The Red Lantern

We stayed at the Red Lantern Hostel which is situated north-west of the main town area.

This is the first Hostel we have stayed in for 30 years and I was a little apprehensive. It was down a little alley and was a traditional courtyard house. We stumbled into a communal living area at around 10pm to find a group of young Austrians drinking beer and playing cards...typical hostel scene and my apprehension increased, whereas, of course, Mandy's enthusiasm skyrocketed and before we were shown a room she had engaged the group, knew names and itineraries and had become firm friends, even thought they spoke little English.

Mandy is going to love hostel life!!!

The room, for a hostel was pretty good, the bathroom, well check out the photo, but the water was hot and pressured! The sign behind the toilet, " Please put all used toilet paper in the bin provided", set me back a second, but it is amazing how quickly you get used to doing things differently!. This is not a hostel thing, it is China-wide. We haven't entered a 5 star establishment yet, so I don't know how they get around the sewerage issues.

Anyways the hostel thing worked out brilliantly. We met some great people...its amazing how many older people use the network, and the staff ( all young and keen to improve their already good english) were fantastic.

Just back on the toilet topic. Beijing has many public toilets which we are sure had been upgraded for the Olympics, the only problem being for females is that most of them don't have doors so its a bit of a parade!!!