Two days in one post

Boat on the Thames (tick), crown jewels (tick), natural history museum (tick), science museum (tick), buckingham palace and Hyde park (tick), getting slightly turned around (tick), catching the wrong metro (tick), smgt getting sick (tick), lots of walking (big tick).

A day at the museum

The Natural History Museum is awesome. So big and so much to see! Spent most of the day there.

We also went to Hyde park for a wander and a sit down. It's been a while since I have walked so much in one day.

Londons calling!

Flights to London went okay. Staff at Frankfurt airport were on strike so instead of going to the terminal we had to park the plane on the apron and bus back to the terminal. But we made our connecting flight.

Got our oyster cards at the metro near the airport. Our accommodation was quite close to the stop on the metro.

So two very tired kiwis (after about 22 hours) crawled into bed about 9 only to be woken up by the fire alarm about an hour later (was a false alarm).

Learnings from Beijing

Always get a cab with a running meter. Somehow the four of us ended up in a shuttle From the airport to the hotel - which was six times as much as the cab we caught back to the airport from the same place.

Never get on a ricksaw. They charge way too much and don't take you where you want. We got dropped off somewhere random.

At one point I was separated from the others and was surrounded by hawkers while i scanned the masses looking for them. Keep walking and keep saying no.

When passing stalls never pay the original price, nice top originally offered at 280 ended up with it for 40 yuan.

The Great Wall

What an awesome day! Took a tour out to the Great Wall and there was hardly anybody there! Also visited the Sacred Way and a jade and silk factory. I thought Beijing would be crowded, but was surprised, not that many people in the streets and the streets were clean. Had sinner tonight at one if the better Thai restaurants and the food was amazing!

Great things

After a good nights sleep we're off to the Great Wall. Had a colorful sunrise but more pollution today as its Monday. Similar to Wellington where Beijing is so quiet in the weekend. Today -just chaos. Tomorrow we're off to London. Maccas for brekkie.

Beijing!

Arrived to a beautiful sunrise. Not much sleep on the plane for me, but I had the aisle seat so had to get up at random times to let people out. Think we were overcharged for the taxi but you live and learn.

It's groundhog day

We're packed and ready to go - again!

Fog, fog go away!

Three days we have had fog, here's hoping that by tomorrow at four it would have cleared!

Foggy start to the holidays...

False start to our holiday when the flights got cancelled :( After waiting several hours at the airport with hundreds of other passengers we were told to go home and contact our travel agent (who was closed) or ring the 0800 number...

Finally got through to them just before 10pm and now we fly out on Saturday - three days later.

Oh well - now I can stay home and relax and get rid of this sniffle I have picked up.

Its a double date with B&V all the way now...