Given the nature of overlanding and how insanely big China is, we have decided to break our blog posts down thematically rather than chronologically for ease of writing (and reading!) Today's post is about some of the BIG tourist attractions that we managed to see on this trip to China (think the kinds of things that make the top ten in Lonely Planet).

In the initial planning stages of our round the world adventure Joe turned to me one evening and said 'do you think we should try and go to a 'stan' country? I was thinking Uzbekistan.' After some research and a whole load of googling, we found a trip run by a company called Dragoman who offer journeys across Central Asia on a purpose built truck with options to wild camp as well as stay in many of the historical cities of the Silk Road. The mix of camping (which we haven't done at all so far), yurt home stays and opportunities for hiking and horse riding as well as museum stops and tours seemed like a great way to explore some less well visited countries which can be difficult to get to on your own, especially with some legally requiring a native language speaking guide. Our epic journey will take us across northern China, starting in Beijing, before we head to Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Azerbaijan and Georgia (we decided one 'stan' just wasn't enough!).

After waiting 8 months to get started on this final 3 month leg, we met the Dragoman crew, our fellow passengers and our truck Layla in China's capital. The trip kicked off with a few days exploring Beijing's rich history (mainly by the metro!) with stops at the Forbidden City and the Temple of Heaven to name but a few, before we headed out on China's super slick highways to start our 44 day long drive across the vast country.

Obviously we didn't just eat in Hong Kong, there's plenty to see and do and we managed quite a packed itinerary in our five day stay. Our first adventure out into the crowded and claustrophobic streets of Hong Kong was to take a ride on what was once the world’s longest escalator system which provides a means for many Hong Kong commuters to travel from the residential area high in the mountain down to the business district and then back again – in fact the escalators switch direction at 10:30am each day. Despite being built to relieve traffic on the roads, the escalators have become something of a tourist attraction in their own right, with the streets either side of them lined with all sorts of restaurants and cafes which you can pop into on your way by, and provided some interesting if not a little unorthodox entertainment for the morning. On reaching the top, we meandered down the hill and took a tour of some of Hong Kong’s famous street art complete with the next generation of instagram celebrity wannabes posing in front of them.

        5. Pizza by the Slice at Paisano's Pizzeria. Whilst more commonly associated with the Big Apple, this pizza chain serves up huge individual slices of hot delicious pizza to a very busy restaurant full of waiting customers. It was bit mad, but the food was good and who doesn't love pizza?!

We are spending 44 days in China with its mighty firewall, meaning we’re basically living in an internet black spot and the blog will suffer. Once we leave we’re heading deeper into Central Asia which has some of the worst internet speeds in the world, so again, the blog will probably suffer! We will be attempting to upload when we can but there is a high possibility that there will be no uploads at all until we reach the UK again – apologies!

Joe’s mum’s birthday meant we spent a few more days relaxing at a beautiful coastal resort

• Marble Mountain – this has to be one of the best places we went to, even if it was a little busy. A series of shrines, statues, caves and grottos are perched high up on one the karst formations, which can be reached through a glass lift or by climbing a number of steps.
  
• Hoi An - a beautiful old port town that was once the shipping and trading capital of Vietnam. Old traditional buildings were influenced by the foreign traders who passed through and the whole area was preserved because river silted up, cutting off larger trading boats
• My Son – UNESCO World heritage ruins of Champa Hindu temples 4th -14th century AD Kings of Champa

We thought we’d try something a little different for our posts on Vietnam. Given the massive detour and stress with the visas, we’d fallen a little behind on the blogging front (which I think is understandable!) and so we’ve decided to condense our Vietnam trip into one itinerary post, complete with pictures from a guest photographer – Joe’s dad Guy! We were incredibly lucky that Joe’s parents decided to sync up their annual holiday with our trip this year so we were treated to a two week stint in rather different style to our normal strict budget backpacking...

