Day 5 - Robbin vs Museums and the Bird's Nest

This guy is one crazy bugger, but a good lad. WIlSON!!

Day 5 - 28th June

My day began with a jam sponge treat. God bless you Beijing!

Linen rolls in a display cabinet... Only in China!

It was decided amongst the group that we'd head to The National Museum of China. After a brief breakfast, Will, Robbin, Amanda, Halil and I set off. The process to get in to the free museum was one fraught with controversy. After the customary security check that we encounter everywhere we go - I was waiting for one to appear when I headed to a public toilet, I was sadly disappointed not to be frisked on my way to the bathroom! Anyway, Robbin was carry a swiss army type knife which he uses for a range of purposes but given it was considered an offensive weapon, he had to part ways with it, despite his best efforts to retain it later on.if that wasn't bad enough, Will's (real name Wilson - WILSON we all call in our best Tom Hanks impressions) Go Pro stick was confiscated. He did however get this back following our departure, fuelling Robbin's Fire even further.

Our trip saw us spend close to two hours navigating the bottom floor of the five storey building. We saw many, many, many pots and porcelain. As Robbin out it in his Dutch accent, 'how many pots can there be?' 

Exiting the bottom floor with a mosaic of Chinese porcelain blurring my vision, and with the museum closing in less than an hour and a half later, we headed to an exhibition on the third floor (led by me). It was an African fertility and expression wooden sculpture exhibit! So we were surrounded by penis', boobs and a whole lot of scary face masks. The others as well as myself were highly amused like school kids.

Number 12 on the menu tonight . . . Just kidding, he's number 13. (For those not in a joking mood, he's just sleeping).

Will and Amanda enjoyed the duck. Robbin and I were envious.

When we left, we headed to our favourite destination for a debrief and then made a decision to head to the Bird's Nest aka the Beijing Olympic Stadium. Canadian Dan, Sean, a Belgium guy and German guy joined us. 

We split into two groups, both heading opposite directions on the circular line on the subway to see who get to the destination quickest. Just like the Amazing Race! We met on the platform so we agreed a dead heat (I still think we won - way to go Will, Dan and Sean).

It was an incredible park and I could sense the vibe with the hundreds of other visitors what it must had been like during 2008. Definitely a highlight of the trip so far!

Yes, that is a snake and a kizard in the rice wine and yes, I drank it.

After finding out the tube closed after 10:30 - thanks Amanda 😃,  we made our way back in a cab to the Long Bar to drink them dry, again. Again, this was followed by dumplings and we bid a farewell to Dan and Robbin. Cheers chaps, made the first leg of my trip an awesome one!

We agreed with Amanda, Sean and Halil that we would meet at 7am for the Great Wall  (Mutianyu) the next morning. With the state of all of us, I couldn't see it coming together.