From the car on the way there we caught occasional glimpses of the Wall, run down in part, which was exciting...but not as exciting as seeing the snow lying on the ground! Yes, it was really that cold - though in truth it was only patches here and there.The Badaling section of the Wall is the most touristy as it is close to Beijing - but it was winter so the tourist numbers were very low. And boy was it cold! The shock to our system's upon getting out of our warm minvan was great - Alex was in tears as was Sebastien and we'd only climbed up the steps to be on the top of the Wall, we still had an hour and a half of walking around to do. So Mummy bravely decided that she could see the rest of the Wall on another visit and took Sebastien down the stairs to the tea house tourist shop to entertain the staff while Brett enticed Alex to enjoy a sedate stroll along the Wall with Kat, Goran and Beano.
It did help that Kat and Alex were best friends 
- and derided Goran as a nincompoop (thanks Aunty Chelle) whilst he took delight in calling Alex a coconut, later a melonhead - friends all round! 
The end result was a happy Alex who was excited to have done the walk at the end of the hour and a half. 
And we were all happy to get back into the minivan for the trip back to Beijing!This photo looks down to where they started - and where Sebastien and Mummy were entertaining the tourists and staff of the (expensive) teashop.
On the way back to Beijing, we passed relatively close to the Bird's nest and Water cube - but couldn't stop for photos. Maybe on our next visit. Goran had his work cut out for us keeping our driver awake - we were driving at prime "siesta" time and several times we were aware of our driver closing his eyes long enough to jolt back into the lane on opening them. Not a pleasant experience and one we hope not to repeat! Our guide, true to form, offered to take us to a cloinonee factory. We were hesitant after the previous day's efforts, but convinced of our ability to resist a hard sell thought we'd like to see the process anyway. It was very interesting to see the intricacies of making various items, especially jugs and vases and it was nice to see a real workshop rather than the pseudo one we saw the previous day. Following that we went to lunch and then home. We wanted to recuperate from the cold and prepare ourselves for the piece de resistence - a dinner of Beijing Duck!After all, when in Rome, er Beijing....right?!
We went to one of the restaurants that are famous for this dish. Although it may have been a tourist restaurant, it plainly wasn't for foreign laowai as the menu was strictly chinese. Here we are trying to work out 1) whether one duck would be enough for the table, and 2) how to order a duck ie whether we had to order the pancakes etc seperately or if they came with the duck.
We didn't do too badly as our duck came to our table and was carved in front of us. Here is the chef slicing the meat in preparation for the pancakes.
Being such novices (and so obviously laowai) the waitress not only made our first pancakse for us (usually she makes one per person to show you how then leaves you to it) but made almost all of them! This photo is from Wikipedia and shows the pancake makings. 
Although Mummy was certain that the meal utilised the entire duck (skin, meat and bones) her chinese was insufficient to ask where the broth was. Ah well, the crispy skin and meat pancakes were delicious enough. Plus, the lack of broth meant we had room for...Haagan Daz icecream for dessert!!! Alex was ecstatic - life couldn't be better. Haagan Daz is a cute little restaurant in Beijing - nice for a date - and not the fast, kiosk style we have seen in Australia. We sat down and ordered a couple of extravagent desserts to share between us - although Alex made short work of a couple of scoops of chocolate icecream! Then it was a short walk back to the hotel and farewell as our friends were to leave very early the next morning and we were to leave not too long after that. We had a great time and hope that they did too.
The final note to our Beijing stay was that on the way to the airport, Alex threw up in the taxi several times. Not great for anyone. We managed to clean up most of it (funnily enough she hadn't really wanted to eat breakfast so it was less, um chunky than it otherwise might have been) and gave the taxi driver some extra money to cover cleaning the cab - which begs the questions of how much you give a chinese taxi driver for such a thing? I mean, in Australia it is spelt out on stickers in the taxi that AUD50 is the going rate - I guess as a result of too many "big nights" but I have seen and read nothing about China. We then managed to strip her off and redress her in something else (although clean clothing options were limited as we were on our way home. Here we are waiting to board the plane home. Ahh, there's nothing more exciting that the endless vehicles and action of an airport. More than enough action for both children.
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