Day 215 - Eating and shopping our way through our last day in Beijing.

Being our last full day in Beijing and already having accomplished everything we had set out to adlib (plus feeling the residual pain and exhaustion after our mammoth effort to the Great Wall and back yesterday) we took today very easily. We slept in like any good holidayer does, until we could no longer stand the suffocating heat in our room or the incessant blaring of the same Kenny G cd we have been hearing for the past week!!

Liv attacked the computer in an attempt to uplift our photos onto the blog for the last week, but it was a good reminder to us that internet cafes often throw paddies and refuse to do what you want them to!

We eventually went out and decided to find lunch. The Lonely Planet recommended Wanfang Snack Street, which sounded great to us as we had been struggling to find the Chinese street snacks that we had become accustomed to everywhere else in China. Unfortunately what we found was not what we wanted - yes there were snacks but they were 5 times the price we pay in Jinan and elsewhere in China, and overall disappointing. We mentioned more than once that living in China has made us more picky - which was even more evident when we saw other tourists looking satisfied with their snacks. So, we set off for a cheap Chinese restaurant, and were immediately given a nice looking English menu - they were a bit shocked when we asked for a Chinese menu straight away where we could compare the difference in prices!!! One dish was 8 yuan on the Chinese menu and 24 yuan on the English!! After ordering from the Chinese menu (even trying a new vege dish!), we ate our food and went in search of the Silk Street - which is actually just one huge shopping mall that sells everything including silk!

We wandered around for a good couple of hours, but as we are setting off on a 6 week backpacking trip we don't really want the extra weight (in fact we had just sent 2kgs worth of stuff back to our home in Jinan) and most of the stuff we can get in Jinan we didn't do much shopping - our only purchase for the day was one pretty pink Burberry watch for Liv (genuine fake of course)!

We rested at home for a while before heading out in search of another cheap meal - and the bargain we got wasn't what we had planned! Adam decided that he wanted a meat dish so instead of the usual 2 vege dishes we get to share, I ordered fried noodles and Adam took a random shot at the menu! Unfortunately for him his meal was cabbage! So Liv found a dish with the word 'beef' in it and asked the waitress if it was yummy (which of course she said it was)! About 2 minutes later Adam's dish come out and he started attacking it with his chopsticks. About 10 minutes later another meat dish was placed before us - uh, hang on a minute! We knew we had only ordered 3 dishes in total! In the end they realised that the first meat meal they brought to Adam was not meant for us, but Adam had already eaten half of it!!! So they rushed that back to the kitchen (we suspect straight back into the wok) and Adam got to sample his third dish of the night - though at this stage he was pretty full and already struggling to get through his beer!!

We went to bed with our fingers and toes crossed that our Vietnam visas would be ready in the morning. We packed at night, because it will be a rush to get back from the visa office to the train station across town for our noon train!

Adlibing the last sights of Beijing.