Slept in until 8.20 and then wandered up to The Schoolhouse, where Michelle works. She was actually very busy but had arranged for the kitchen to cook us breakfast which we had back at her dorm. She then arranged for her room-mate Daniel to give me a lift to where I could catch a van to go down-town and get the bus back to Beijing. Daniel even paid for the van trip which was really nice of him even though he shouldn't have. A bit sad saying good-bye to my good friend Michelle again but here's hoping she'll make it to Australia one day.
I had trouble picking the right 915 bus as I couldn't see the Chinese characters that Michelle had written on any of the buses so I rang Michelle and she spoke to one of the locals who was waiting with me and then he told me which bus to catch. Got back to the hostel at 2pm so only had time to visit the Bell and Drum towers, caught a demo of the drums at 3pm luckily. Then tried to get to Prince Gong's mansion but got there too late to enter so just had a wander around the back lakes district which was interesting as the lake was frozen over and locals were skating and walking across etc. I then came across a section where they had made a big hole in the ice and these guys stripped to their bathers and swam in the icy waters! Then had a wander around the local shops and had an Indian meal for change after 18 days of Chinese food which was actually very good real Indian food.
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