13th August: Japan again

We were awake early so we decided to get the day off to an early start. Since Rich was a late edition to the trip and he has no idea where we are going or what our plans are, he is getting a bit confused. He keeps saying that he loves being in Japan.

''When I see the people on the street, with the eyes and all, I just presume we're in Japan.'' (I think we should have gone through the trip with him before we left Ireland because he seemed very shocked when he found out that we would also be going to Vietnam.)

We attempted to rent bikes for the day but the guy was a total prick. Lazy out, didn't want to help us at all. So, we headed off in search of the Summer Palace.

This place is amazing. Set beside a lake it is by far the most beautiful sight in Beijing.

We spent hours around the palace and even rented a pedalo on the lake. The place was packed full of chinese tourists. Not a westerner in sight. You'd tend to forget that with 1.2 billion people some of them must be tourists.

From there it was over to the Lama temple, the most impressive Buddist temple I've seen. It's huge! Every builing houses a giant Budda, with the biggest Budda housed in the very last building. To give you the scale of it, since no photos are allowed (and I nearly got Kung Fu'd in to next week) his eye was as tall as me!

We rushed back to the hostel and Rich collapsed onto the bed. Me and Fi went to find the famous Chinese opera but ended up being taken down a really dark, intimidating alley which we got out of as quick as we could. No opera but an adventure none the less. Rich was still asleep when we got back and slept till morning.