Continuing the exploration of the Caitlins we drove to Nugget Point. Luckily it was a nice morning and we got some excellent views of the iconic landforms that reach out from the coast to the ocean, the lighthouse and the rocky inlets. Its a short walk down to the viewing point and its well worth it.

Onwards towards Dunedin and upon arriving at the popular St Clair Beach we strolled along the sandy beach and watched the dogs playing in the waves fetching balls and sticks thrown by their owners. This was a quick stop over as we would be backtracking to Dunedin for Christmas in a few days time. For the next two nights though we decided to stay on the Otago Peninsula, famed for lush hills, extinct volcanoes, beaches, albatross and penguins. We pre-booked to stay in the Portabello Tourist Park ($31 NZD/night) as we weren’t sure how busy it would be so close to Christmas.

This private camping ground is a very nice spot indeed, with a short walk to a shop, pub and an award winning chippy in Portabello. We decided on a walk towards and along the Okia Flat. This takes in “The Pyramids” (volcanic hills), a beach / coastal walk and a crouching elephant made from volcanic rock. The walk took a few hours and we spent the time exploring further into the Papanui Inlet with its soft crunchy sand that swallowed our feet!

Later on we drove up to The Royal Albatross Centre located at the very tip of the peninsula which offers viewing (over the hill where the birds are nesting) and a museum/cafe. As we did not want to pay for the pleasure we took up a vantage point, with lots of other tourists, on top of the cliffs to see if we could spot any birds returning from their day fishing out at sea.

We did see several albatross in amongst the pretty large gulls, and they are HUGE, the photos really do not do them justice. Seagulls also have a big nesting site here and do create a fair amount of shrilling and screaming all on their own. On the other side of the cliffs you can make your way down to the bay and watch the Blue Penguins returning to feed their young. They only come ashore once its practically dark so we waited for them with around 100 other people.

This is also a free area for visitors to watch the penguins and luckily there are volunteers in the guise of marshals (in high vis vests). They offered an informative insight into the penguins and how long they have been there for as well as keeping order amongst the crowds. The elderly male warden has done this job for the past 5 years and was a nice bloke, but his people skills left something to be desired, clearer communication would have made it simpler for people to understand what to do and where to stand. He was however very passionate about the protection of the birds from public! After some shouting at idiots who couldn’t turn their flash on their cameras off, the little birds made their way up to where we were standing, one even walking inches from both of us and producing a little poo. Helen loved it.

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f/2.0, Leica 90mm f/2.8, Zeiss 18mm f/4 ZM processed in Lightroom 3)

First of all was a lovely sunny walk around the block with Sarah’s best friend Madison her beautiful golden retriever. This was followed by an hour and a half class with Erich Schiffmann whom Helen and Sarah had both trained with in August. It was good for Helen to be back at Exhale, although the $22 class fees are pretty high, luckily we had a free pass between us too. The class was full, although it wasn’t to Dave’s tastes, Helen was definitely in her comfort zone and enjoyed some un-interrupted yogi time, feeling much more confident with Erich’s free-form approach.

Yoga was followed with an appointed with a chiropractor to help sort out Helen’s neck problems and then lunch at Wholefoods on the edge of Venice. The healing part of the day was over, next we were ready for some less-charming enthused Hollywood action. Sarah very kindly played host and drove us around some of the famous landmarks and areas we have so far purposely missed off our list! We drove around Rodeo Drive, Sunset Boulevard and Moholland Avenue taking in some of the mansions and the Hollywood sign.

Moving onto Hollywood itself where a film premier was taking place for Leonardo DiCaprio’s new “J Edgar” film, although we were around 2 hours early for this so could only take in the hype and crowds of fans starting to form. So it’s nothing really to shout about but now we can say we went to Hollywood. We would have liked to enjoy a drink at the roof bar on top of the W Hotel, but it was closed so we had a sneak peak and then enjoyed a beer in the lobby bar.

We ate at a really good Thai restaurant down on Hollywood Boulevard called Jitlada Thai, recommended as THE best Thai in LA!! What a statement! We love our Thai food, and yes it was pretty good especially the green curry and a fish dish. But THE best?? Hmm! It has a good authenticity about the place, family run, not too fancy but the service was slow at the end.