The first few days of arriving in Vietnam were spent recovering from our flights, getting over our jet lag and exploring the hot and humid city on foot. Highlights included:

• The French Quarter – an area of the city with government offices housed in French colonial buildings with a backdrop of shining skyscrapers and designer stores, as well as large statue of Ho Chi Minh himself.
• Zoo and botanical garden complex- which animal lovers may wish to avoid (the cages and conditions are questionable, though they do have a nice collection of bonsai trees).
• Vietnam History Museum – the exhibits here have detailed information in English as well as Vietnamese, and gives some insight into Vietnam’s ancient past.
  
• Bitexco Tower/Eon Heli Bar – this is highest restaurant/bar in Saigon which is accessed through a shopping mall. It does offer views over the city but is a little expensive for what it is.
• A day trip to the Mekong delta.
• War Remnants Museum – this place is known colloquially as the ‘American War Crimes Museum’ and details some very graphic aspects of the Vietnam War. The exhibits include upsetting photography and testimonies, including the continued genetic devastation caused by exposure to the highly toxic Agent Orange, but on the whole the information is enlightening.
  

I would advise that nobody should try to fly all the way across the world and back in a week unless they REALLY REALLY have to. Getting of the plane at Heathrow and immediately going into central London on a packed commuter tube train with jet lag killed us. But, long story short, we got our Chinese visas!

It was so nice to go home, see the family, hug the dogs and spend some time drinking tap water and relaxing. It turned out to be a great recharge of the travelling batteries and the perfect opportunity to offload some useless space wasting items we hadn’t even used, as well as the chance the stock up on some essentials like paracetamol and toothpaste – we just wish we could have done it under less stressed, last minute circumstances! You live and learn…

Despite numerous phone calls, emails and reassurances to the contrary, it was in the Cambodian capital’s Chinese Embassy that we were finally told that there was no way to secure a visa for longer than 30 days on the road. We’d spent ages getting photocopies, print outs, passport pictures and forms only to be immediately turned away from the counter and we felt both deflated and panicked as we realised the only option was fly back to the UK.

This presented 3 main challenges: 1) timing (when could we reasonably make the trip home? We were going to have to cut out a part of our itinerary and which was really sad after all the planning and preparation we’d done), 2) the cost (the price of return flights half way across the world was eye watering, not to mention all the flights and prepaid accommodation that would be lost), and 3) actually getting a visa (the official way to get a visa from the embassy is through an agency that required appointments which were fully booked up months in advance). There was also an added complication that Joe’s parents had a fully booked holiday for us all through Vietnam in just over a week so we HAD to be in Ho Chi Minh city for the start of that. All this meant we really only had two options: fly home now and miss out the last week of Cambodia or fly after Vietnam and miss out Hong Kong.

Many hours of googling flights, phone calls home to parents and agencies in London (not easy given the time difference!) and lots of considering which bits of the trip we were willing to sacrifice later, we booked absolutely last minute flights home from Phnom Penh via Kuala Lumpur, returning to South East Asia after 8 days but this time to Ho Chi Minh. We found an expensive agency who could get our visas through an express service without an appointment in advance, giving us time to get everything sorted and still be back in SE Asia for the start of the family Vietnam trip. Phew!

I don’t know about you, but when I think about ‘travel blogs’, I mainly think about envy inspiring rose-tinted pictures, funny stories and general light-heartedness occasionally mixed with some warnings, advice and tips. We always said when we started this ‘diary’ that we wouldn’t shy away from telling the truth about our experiences because in many ways this platform can obscure reality, creating a disconnect between what is really going on and what you want the people who read your blog to see and more importantly feel. Sometimes, posts need to be serious and space needs to be dedicated to difficult subjects, which in this part of the world relates heavily to war and genocide. It goes without say that some of the details in this post may be difficult to read and we appreciate that not everyone will be comfortable with the disturbing details – if you think this may apply to you, you are more than welcome to stop reading here. However, we believe that part of travelling as responsible tourists is not just taking lots of photos for Facebook. Part of our responsibility is to learn about and understand local history and culture, and in Cambodia, this includes the country’s very violent and very recent past.