Beijing- Day 1

We arrive in Beijing around 2am...how can the train be early!Luckily Charlie wakes up just as we are arriving otherwise who knows where we might have ended up! We decide to get a taxi as we are both pretty tired....but the taxi drivers have other ideas.The conversation went something like this....
Lama Temple please....?
50
No....use the meter
No meter...50...I'm tired
go to bed then and don't be a night driver FOOL....
This went on for a while.We got fed up so we started to walk.Yes we argued over 2 GBP but its the principle, that's almost a nights accommodation at the hostel we are attempting to get to. The walk to the hostel may have been painful and long but at least its better than getting ripped off by taxi drivers.

This is how the day progressed!

Beijing Zoo

Yes,ok I'll admit it was my idea to go to the zoo and because of the experiences i have had in the past at Colchester and London Zoo i was excited to see the animals.When we walk through the entrance we head straight to the giant panda enclosure...when in China and all that! The first is an indoor enclosure housing three pandas and its a reasonable home....not perfect but acceptable. The Olympic pandas are in an outside enclosure and we quickly notice a very distressed panda pacing up and down...up and down. The next panda is munching his way through some bamboo and looks pretty content. Maybe the first panda was a misinterpretation?

Next we head off to see the monkeys. They too appear to have reasonable enclosures but in a country like China and a city such as Beijing i'm expecting a bit more for these animals.So far alright though.I've always loved monkeys i think they are hilarious to watch and these are no exception.

However there was one enclosure with a monkey in who proceeded it seemed to try to pass a piece of paper through the holes in the enclosure to us...they are such clever animals...it felt uncomfortable though...the monkey seemed stressed and it was almost like a SOS letter!

We continued on to see the wolves....large beautiful animals pacing...pacing pacing unhappy and stressed out in a filthy enclosure with hardly a 1/4 of the room they needed for the environment to be even acceptable. My stomach started to sink i think my initial gut feeling may have been correct and i was starting to feel a little bit angry about this place.

I knew we were getting close to the tiger and lions enclosure. Anyone that knows me will tell you that tigers are my favourite animal i think they are absolutely breathtaking to see and i was really concerned about seeing this....i was hoping i was going to be wrong. As i walked in i was shocked...the size of these animals..id never realised when seeing them in other zoos mostly because in other zoos the enclosure are of a size that i never really get that close.This was different they were in cells...barred dirty cells where you could literally stand 6feet away from them. They looked edgy, and unhappy and i didn't blame them this is not right!This made me angry. What didn't help was the locals who seemed to find immense amusement in taunting them...growling and clapping hands and shouting at them as if they would pose for their pictures.These are not supposed to be there for our amusement and i really wished the animals in this enclosure would break out and rip the face off these stupid people. It was very very upsetting for both me and Charlie.

As i walked down to the last cage the two lions there took my breath away they were stunning animals and it only made it more heartbreaking to think of them in this place.I was furious!Trust me when i say the photo does them no justice.

Things continued to go downhill from there really....elephants in cells also barely able to move around. Hippo's on display behind glass in the restaurant where the people were given more room to eat than they were to roam around. And a rhino unable to even stand it was in such a state. I'm glad i went if only to have a rant on here and tell anyone if your ever in Beijing or you know of someone who is going to Beijing tell them to not visit this place...it is the epitome of animal cruelty....i hope that if people stop visiting they will rethink the standards of this place and give the animals the respect and life they deserve.

Anyway sorry but i had to get that off my chest.

Summer Palace 

We didn't realise the scale of this place...it is immense. We decided that after the long day we'd had already...and the fact that once you've seen one temple you have pretty much seen them all we would just get a feel for the place. The one thing that really stood out for me was the temples all situated round a massive lake....it was really stunning the photos say it all really!