The next day we didn’t really do much but we did get to spend a few hours working with Sarah for her yoga portfolio. Helen shot some images for Sarah’s profile on the Santa Monica beach and grassy sidewalk, involving a mixture of portrait and sequence poses with some lovely natural one’s thrown in too. Dave had already snapped Madison the day before and so we could leave Sarah with a nice series for images for her to treasure (we hope!).

It was a rainy day after a hint of sunshine and later on it cleared up. The perfect day for a film so we watched Martha Marcy May Marlene. A little of a suspense thriller, something we think takes on a Charles Manson inspired story. Then we ate at Fresh ‘n’ Easy over the road from the cinema which has recently opened and offers good salads, sandwiches, soups and so on.

On our last day in LA and after a quick Skype call home to the Roscoe’s we went to another yoga class. This time we were back at Yoga Glo, a studio that offers free yoga to people with an array of top class teachers in LA. It makes its money from the subscribers who follow the yoga classes online, so each class is filmed. We were back with Jo Tastula and she co-taught with meditation teacher Harshada Wagner. Another lovely class which was perhaps more up Dave’s path; more physical basically with guided meditation.

We then made our way to the Getty Centre, which Helen has visited before and remembers the photos she took there. It was a saturday so it was busy, the bonus is free entry but you have a $15 parking fee. It really is a must-see for visitors going to LA. The building sits on a hill overlooking downtown LA and the coast-line. It was a really clear day too so we had great views. The exhibitions were pretty good, the Bauhaus photography exhibit was not really all that good but the one exhibit that stood out for us was Crosscurrents in LA Painting and Sculpture featuring LA artists from the 50′s, 60′s and 70′s including David Hockney’s Splash. This exhibition is part of Pacific Standard Time, art taking place around central LA.

The buildings, architecture and the gardens are perhaps the best thing about the Getty, plus the views. It’s modern, tasteful and very white. Perfect against a blue sky. Lunch there is over-rated and over-priced, we saw a few people taking in a picnic and this seemed the more enjoyable option.

We didn’t have long left so we packed our bags, and after saying goodbye to Madison we went to the Bergamot Station Arts Centre to stop at an exhibition opening. One of Sarah’s colleagues was involved in the opening fettering layered photo montages and photography, this was at the Tag gallery. There is a great hub of art galleries at this location. We then enjoyed perhaps our best sushi yet, one of Sarah’s all time favourites in La. It was excellent and a steal at only $20 each! Again authentic to Japanese culture and their sashimi was fantastic we could have easily been back in Japan! After a filling of sushi Sarah dropped us off at LAX, this was our final goodbye and a little tearful. 3 months in North America, it was strange to be moving on but it also felt good. Thanks to Sarah for being the perfect host and making fantastic home-made granola! Go into business with that Sarah! ha! Oh and her aunty’s pumpkin loaf was amazing, another best seller surely!

So farewell America, for the time being. We’ll do a highlights feature soon and we already have plans of what and where we’d like to visit when we return. New Zealand awaits and we are excited about more new beginnings. We just need to embrace the 13.5 hour flight first.

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f/2.0, Leica 90mm f/2.8, Zeiss 18mm f/4 ZM processed in Lightroom 3)

Currently the weather in this part of LA has been fairly predictable, overcast / foggy up until noon and then the sun blazes through, 75F give or take a few with a nice cooling breeze near the seafront.

However most of the 14th during the day was overcast and nothing actually grabbed our eye, which is unusual. None the less we headed for sushi at Hama Sushi for the 5pm – 7pm “earlybird” bar menu which had selected sushi, various other dishes, beers and wine all at a reduced fee. California rolls never tasted so good. A stroll along the beach front brought us upon a large crowd of people who were dancing to the beat of lots of random drums. All sorts of people and characters jumped out, it was a strange little moment on a fairly quiet evening.

The following day, after an early morning run and homemade breakfast, we once again explored some of the Venice canals. They are a great place to wander around whilst having a good nosy at the huge variety of houses on display, these must be worth a fortune! Luckily our host has a bicycle that we can use and this is probably the best way to see the local area, especially the beach path system for “Peds” and “Bikes” which is a great ride past Santa Monica, or in the opposite direction towards Manhatten beach. So while Helen is doing her yoga, Dave is cycling the beach paths enjoying the views and topping up the t-shirt tan!

