Because we've travelled so close to Easter, we booked and paid for the Leg 2 flights and tour before we left on leg 1. Hence all that money has been "hostage" to us getting home safe and getting the Chinese visas. We've now happily delayed booking Leg 3 until we're home again and ready to leave on it.
Unsurprisingly, really, all my stressing about getting visas and then entry was for nothing, as both went without a hitch.
I've decided that the excellent video-on-demand in-flight entertainment on modern airliners is a two-edged sword. It does stop you getting bored, but also removes some incentive to try very hard to get a nap when your body isn't at all interested. I've scarcely had a wink on any of the flights so far!
I feel like I've learned a lot just from the one car ride from the airport to the hotel (although the Olympics were only not-quite four years ago here, and this will have been the main route, so I'm reserving final judgement).
- Everything appears very well looked after - none of the mouldering and gentle decay normally seen on the outskirts of most major cities.
- Many road signs have some English on them, and "Latin" letters are used on car number plates and road numbers.
- Flying in, there were SO many big groups of tower blocks, each group on its own huge rectangular plot, often well away from the next plot and with blocks staggered like the 5 dots on dice. Beijing is 20 Million people, and they all have to live somewhere.
- Most of the traffic has been made up of cars, rather than the scooters that throng Vietnam or the bicycles one might have imagined (mentioned as a litmus test of economic development).
I've gone on too long now for the landed-safe quickie I intended, but what sort of traveller would I be if I weren't fascinated by experiences of brand new places?
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