Well I visited the old Manchurian Imperial palace in Shengyang. The one they built before they went on to conquer Beijing. It is a world heritage site and was well set up. The entry fee was the highest i have had to pay yet. Inside they had some interesting army exhibitions from the period and all of the king and his queens chambers were decorated as they were supposed to have been in the early Qing dynasty (17th century).
I also found a few other treasures and will up load the images when I can find a computer with a working USB port.
Today I travelled by bus to Harbin. It took about 7.5 hours. We had for a while a bus half full of boxes and i had my backpack on the seat beside me. Halfway into the trip they dropped off the boxes. The road was almost like Australia. 4 lane divided motorway, and mostly rural. Until we got close to Harbin, the vegetation was dry and the country side straw yellow.
I am staying in a posh 3 star hotel which is heated like a sauna. I suppose this makes up for the external temperature and tomorrow I think I will use my thermals. Though it has warmed up and the -7 degrees min from a week ago is only -1 for the next few days. I also booked my train ticket on the overnight train to Beijing. I did the whole transaction in Chinese and I am very pleased with myself at the moment.
So it is off into the dark again so I can get some dinner. I think I will try the USA beef noodle California chain. It has at least three places around the square in front of the train station.
