on tiger was running back and forth the 3 or so metres of it's cage really frantically. The rhino was banging it's head against the rails, and not one of the enclosures had any water for the animal- except for the pandas and the amphibious animals. However, it is a very famous and well-regarded zoo, so I suppose they know what they're doing. We did get very annoyed at the people throwing rubbish and stones at two sleeping lionesses, trying to wake them up. All of the outside enclosures were covered in rubbish, obviously thrown by visitors trying to get the animal's attention.

Having said all this (it sounds like an RSPCA report!), we did have a lovely day. The tigers were beautiful, and we saw Giant Pandas! They were very cute, they kept rolling around and falling over. It was a really great zoo for getting up close and personal to the animals- Sarah even had her photo taken with a chimpanzee named Betty sitting on her lap!

Day 4, the longest day...

Got up early as we had booked places on a tour of the Great Wall of China! Jack drew a diagram of the toilet to show the front desk. They found it pretty funny and promised it would be fixed when we got back.
Our tour group consisted of: Jack & Sarah, 4 Vietnamese guys (who got drunk), a Philippino lady and her Peruvian boyfriend, and a pretty bolshy family from Birmingham, whose daughter is going to Leeds next year to do English (small world!). The guide's English name was Wendy, and on the bus she kept telling us jokes and little facts about China. Due to the overcrowding of China, it is illegal to bury a dead body- everyone must be cremated (apart from Chairman Mao, who got hundreds of square feet of precious Chinese soil for his mausoleum). Wendy said if you want to be buried, you have to move to Canada where they have lots of space! That makes sense, considering how many Chinese we saw in Vancouver!

First stop was the Great Wall. It really was amazing to see, even if we were in quite a 'tourist-y' area. We had the choice of going the hard way or the easy way... we chose the "easy" way, which turned out to be hard enough! Hundreds of steep steps, but the view was amazing the entire way. It took us longer to get back down, because all the other tourists had arrived and all the mongolians and chinese wanted their photo taken with the white girl. Jack was given babies to hold for photos, and the people were all very friendly, except you could be minding your own business when suddenly you turn around and an entire asian family has arranged themselves around you, and theres already a camera waiting for you!

From there we were taken to a 'Jade gallery', to our surprise. We had a brief talk on how jade is sculpted, and from then on it was all just a hard sell. Luckily, we had no money on us, and we were allowed to leave!

Next we went to the Ming Tombs, which was actually a bit disappointing, as the traffic was so bad, our guide decided to take us to one of the tombs that hasn't been opened! We stroked a big turtle for luck, and walked through a tunnel called 'The Ghostway', because the thousands of slaves who built the tomb went in that way, but never came out again. They all had to take poison on the completion of the tomb, like the Egyptians did with the pyramids.

Then we had a really nice lunch at the 'Beijing Friendship Store', AKA ' Beijing Rip Off The Foreigner Store'. We had longer there than we did at the Great Wall, as next to the restaurant was a huge shop where if you looked at any object too long a shop assistant would appear and try to sell it to you. We were then taken to a tea-house (again, not on the itinerary), and were given lots of samples of tea to try. We both liked one called 'Oriental Beauty', which is a prize-winning tea. However, at the end of teh tea ceremony, none of us wanted to buy anything (as we'd been forced in there by Wendy), and the girl (who called herself 'Miss Tea') stormed out in a huff.

After that, we were taken next door to a massage and reflexology centre. We had a lecture on keeping fit and healthy and then a troupe of reflexology students came in and took control of our feet. During this, they tried to sell us lots of products, but apart from that it was a lovely massage. Jack couldn't walk afterwards though, as his masseur (a young goofy guy who had the giggles), had obviously hit the wrong nerve in Jack's foot. Sarah was fine :D
We also had a consultation with a Tibetan hand doctor, and 85 year old man who could look at your hands and tell you what's wrong with you. It was quite scary actually, he looked at Jack's hand for a couple of seconds and said 'You have asthma'. He got everything right, although he didn't pick up on Birmingham Lady's diabetes.

On the way back to the hostel, we went past the Olympic Stadium, which has been re-named 'the birds nest' by the locals. It is a big glass and chrome construction, with a roof the shape of... a birds nest! We had been told we could look around it, but the guide went back on her word again and all we got were a couple of photos as the bus went past.

Overall, though, day 4 was a really amazing experience.
And to finish it off, Jack's broken loo had been fixed. Hurrah!

Day 3, it's not so bad.

The world is a better place when you can have a hot shower and you know where breakfast is coming from. This is the first important truth we have learned on our journey to True Wisdom.

We bought breakfast from the patisserie we discovered the night before, and took a taxi to the Temple of Heaven. This is where the Emperor would say prayers and give sacrifices in the hope of a good harvest. It was a really hot day to be walking around, and Sarah had to use the Chinese sunscreen she bought (which also turned out to be skin-whitening cream).