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f/2.0, Leica 90mm f/2.8, Zeiss 18mm f/4 ZM & Olympus PEN EP-1, 17mm f/2.8 & 100mm f/2.8, processed in Lightroom 3)

The bus met us outside the hostel in Tunxi at 7am and we found a couple of seats at the back of the smallish bus. Sitting at the back on these things is never a good idea when you’re in the more rural areas; not a lot of space and its a bumpy ride! It was a local bus with most people making their way to work. It took us about an hour to reach Tangkou which is the closest village with transport links directly to the start of the paths of Huangshan Mountains. You will always find your way around by pointing to a map or just looking for where most people are heading! Here there is a bus station with coaches upon coaches lined up ready to take you to either the west or the eastern paths to the summit. It’s a little like a theme park, it doesn’t really seem reflect any other mountaineering experience we’ve had before, except for the alpine ski resort feel. Anyway you choose which way you want to go and then get the bus to that entrance point.

The bus costs around 15 yuan per person and most people tend to head to the eastern steps or they get the cable car! We had read in the Lonely Planet and on some other travel blogs about the best routes and views etc also so we had an idea of what to expect. Once you arrive at the entrance point to the mountain there are of course more entrance fees to get in. With it being off season we paid around about 100yuan to access the routes which start with steps, leading to more steps and so on. We started pretty early at 8.30am and passed the local marathon club who seem to team up together for big adventures, yodelling into the cliff tops…we sped past them early on so as not to get too caught up in their crazy ways. It is perhaps the one mountain that everyone in China wants to climb. The scenery is beautiful there is no doubt about it, but it’s annoying for us that they have built a path all the way from start to finish. Why can’t there be any nice trails to hike up, something like Snowdon or Mt Blanc would offer way better options for hiking without trying to make it all into one bit tourist trap. We’re just glad we went off season as witnessing the video footage on our way up showed thousands of people in the summer season making their way up and down the mountain. Some of the paths are also pretty narrow and close to the edge so it wouldn’t be pleasant at all to be there amongst the masses.

It took us around 3 hours to reach the first station which is where the cable car goes to, from here there are many paths that lead towards other higher points on the mountain, one place that had outstanding views but with a ridiculous name was Beginning to Believe Peak, on the sign on the way up was something like ‘seeing is believing, you’ll only believe it when you reach the heaven peak’…or something just as cheesy! Other peaks were climbed and at times we were the only ones there, very refreshing in the circumstances. We found our way to Bright Summit Peak where everyone crowds to when the sunsets and rises, there were already lots of people there waiting in anticipation. From here we walked to find our accommodation for the night. This was situated behind one of the hotels past the Bright Summit Peak.

We went for the cheap option on accommodation front, but it really was pretty poor and perhaps paying the extra 20 yuan for the night in one of the better budget hotels would have been a more pleasant experience (we paid 100yuan for a dorm). Dave and I were split up into single sex dorms and they were in a cold, damp basement. Further down the hallway were old, mouldy looking mattresses that didn’t fill us with any confidence! The good thing was we got there before anyone else so we managed to enjoy clean, hot showers before setting out to enjoy the sunset.

We found a spot away from the busy areas for the sunset along with a few others and took in the views. Putting all of the steps behind us and hotels on the top of the peaks, we managed to find a peaceful spot with a stunning landscape and sunset to fit. It was really peaceful.

The food isn’t good on the mountain too so be prepared to take snacks and fruit with you. We did have some vegetarian food which just about did the job and then we went back to our room to play cards. Later on we were both bombarded by the other guests staying in the rooms. We then had to separate for our first night in two months!! Lost we were!! ha ha!

It didn’t matter too much having damp rooms as we didn’t stay in them for very long as we were up at 5.30am the next morning for the sunrise. This doesn’t occur until around 6.30-7am but we got a good spot and again it was nice and quiet. The photos speak for themselves. Straight after we made our way down on the western steps. This route is tough and a lot steeper than the eastern steps, less people choose this route and as we left so early it was a long time before we passed anyone. This was great as the views once again across the mountains were breathtaking. One problem with all the steps is that it’s not very good for your knees and calves, too much concrete! We were passed on walking sticks from some kind walkers the previous day so we said we would find some people to pass ours onto too on our way down.

It took longer than we anticipated to reach the bottom, we both found people to pass our walking sticks onto and we had a little cheer at the bottom before waiting for the bus to take us back to the bus station.

