Beijing Rain

Oh how it rained - and oh how grateful we were!

We landed in China after an all-night flight and were grieved to discover that the clouds which had obscured our view of the countryside appeared to go all the way down to ground-level - Peking's famous air pollution.

It was bad out by the airport, but it was terrible in the city centre where skyscrapers towered into the misty heights, wide avenues disappeared into an obscuring cloud, and even the famous Forbidden City was hidden in the mist, to the extent that the freshly painted woodwork above our heads looked dull and distant.

We were apprehensive about the Great Wall, one of the main reasons for coming to China, but as if in answer to our prayers, there was heavy rain in the morning which cleared the air so that the Great Wall looked just as it does in all the picture books. I was intrigued, though, to have the unusual experience of seeing the rain from beneath!