The main hall of the temple is a beautiful circular building made entirely of wood, and no nails (a guide said that it is held together with a special sticy rice). There's a door in one of the outer walls called the '70 year old door', even though it was put in in the 1730's. It was built for an emperor who had turned 70 and was in failing health- the door meant he had less of a walk to get to the temple. But he didn't want his heirs to become lazy and just use the door whenever they pleased, so he issued a decree that his offspring must reach the age of 70 before they were allowed to use the door. Interestingly, no emperor after him ever reached that age!

That night we found our restaurant. We became regulars, but I think we may have been a bit unpopular as we never finished all the food they brought! We ordered duck pancakes, and waited while they roasted an entire duck. They brought it out to our table and the chef snapped the head off and left it on the tray as he carved it for us! It was completely different from the shredded duck you get in the UK at Chinese restaurants, it was white meat and they were large slices with crisp skin on. Just gorgeous :)
Halfway through our meal, the waitress re-appeared with a huge bowl- in it was duck soup made from the bones and left over bits of our duck! It had bones floating in it and everything! But it was quite nice, really :P

Got back to the 'Spit Pit', and Jack decided it wasn't grotty enough, so he blocked the loo.

Day 2, and hungry.

We survived the night. Just. :D
We had no idea where we could get any breakfast, and so we walked the streets for about an hour trying just to find a supermarket, or anything! We couldn't find anything, and we were in a very 'local' part of Beijing, so there were hardly any signs in English, and not many people spoke enough English to help us. The only thing we found was a guy frying dough (we think it was dough) in the street. We bought two, but it was disgusting and only made Sarah feel worse. Jack ate them both, of course. Then we took a taxi ride to the Forbidden City (we'd heard there was a Starbucks). We stood in the outer courtyard for a bit, looking lost, when a Chinese guy came up and said he'd help us find food if we'd have our photo taken with his Japanese friends. He showed us to a stall selling biscuits and stuff (at extortionate prices), and we posed for a photo with the Japanese kids. This would not be the last time Sarah got 'Whitegirl-ed'.

We then entered the Forbidden City, which was vast and pretty amazing. It was our first taste of traditional Chinese architecture, and we walked from throne room to throne room (the emperors were fond of sitting, it seems). There were also many rooms for the emperor's 1000 'lady-friends', their 3000 eunuchs, and I'm not sure where they kept his 100 children! We were there almost all day and only managed to see a very small section of the City. The gardens were beautiful, full of blossom trees and fake grottos, even a man-made cliff.

Our only meal was a hotdog at lunch time (Sarah was so hungry by this point that she actually ate the mustard and gherkins that came with them). When we felt we'd seen enough for the day, we took a taxi back to the hostel. That evening, we had our first Chinese meal, at a sort of 'Noodle King'. We weren't sure what we were ordering, and it turned out to be a prawn noodle dish. Jack ate all of his (isn't he brave), and Sarah picked at what hadn't been fishified.
Afterwards, we discovered a patisserie jsut down the road, and this turned out to be the turning point of our food crisis. We gorged ourselves. It was good.

S&J

ps. Mamma Baillie- I saw a cat! A live one! Couldn't take a photo though, it was too fast. SMB xx

Our hotel room has a pool...

...of spit in the corner.

Shock! Horror!
We arrived at Beijing airport feeling really ill. The landing took about an hour, and it was incredibly turbulent (rougher than crossing the English channel in a dinghy). The arrival hall was actually quite nice, all tall red columns and golden slats, but we were both feeling to sick to really care. Then we got to a taxi and handed over the map we had been sent by the hostel. The first sign that it was no good was the a taxi driver laughing as he showed it to his mates. We were lost in Beijing for ages, and eventually the driver just took the meter off and started asking people on the road, and in other hotels. It was pretty awful. We eventually made it to the hostel (it seems they'd been telling a few fibs). They're only called the 'Zen Hostelry' to attract westerners, in practice they're called something completely different.
No one spoke any English, and it seemed they hadn't even received our booking (we think maybe their English translator who does the website might have taken our deposit for herself).
We were shown to our room which was flea infested, covered in hair, and, as we have mentioned, had a pool of spit in the corner by Jack's bed (the Chinese just spit wherever and whenever they like). The water wasn't safe, so we went to sleep starving and dehydrated (and in Sarah's case, being drained of blood by fleas and bed bugs).

Here we go....

Hi everyone!
The hostel in Beijing had no internet (more on that later...), so we were unable to post anything here! So the next few post will tell you all abot what we got up to in Bejiing.....
x

Airport

Hello! Just to let everyone know we got to the airport safely- Our flight should be boarding in half an hour, but we still don't know what gate to go to!
The bus was ok, we were sat in front of a very loud, glamourous German woman... but we both managed to go to sleep anyway :D
We'll update you whenever we can, and we'll let you know when we get to China (probably not straight away). If you don't hear from us within two days, please send food and money (I'm joking, please don't panic! :P). Jack also requests you send Zea.
Lots of love,
Sarah and Jack
xx