Two buses later and we were back in Tunxi ready for some good food and rest before our hardsleepers booked for that evening.

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f2.0 & Olympus PEN, 17mm f2.8 & 100mm f2.8, processed in Lightroom 3)

We have quite a lot to fit in on this post so here we go…

We had a night train booked to go to Xian, leaving Beijing West on a hardsleeper. The train was full and we were 2 of 6 in our cabin in a carriage that houses around 10 or so cabins! There are also around 20 carriages so the trains are pretty massive. The price for our bottom bunk was 275 RMB each, not bad as it’s our accommodation and travel in one. Once we were ready to get into bed the lights went out and everyone went to sleep until our arrival the following morning at 8am.

When we got to Xian station our hostel Shiyuan were waiting with a sign saying Helen Roecoe…we knew it was for us! There were a few other backpackers on the taxi bus to the hostels, most were dropped off at Yin Tang Inn a few streets away from us. Shiyuan is a YHA hostel located near to the South Gate of the city wall. It’s a pretty good location and they were really helpful. We were impressed at being able to check into our room at 8.30 in the morning. For our time in Xian we booked a mixed dorm room so we could save some money and meet a few other backpackers. On the first night though we had the place to ourselves. They have a decent cafe at the hostel and breakfast is fairly substantial and at a good price. You also get free coffee and beer every day you’re there!! Not bad!

We had a few things to sort out when we got there – our ticket back to Beijing was one, breakfast another and looking into the tour to the Terracotta Warriors. Getting the train tickets was easy once we found the little ticket office a few streets away!! It’s well located to the hostel but it is tricky to find – appearing as a kiosk to an ICBC branch. You can’t buy return journeys over here, so each time you arrive in a place you need to pick up your return or the connection to your next destination. We got back to our hostel having purchased two hardsleeper tickets for two days time. After some breakfast at the cafe we went to the reception desk to book ourselves onto their tour the next day. We know we could have done this ourselves and got the bus to the site for a lot less, but we wanted to book a tour so that we could meet a few other backpackers/travellers in Xian. Having sorted this out we then walked up to the South Gate entrance to the City Wall, paid the entrance fee of 40 yuan each and then found a bike rental service quite easily once we were on top.

Cycling on the XIan city wall was really good fun and we stopped plenty of times for sights that we wanted to photograph. Construction of the city, demolition areas, temple rooftops, large apartment blocks on the other side of the wall, lanterns and a strange collection of animal shaped floats left on the top after some type of carnival…we couldn’t quite figure out how long they’d been left there and whether they’re still in use!! All of this mean’t that we were stopping every 50 meters or so at some points! We even managed to set up the self-timer on the Olympus to get a shot of us cycling toward the camera! Oh fun!

We cycled the wall for around 2.5 hours and paid an extra 10 yuan for the privilege. We would recommend doing this if you get to Xian! Later on we went for some street food in the city’s manic Muslim quarter. This is quite an experience with so much food being cooked right on the street under burning flames, hot pots and local delicacies are thrown into the limelight and under your nose. Mixed in with the food are a few streets of tourism gift stalls, dried fruit and restaurants. Again probably a must if you get to go. We had some of the Cool noodles, which is supposed to be a famous local snack but it is what it is…cold noodles!! Helen had a vegetable hot pot dish and Dave opted for the Chinese sandwich with beef. We got back to the hostel at a good time and Dave rang home.

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f2.0 & Olympus PEN, 17mm f2.8 & 100mm f2.8, processed in Lightroom 3)

26th – Terracotta warriors

We left at 9am for the trip to the Terracotta Warriors with a few people from our hostel and went onto Yin Tang Inn to pick up some more people on the tour. We met a great group who’d all met at the hostel the night before, most of whom were traveling around China and had loads of tales to tell of their experiences. After some brief bonding we were interrupted by our tour guide Jha Jha (“Lady Jha Jha” apparently) who proceeded to inform us about the warriors and the local area that we were traveling through. She is quite a character and well known amongst travellers as she loves the line, “My name is Jha Jha, I’m 27 and single!” which made us all chuckle. Our fellow sight-seer Sam was her target on this trip and we all teased him about this as the day progressed.

Make sure you take some photo ID with you when you visit the warriors as security is tight and you have to go through airport style security twice before you get anywhere near. Whilst walking to the entrance from the bus drop-off point you have to walk through an 80′s style English pedestrianized shopping mall! It’s pretty kitsch!

