15th Aug 2026
We had a leisurely drive down to Heathrow, still with only enough time to get to the plane and not much dilly dallying around in the airport. The kids were all great and we didn’t even lose one this time! There were no delays and we actually got to the gate in time to board, which is unusual for us.
We all managed a bit of sleep on the 10h plane journey to Beijing, it went really quickly. Bo ate dinner, curled up on his side like a cat with his kindle and slept solidly for 8hours. Rai was close behind.
Everyone else grabbed a bit of kip here and there. I lay on the floor in front of the kids seats, like a tramp, but was nice to be fully laid out. Like a povvo first class experience.
It was a bit fraught in Beijing, as we didn’t have a long before our connecting flight to Shanghai. And with a gaggle of children, shuttle trains and multiple security checks, we got there just as they were about to board.
They had randomly allocated Crickett a seat by herself at the very back of the plane (good luck fellow passengers!) and the rest of us 30 rows in front. Maybe they’d met her before? Anyway, I swapped with her and revelled in 2.5h to myself reading undisturbed (Flesh, by David Szalay).
They do everything on apps here in China now, very different to my time here in 2009. So Alipay for payments and didi for taxis is pretty much all you need, other than an eSIM. Spent a bit of time setting up all the admin/apps/ payment in the airport before we booked a didi ride to our hotel in the city.
Reminiscent of 2009, actually leaving the airport was a bit of a challenge. Ordering the didi was fine, but they arrived on one level while we were on another and communication to explain or remedy that was… limited/challenging and in one case, fruitless.. But we got there in the end with gridlock nose to nose traffic for an hour. The kids were very patient…
We are staying in a mediocre hotel in a really central location, within walking distance of The Bund, walking street, People’s square and Yu gardens. But it’s hot as hell, even at night, with a real feel of 45* in the day. So we’ll probably just die tomorrow.
For our first night, I tempted everyone to walk to the bund and grab a drink/ snack, even though we arrived at the hotel at about 9pm. It was an adventure, as I constantly F up reading Google maps, and this time managed to do it going out and coming home! But it was nice to jump straight in to the heart of the city and enjoy the lights and the chaos.
Crickett is proving very popular; people are constantly asking for a photo with her/ of her, and she is so far very obliging. Let’s see how long that lasts…
We are here for a couple of days before flying to Hanoi, Vietnam. We’ve got a few things on the tick list to do here, but largely will just pootle about and eat food and ice cream, like usual. Hopefully the weather doesn’t burn us all to a crisp, I think it’s 38* tomorrow.
danilovescats 