China
Living, working and travelling in China was the start of my love of travel. It changes now every day, new cities spring up, new roads and rail links make more of the country accessible but the basics remain the same. China is a country rich in culture and history both wonderful and terrible. You’d need a year to scrape the surface of what is on offer and to become truly absorbed into this amazing place. One constant is the friendliness of the people - I always felt welcome and help was never further away than asking. I was lucky enough to work, teaching English in Qingdao for 4 months enabling me to experience the real culture, food and day to day life of ordinary Chinese people and places.
My travels took me to many places - from the Great Wall, Summer Palace and Tiananmen Square of the vast Beijing. I travelled by train south first to Nanjing, a city full of history and surprises, on to Suzhou, a beautiful city of pagoda’s, canals and tasty noodle soups spun and cooked while you wait. Shanghai was the highlight of my East coast travels, it is now nearly double the size and the shopping Mecca of China. It has been a centre of fashion for a long time.
This is an amazing city - split in two by the mighty Yangtze - new on one side and the old and traditional on the other. One moment you can be wandering through incredible food markets with everything imaginable on offer, the next strolling down the riverside Bund, or shopping in some of the most modern malls in the world.
This was also the place from where I started my trip up the Yangtze River. I used a local riverboat, but there are now some very comfortable river cruise vessels plying the river. Despite the world renowned damn, though not as deep or dangerous as they were once, the three Gorges and little gorges are still a must see. A really inspiring, once in a lifetime experience. The scale of the landscape is truly beautiful and humbling.
The rest of my trip around China took me to the borders of Tibet, Kunming in Sichuan Province where the spicy food is a wonderful mix of Chinese and more South-East Asian flavours, the upper Mekong close to the Border of Burma/Myanmar, the beautiful areas around Guilin and Yangshuo and a week in the bustling metropolis of Hong Kong. My experiences included hiking Tiger Leaping Gorge, meeting and talking to writer persecuted during the cultural revolution, going to a traditional Chinese opera, cycling through incredible countryside, floating down the beautiful Li River, Cormorant fishing, going to a local practitioner of Chinese medicine and having my own tea made and many other wonderful things.
I always love putting together itineraries for people to visit this fantastic country, there are some wonderful tours, cruises and river trips on offer and for those wanting something different or even family/group travel, I will put a trip together that will suit you and one that I am sure you will always remember.