The warriors are located in bunkers that are covered by huge structures. It did feel a little Indiana Jones with a smattering of easy tourism thrown in. Bunker 3 is the biggest and best site so with that in mind we were taken to 2,1,3 bunkers, saving the best until last.

It’s an impressive site with excavations continuing to be undertaken which all happens after 6pm when the sites close. The visit is a worthwhile one however we were expecting more!? We felt that you would be able to get closer to the masses of warriors, that it would be more of an under ground cave system and that in-fact there would be more warriors. We did learn that there are more sites around the area however they have not been officially located yet. The background story is an impressive one involving Mercury ingestion by a power hungry/eternal life seeking emperor and ultimate death for the workers under his control.

As we are in China and we are tourists we were taken to a gift shop selling various things such as jade jewellery, warriors and the man who discovered the site itself was sat behind a desk signing books for those seeking that extra special touch! We couldn’t quite believe that he was there…it was a little surreal but very typical of the levels tourism have reached here.

Following on from the trip to the warriors site we had a brief journey to the tomb where the crazed emperor is buried, it sounds like an amazing site, but it is yet to be reached due to the dangers of a mercury moat and oxygen damaging the hidden artefacts with his body. So you can see a hill in the distance and after about 5 minutes we went back to the bus to leave! On our way back we stopped at a hotel for a big lunch all at a bargain of 25 yuan. As Helen and Ian don’t eat meat they had to sit on a separate table to the rest of the group…romantic meal for two! The restaurant was huge and only had about 3 tables full so this looked pretty funny! David and the meat eaters gouged on pork and other unknown meat-like objects whilst Helen and Ian were very civilised in their Pak Choi and sticky potatoe spread.

When we got back to Xian we decided to get a taxi over to their hostel a little later on as there would be a dumpling making party! A couple games of pool some beer and a few snacks later and we were all making speed dumplings! We’d say a little more atmospheric than the one at the CCC earlier in the month…Jackson 5 on the soundsystem and we were on our way to dumpling heaven!! They weren’t much better though than the last one’s we made and after a while when they’re cooked they do tend to be very samey! Still it’s all in the fun of making them!!

A couple we’d met the day before came to join us for beers at the bar after the dumpling making session and we chatted about plans for China travel, we are doing a very similar route but at a different time so it was good to get some ideas. We then went to the bar street…hmmm not really Liverpool’s Matthew St but there were a few bars offering cheap beer so we went in for an hour or so before saying goodbye to our warrior buddies and went back to our dorm.

27th – Next day Helen was ill, we didn’t do much as she had some kind of tummy bug so it was a light and slightly teary stroll to the Giant Wild Goose Pagoda, which was a lot further than we had anticipated, we followed this up with a taxi back to the hostel where we managed to get a room for the day. We decided later on that it wasn’t a good idea for us to leave that night for the train. The hostel were very accommodating and let us have a dorm room for 4 just for the two of us. Helen slept and Dave went out for food. We didn’t know this at the time but we could have taken our train tickets back up to 2 hours before leaving Xian in exchange for a refund with only a fifth of the price lost. We didn’t know this so we did loose out on some money and had to buy tickets for the next night. 28th – Helen was feeling better the following day although we laid low in Xian and ventured to a local park in between hanging out at the hostel for most of the day. We could only get a soft sleeper back to Beijing, which was okay but not that much better than a hardsleeper! Still it mean’t we had a quitter cabin. The train left Xian at 8.34pm and arrived in Beijing at around 7am. It took us around half an hour to catch the metro back to Xinjeikou on line 1 as the rush hour was pretty crazy! We literally only just managed to squeeze on with our bags after watching several locals climbing their way off the train. Madness.

On the 29th we spent the main part of the day at the apartment resting, writing, washing clothes, watching Peep Show and only ventured out once to the supermarket. Sometimes you just need to have a lazy day (and have a washing day)! We followed this up the next day with a spot of Christmas Shopping at the Yashow clothing market on the other side of town, it was fun bartering and we managed to buy most of our prezzies too. Good times! The bookworm also delighted us by providing some nice solid western food. We also went out for food with our hosts the chen family, but for some stupid reason we forgot to take our cameras out with us!! What were we thinking! The food was really good aswell…ah well we think you are enjoying the food pics so we will have plenty more to show and we had a very enjoyable evening – big thanks to them for helping us out with our accommodation whilst we have been staying in Beijing.

