Last day in Beijing

Friday was my last day in Beijing, & I started with a trip to Olympic Park. I really do love the 'Bird's nest' & 'Water cube', they are very cool buildings. The place was totally over-run with Chinese tourists, with hardly a westerner in sight.

I then hit the markets... I bought as much stuff as I thought I could fit in my pack, but could easily have bought more... Stuff is so so cheap. I bought a couple of pearl necklaces, some earrings, a couple of lanterns, lots of very cool 'Mao' posters, plus a few other bits & pieces...

I got a bit carried away at the markets, & had to leg it back to the hostel in order to pick-up my ruck-sack & make my way to the train station. The train trip was bit of a nightmare really, I'm trying to erase it from my memories! It turns out that the reason it was so busy & I couldn't get a sleeper berth is because it was a Chinese festival, something to do with the sweeping of the graves, & it was centered in Xian! Of course that meant every man & his dog was travelling to Xian on Friday night... I had close to 14 hours of sitting upright (the seats didn't recline one bit) squished into a carriage brimful of locals. They were sitting & lying down in the aisles, & some of them stood up for the whole journey. There were babies crying, the carriage was way overheated, & a barely got a wink of sleep. All I can say is thank goodness I had my ipod to keep me sane! We finally rolled into Xian at about 7am.