Posting a blog post everyday which involves writing a mini diary and editing through copious amounts of photos takes up lots of time. Therefore we have decided that as we are a few weeks behind we are going to try and condense the posts into multiple days. Also here in China we have access to most websites that we need for general use, however there is no Twitter or Facebook, so we will be very quiet on these social networks until we leave China in early 2011.

So here we go…on our second day in Beijing we were on a mission to find out about trips and local sights aside from the more obvious ones. We obtained a street map from Templeside that gave us pretty good bearings on where we were located plus Frank had informed us of the nearest tube stops, bus stops and the like. What we didn’t really think about was the distance it takes to get from one block to another on foot. We had intended to go to the China Cultural Centre (CCC) to find out about trips and cooking classes on offer but several tube stops later, one taxi journey and a walk 20 minutes in the wrong direction we redirected to 798. We had intended to visit the 798 Art district early on in our visit here anyway so it wasn’t too much of a change of plan.

Although we feel that the many art critics and cynics out there would refer to 798 as art tourism, it still offers an eclectic mix of contemporary art and culture that isn’t so apparent anywhere else in the city. 798 is an old factory complex that has been renovated into around 70 or so art spaces, galleries, studios, cafes, quirky gift shops and restaurants. We thought it was pretty cool, although perhaps not all of the art on show is to our taste and perhaps some is trend for trends sake it does take you away from more traditional aspects of Chinese art and culture and perhaps brings it more inline with the graffiti lined walls of Berlin city. We do love Berlin though so that one is always going to be tough to beat!! But in our minds it did the trick and we quickly forgot about the directionless walk around the city. We picked up a mandarin phrase book which we think will come in very handy indeed whilst we are in China and we photographed buildings, spaces and art on show. (Copyright isn’t really an issue here as you can pretty much photograph any piece of art on show). The photography gallery showcased some interesting compilation work and we liked the Ullens Centre for Contemporary Art, although it seemed much of the space was closed off for an event. We did manage to find our way back to our new home that evening and cooked ourselves our first meal in the Hutong.

The next day we decided to stay a little more local and our first port of call was to visit the Peking International Youth Hostel. Helen was determined to pick up some information from a hostel and we also wanted to print out some information and directions to show taxi drivers. As a general rule they wont stop to listen to where you want to go but will look at the map or if you have where you want to go in Chinese written down bingo you’re in luck! Sometimes even if you speak Chinese but look western they wont listen!! So with that in mind we had some printing to do and our reason for going to the hostel was that we feel by being in the apartment, yes it’s great because we are in with a local community but you don’t really get to meet other travelers or get the best kind of advice. So if you can find out where the nearest YHA is often they will have the info and the passing travelers to meet!! We went away with our print outs, some info on tours and enjoyed an amazing ginger honey tea!!

Within walking distance of the YHA is Beihai Park. It costs around £2.5 to get in and there are a few temples and pagodas in the park. It was a really sunny day and the sky was pretty blue so the white pagoda on the top of the hill really did shine. It was a really enjoyable walk up through the temples and to the top where you have views across the Forbidden City, Beihai lake and beyond. We spent the best part of the day here and also came across the Chrysanthemum exhibition. Something of an anticlimax but it did offer some great photographic opportunities and the low afternoon light was perfect for this.

On our third morning at the penthouse apartment (he he) we ventured to the very local farmers market to pick up some fruit and veg and to generally take in the atmosphere that contains the place. The market sells not only fruit and veg supplies but household cleaning products, gas cookers, bikes, meat, fish, tea and clothes, alongside which was street vendors selling food to eat there and then or noodles to cook, meat off the bone and so on. It’s a very local place and it was loads of fun buying our grocery shopping. We were amazed at how cheap the fresh fruit and veg is to buy. for less than 20 pence we bought a bulb of garlic, one green pepper and two chili peppers…they have money that looks more like monopoly money for values under 1 yuan. We were moaned at for only buying 1 or 2 of any item. Still we went away filling our fridge with good quality fresh food. We explored the local hutong further before heading back for more catch up time on editing.

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f2.0 & Olympus PEN, 17mm f2.8 & 100mm f2.8, processed in Lightroom 3)